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Old Market Street, BRISTOL, BS2 0ER

View along cobbled street towards the bend which leads to Old Market Street, and buildings of Midland Road in background.

Some interesting features of the old Trinity Hospital almshouses. The original almshouses were built by a city merchant, sheriff and mayor of Bristol, John Barstaple, in about 1402. The buildings were rebuilt many times, especially between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries, and are now private flats.

Opposite what is now Barstaple House is a related almshouse, Trinity Hospital North. The original almshouses date from around 1400, but these are clearly much newer, perhaps nineteenth century. It is almost inevitable the such charitable and historic ventures are not immune from the cans.

The plate of Redcross Lane has been obliterated by much layering of paint.

This OS cut mark can be found on the NW side of Old Market Street. It marks a point 18.422m above mean sea level.

The buildings are based on the original site of John Barstaple's houses. Barstaple was a merchant, sheriff, mayor and benefactor of old Bristol from about 1400. He was awarded a royal charter 'to grant land in the suburb of Bristol to the mayor and commonalty of Bristol to build a hospital for poor persons'. The present buildings are a mixture, being extensively rebuilt between 1858 and 1883. In 2010 the houses were sold off and became private residences; the funds were used to build new charity houses elsewhere.

The area is historically just outside the old town of Bristol and where markets were held, suitably outside the jurisdiction. Consequently, affairs could get a little out of hand on occasions. Now the place is very much part of Bristol's heartland but the faint air of revelry and misrule still lingers. Fortunes have come and gone, and perhaps will return again one day. Meanwhile, the present face is one of colourful transience.

The old Trinity Hospital almshouses back wall has some incongruous features.