The Exchange
is situated in the Market-place, on the west side of Northgate-street. It was commenced in 1695, and completed in 1698, at an expense of £1,000, towards which Roger Whitley, then Mayor, contributed largely. It is a good brick building, ornamented with stone-work, supported by stone pillars on the ground floor, through which is a thoroughfare from south to north. In a niche on the south front is a statue of Queen Anne in her coronation robes. On the right of this statue is a tablet, having the arms of the Earldom of Chester on a circular shield in the centre, and above these the coats of the Principality of Wales and Duchy of Cornwall, having each their respective coronets over them. The blazon of this tablet is believed to have been furnished by the last Randle Holmes, Deputy Norroy King at Arms, who died in 1707. On the left of the statue is another tablet, containing the Royal arms of England as borne by Queen Anne. The centre of the building is occupied by the Common Hall, wherein are held the city sessions and the elections for members of parliament for the borough. The north end of the Common Hall is fitted up as a court of justice, having a bench, bar, witness and jury boxes. On each side of the bench are ornaments, composed of lictors’ fasces and spears, used to support the sword and mace.
Adjoining and communicating with the Common Hall on the north is the Council-room, commonly called the Pentice, where the mayor and magistrates sit as a court of Petty Sessions. Over the mayor’s seat in this room is a splendid full length portrait of George the Third in his coronation robes,—the figure by Gainsborough, the drapery by Reynolds,—presented to the city by the late Marquis of Westminster, in 1808. On the south side of the Exchange-buildings is the City Assembly-room, where the meetings of the Town Council are held. The Town Hall, the Pentice Court, and the Assembly-room, are all decorated with fine portraits of benefactors to the city, and of eminent men who have been officially engaged in its highest legal appointments, or in the administration of its municipal affairs. Among these worthies may be seen the donors of local charities, and other celebrities; as Recorders Comberbach, Leycester, Levinge, Townsend, and Sir W. Williams; Sir Henry Bunbury, M.P. for Chester in eight successive parliaments during the reigns of Queen Anne and George the First; Sir John Grey Egerton, M.P. for the city from 1807 to 1818; Thomas Cholmondeley, Esq., Mayor in 1761; Robert, Earl Grosvenor, in his parliamentary robes, painted by Jackson; Richard, Earl Grosvenor, and Thomas Grosvenor, Esq., M.P., in their robes of the civic mayoralty, painted by West; W. Cross, Esq., first Mayor after the passing of the Municipal Reform Act; and W. Wardell, Esq., Mayor in 1841. At the north end of the Exchange is the Market, appropriated for the sale of butter; and a few yards apart is another building of equal breadth, but longer, for butchers’ meat, both of which are neatly fitted up and well adapted for their respective purposes. We recommend the tourist now to continue his walk up the street, for the purpose of visiting the Training College, which, we doubt not, our former description has made him curious to see. Supposing this to have been done, we now return on the east side, passing through the Northgate about 100 yards, where we come to a narrow avenue on the left, under an old archway, the remains of one of the gates of the monastery of St. Werburgh. A little further down, opposite the Market-hall, stands a noble arch called