Castlefacts³

Bewdley Town Gates

Has been described as a Certain Urban Defence

There are no visible remains

Name	Bewdley Town Gates
Alternative Names	Welch Gate; Dog Lane Gate; Tinkers Gate
Historic Country	Worcestershire
Modern Authority	Worcestershire
1974 Authority	Hereford and Worcester
Civil Parish	Bewdley

Medieval Bewdley had four gates. These were Welch Gate (HWCM 10692), Bridge Gate (HWCM 10693), Tinkers/Lax Gate (HWCM 10694) and Dog Lane Gate (HWCM 10695) (VCH 1924). The gates were large timber constructions with rooms above. Structural remains of the Dog Lane Gate were uncovered in 1959 (HWCM 10854). It has been suggested that the curved line of Dog Lane may mark the line of a town ditch (Slater 1991, 65-6). The late development of the town and the lack of documentary evidence for defences at Bewdley may indicate that the gates were intended to control traffic and exact tolls rather than form part of a defensive circuit (Jones and Bond 1987, 100).

Gatehouse Comments

Bewdley was an important transit port for iron goods from the Black Country, brought overland on pack animals and then shipped onto boats for transit down the Severn. It competed with Worcester for this trade and was, in the C18, succeeded by Stourport. The gates were undoubtable important in the control and taxation of this through trade which, in the early modern period, were to become the little remembered first leg of the Atlantic triangular slave trade.

- Philip Davis

Not scheduled

Not Listed

Historic England (PastScape) Defra or Monument number(s)

114267
114268
114280

County Historic Environment Record

www.heritagegateway.org.uk/Gateway/Results_Single.aspx?uid=MWR3329&resourceID=1035

OS Map Grid Reference	SO784753
Latitude	52.3754081726074
Longitude	-2.31751990318298
Eastings	378480
Northings	275300