Crewe Almshouses, Nantwich

The site has been identified by local historian James Hall as the location of the mansion of the Mainwaring family at the end of Beam Street, which was described by William Webb in 1622 or 1623 as "the fine house of the Mainwarings", one of the five principal houses of the town. The Mainwaring family had settled in Nantwich in the late 15th century, and by the late 16th century were among the wealthiest families of the town. The house was described in Roger Mainwaring's will of 1590 as "my chief mansion house at the townsende of Namptwiche w^th all the buildings and gardens thereunto app'teyninge". In 1644, on the death of Lady Margaret Norton, the building passed to the Dodd…

Crewe Almshouses is a terrace of seven two-storey houses totalling thirteen bays, in red brick under a slate roof. It has a central projecting section of three bays with a circular stone decoration, which is topped with a pediment. The main entrance door is in the centre of the three-bay section; it has a stone surround with a semi-circular fanlight and decorative keystone above, and is flanked with Tuscan columns supporting a pediment, narrow flanking windows and pilasters. Above the entrance door is an inscribed stone tablet framed with decorative stonework including a keystone motif above and two corbels below. The inscription reads: "These Almshouses were erected in the Year of our Lord…