Queen's Aid House

The High Street was the home of the wealthiest townspeople in the 1580s, and the houses dating from the rebuilding form the finest examples of post-fire architecture in the town.

[2] The modern High Street still contains many other good examples of Elizabethan timber-framed buildings, all of which date from after the fire; these include the grade-II*-listed number 46, which stands opposite the Queen's Aid House, and the grade-I-listed Crown Inn.

According to the contemporary account of Richard Wilbraham, 150 houses burned down, and the devastation was such that a national relief fund was organised to help pay for the town's rebuilding.

Based on the signature to the inscription, it has been suggested that Cleese built the house for himself; before the fire, however, he was recorded as a tenant in Pepper Street.

[10][11] In the original layout, there would have been a shop on the ground floor facing the street, with a hall behind giving access to a buttery and kitchen.

[13] When local historian James Hall wrote in the 1880s, the Queen's Aid House had been a grocer's shop for at least a century, and had then been occupied by William Sandford since at least 1874.

[20] The Queen's Aid House is a tall black-and-white building of three storeys plus attics under a tiled roof, with a timber frame infilled with plaster.

[1] On the second storey, between the two windows, is a carved wooden plaque, which commemorates the aid given by the queen in rebuilding the town:[1][3][8] God Grante Our R[o]yal QueenIn England Longe To RaignFor She Hath Put Her HelpingHand To Bild This Towne Again[8]A second carved inscription, in two panels under the second-storey jetty, reads: Thomas Cleese Made This WorkeThe Yeare of Our Lorde God.