This postcard from over 100 years ago was taken by Frederick Pearse and shows a substantial building on the right that, externally, has barely altered during the intervening years.

Until the mid-19th century, it was the Catherine Wheel inn.

Documents record an inn of that name in Tudor times, though then spelt with a ‘K’.

The present building dates from 1790 when the earlier inn was rebuilt.

Two successive innkeepers named William Parsons (father and son) owned it during the latter half of the 18th century and it was the second of these who rebuilt the older inn.

Three bricks inset into the wall at the rear are stamped with a pair of differing initials - W P, J M and J W, all with the date 1790.

The first is for William Parsons, the second for builder Josiah Muspratt and the third for slating contractor John Windover, all of whom, it may be assumed, were directly involved in the project.

It took its place as one of the premier local coaching inns of the town and was a stopping place for at least three major coaches to and from London and the West Country.

Like all coaching inns, there was a steep decline in prosperity once the railway arrived and it was not long before the inn was closed and up for sale.

After some years on the market, in 1863 the Catherine Wheel was sold for £900 to trustees acting for the Andover Institute, a body of local worthies who wanted to establish what we might today call a cultural centre.

There was a reading room where newspapers and periodicals were stocked, as well as a library, and a museum.

However, it did not really work in the way intended and the cold and remote atmosphere of a down-market gentleman’s club encouraged nobody, neither those whom it was intended to educate, nor those who could go home to a warm fire and read their own newspaper.

Matters were not improved when a resident display of stuffed birds became infested with maggots.

Finally, in 1897, the building was sold to Andover Borough Council, financed by Alfred Butterworth who was a firm believer in free libraries – a role the building fulfilled until a new library in Chantry Way was opened by Lord Eccles in 1971.

Incidentally, the clock inset into the front wall was the 1854 gift of General Shubrick to the Andover Turnpike Trust in gratitude for its maintenance of local roads, enabling him to better enjoy his hunting days in the district.

Originally on the front wall of the toll house at the junction of the Salisbury and Weyhill roads, it was moved to its present position after the demise of the trust in 1872.

Although recently renovated by Geoff Levy, the hands on the clock-face have lately come to rest permanently at 12.10. No doubt it needs winding.

There is a long-held supposition that the Catherine Wheel inn was once the site of Andover prison, a claim which dates back to at least 1884 when local historian Rev Clutterbuck raised the matter.

We do know that a prison was built in Andover in 1624 and that it was a substantial building but its whereabouts has been confused because of the existence of two rivers that passed across Bridge Street, one of which has been largely forgotten.

The Anton, of course, flows under the town bridge today but there used to be another smaller waterway that passed across the street further west and crossed by a small pedestrian bridge.

That river, known as the Westbrook, now flows under the road and comes out near Keens House where it continues on to Rooksbury.

The prison was built on the east bank of the Westbrook, not the east bank of the Anton.

In contrast to the inn which was a private concern, the governing Corporation owned the prison and its land.

In 1623, Robert Somerset surrendered to the Corporation a plot of ground near the Westbrook.

The prison was built the following year and in 1627, Richard Wigmore rented the prison from the Corporation.

The document explicitly states that the prison was at the east end of a stone bridge over the Westbrook.

Further, a 1699 mortgage on the Catherine Wheel includes a garden next to the ‘common gaol of Andover’, clearly showing that the ‘gaol’ was separate from the inn and that there was an expanse of ground between their respective sites.

Another reason for confusing the Catherine Wheel inn with the prison is that the landlord of the inn also acted as gaoler.

In 1750, this was William Parsons senior and the council minutes record that the garden between the inn and the prison, owned by the Corporation, was in future to be held gratis by the present and any future gaoler.

Perhaps it seems strange to us that an innkeeper should also be a gaoler but he was well-equipped to provide the food and sanitary services necessary.

There were no hardened criminals in the local jail.

Most would be people who had been fined for petty misdemeanours and then refused to pay or to contain rowdy elements overnight who had been causing a disturbance.

Certainly, anyone accused of murder would have been taken to the county jail at Winchester to await trial.

Nobody seems to know when the prison was demolished but it was likely during the late 18th century.

Pigot’s directory of 1830 lists Thomas Cowley as governor of the borough jail in Kings Head Street – the old name for London Street – which may be a mistake.

Certainly, by 1848, the jail was in Winchester Street but not then attached to the police station, which was in Union Street.

However, by 1860, both police station and jail were joined as one set of premises in Winchester Street.

That remained until 1959 when a new police station was built at the entrance to South Street.

The old police station site was where the South Street flyover now bisects Winchester Street.