A Chronological Outline of the History of Bristol and the Strangers Guide through its streets and neighbourhood ---- by John Evans, Printer. 1824
258 EIGHTEENTH CENTURY
A. D. 1716 This summer, an alms-house, the gift of Mr. Alderman George Stevens (mayor in 1706-7) was erected in Temple-street, for twelve poor persons. (It is intended, upon the rebuilding of Doctor White’s Alms-house, to place the figure of Neptune as guard over the waste-pipe in front of this building.)
Dec. 26, about three o’clock in the afternoon, a fire commenced in Wine-street, and continued for seven hours. It began at the house of Mr. Plomer, a mercer, near the High Cross, and burnt two more houses to the ground. The wind being WW. by N. with a brisk gale, and several other houses being on fire, the inhabitants also of High-street and St. Maryport-street were in great alarm.
- See "Memoirs of himself, by Mr. John Fox," or an extract in the Monthly Repository, vol. xvi. p. 193. Mr. Fox was in London this year, and became acquainted with Mr. Jeremiah Burroughs, a dissenting-preacher at Blackfriars, who was a musical amateur, and hereafter became Collector of the Customs in the port of Bristol, having married a niece of Mr. Knight, cashier to the South-Sea Company.
1717 A dome, &c. added to the tower of All Saints’ Church. This must have been at least five years in progress. Mr. Goldwin, in his "Poetical Description of Bristol," published in 1712, after lauding the Council-House, as one of "two noble structures" "on either side the publick Toizey," adds,
"The adverse frame unpolisht greatness shows,
And, true Church-work, in slow advances grows;
Not want of zeal, or chearful gifts of gold,
But jarring schemes the pious work withold:
When nimbler bands th’ imperfect Dome compleat,
‘Twill shine in beauty, and its rival greet."
The Fish-market removed from High-street to the Quay, north side of St. Stephen’s Church; the ground allotted for the purpose being considerably raised and railed in; and, to give room for it, the Conduit was taken down and rebuilt nearer the river. See 1771.The Quay-wall lengthened 280 feet, as far as the Gibb, up the river Avon, and the slip made for the Ferry to Redcliff Back; another at the graving-place, opposite Trine-Mill, and a third at the Gibb.
May 29, "guards were placed at several parts of London, who sufficiently corrected the insolence of those who dared to wear oak-boughs in memory of the Restoration."
June 20, died the Mayor of Bristol, John Day. He was buried in St. Werburgh’s Church; the funeral being attended by fifty - two coaches, and "two hundred and fifty-eight
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