Bear and Billet
The Bear and Billet is the finest 17th century timber framed town house in Chester. It is dated 1664 and was built for the Earls of Shrewsbury, who had half custody of the adjacent Bridgegate in the mid-17th century. The building probably replaced an earlier building, destroyed by Paliamentary bombardment during the Civil War.
The Bear and Billet is the last major oak framed building in Chester, showing just how long the city took to adopt new architectural styles after the end of the Civil War. The fine oak facade, with its vast mullioned windows is far more typical of the late Tudor than the Restoration period, although the console shaped brackets which support the jettied facade are an early attempt to introduce neo-classical motifs.
Although it was built as a fashionable residence, the building has been compared to merchants' houses in Amsterdam. The loft in the gable was certainly designed as a grain warehouse, with double doors and a bracket for a hoist. This is not surprising given the house's position next to the Bridgegate and the Dee corn mills.
The Shrewsbury family owned the building until 1867, but it became an inn in the 18th century. Originally called the Lower White Bear (because there was another White Bear further up Bridge Street),it was renamed the Bear and Billet. The distinctive inn sign depicting a bear shackled to a billet or stake was a well known local feature until the property was re-named Benson at the Billet a few years ago.
Just to the north of the Bear and Billet stood two former town house which were later joined together as an inn. Ye Old Edgar is actually much older than the Bear and Billet, dating from c1570, and one of the best examples of late Tudor building in Chester. The name commemorates the tradition that in AD 973, the Saxon King Edgar was rowed down the river Dee by eight tributory Celtic kings, in token of their submission to him. The inn name survives, although the building has been converted back to two dwellings.