From the horses mouth

February 6, 2006

RAMPANT HORSE STREET

Thousands of busy shoppers step on it every day . . . but I wonder how many have noticed it.

This is a memory of a time long when ago when it was horses that people came to buy in this part of Norwich.

Celebration day: Rampant Horse Street decked out with banners and bunting on King George V’s silver jubilee day on Monday, May 6, 1935.

If you look down as you walk into Debenhams, off Rampant Horse Street, you will see, picked out on the floor in tiles, a picture of a rather rampant horse.

It pays tribute to the 13th century inn known as The Ramping Horse.

This was described as “alongside the highway of New Burgh, where the horse market was held”.

In the 16th century, Will Kemp danced “the morrice” past it, cheered on by a huge crowd as he jigged from London to Norwich.

And in the 17th century, rough and tumble political meetings were held at the famous old inn along with “plays, drolles, fairies and interludes” with music, aided by a company of 16 servants.

It must have been quite a place.

During its days as a coaching inn, long boxes were left there, booked for dispatch to London.

One day, one of these boxes was opened and it was found to contain the body of a man, recently removed by the resurrection men from Old Lakenham Churchyard.

At the start of the last century, Rampant Horse Street was home to Curls (now Debenhams), Buntings (now Marks & Spencer) and the first Woolworths “3d and 6d” store in the city.

The wonder of Woollies caught the imagination of the people of Norwich and it became one of the most popular stores in the city.

And I wonder if anyone remembers the splendid Snellings’s Ballroom that operated in the street — a place where many young people were taught to
dance.

How the street survived the Second World War is a miracle.

It was in April of 1942 when the Luftwaffe set out to destroy as much of the city as they could.

Rampant Horse Street was blown to pieces. Curls was reduced to a pile of rubble and Buntings was a smouldering shell. For years following the war the Curls site was left as a gaping hole in the heart of the city before it was re-born as the biggest department store in East Anglia — complete with new-fangled moving stairs.

Take a moment to look down the next time you step into Debenhams and remember the times when it was horses you had to look out for — not cars.

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