Site: Old Middlesex Sessions House (1 memorial)
EC1, Clerkenwell Green
Built in 1779, designed by Thomas Rogers. The panels on the façade are all carved by Joseph Nollekens. In the 19th century this building was "swapped" with a building at Parliament Square which became the Middlesex Guildhall. As ever, Ornamental Passions has an excellent entry on this building.
The 1952 film 'I Believe in You' uses the exterior of this building as the courthouse at the centre of the lives of probation officers and their charges, but it had ceased its legal function in 1921.
2017: Caroline's Miscellany gives a full history of the building.
2025: A London Inheritance explains that Hicks’s Hall was the first, dedicated Middlesex Sessions House. Hick's Hall was in nearby St John Street, where the road widens out and there is bike parking and, since 2020, some trees. Old maps show Hick's Hall there, in the middle of the road, 1612 - 1780s, by which time the Clerkenwell Green building had taken on its role.
