Where is Christmas Close?

Many events in A Corpse in Christmas Close take place in the historic city of Winchester.

Although Christmas Close is fictitious, it’s nestled in an area close to Winchester Cathedral. I’ve suggested the name is derived from the road’s association with the cathedral and religious ceremonies that took place there.

Let me take you on a tour of some of the locations featured in the book.  

Winchester Cathedral

The first chapters of A Corpse in Christmas Close are based on a real event, when the Prince of Wales, later to become Edward VIII, visited Winchester on 7 November 1923. This provided the perfect opening to the book.

Reporter Iris Woodmore is sent to cover the event for The Walden Herald, and I’ve accurately depicted the royal itinerary as she and photographer, Robbie Roper, spend the day following the prince around Winchester.

The Prince of Wales's first stop was the Guildhall, where he was presented with the Freedom of the City decree encased in an oak casket made from eight-hundred-year-old beams taken from Winchester Cathedral. He later attended a service at the cathedral.

Curle’s Passage (above), Cathedral Close and St Swithun Street

If you turn left when you leave Winchester Cathedral and walk through the much-photographed Curle’s Passage, you’ll come to Cathedral Close and St Swithun Street. I’ve placed Christmas Close behind the tiny St Swithun-upon-Kingsgate Church.

I describe the close as a narrow cobblestone road enclosed by the tall, grey-stoned medieval walls Winchester is famous for. You can easily walk past Christmas Close without realising it’s there – making it the ideal location to commit murder.

Winchester College, College Street

After his visit to the cathedral, the prince’s next stop was Winchester College, where he watched a game of Fifteens. This football match was played between Commoners and Houses under the Winchester Code, regarded by some as the oldest football code still in existence.

The prince’s last engagement of the day was to attend a service in the college chapel where the Bishop of Gloucester consecrated the new altar and screen that formed part of the college’s war memorial.

Face in College Archway

Much of the college’s architecture dates from medieval times, and the courtyard is particularly impressive. A stonemason carved a face into the roof of the archway that leads into the college courtyard. When you enter, the face appears to smile as though pleased to see you. When you turn to leave, your viewpoint changes and it shows sadness at your departure.

P & G Booksellers, College Street

When Iris revisits the crime scene, she retraces her steps between Winchester College and Christmas Close. As she does, she visits P & G Wells Booksellers on College Street.

It's believed to be the oldest bookshop in Britain having been at 11 College Street since 1789. It has traded since 1891 as P & G Wells and is Winchester’s longest-running retail business.
 

Jane Austen’s House, College Street

A few doors along from P & G Wells Booksellers is the house where Jane Austen died in 1817. Her final resting place is in the nave of nearby Winchester Cathedral under a memorial stone that celebrates ‘the extraordinary endowments of her mind’.

Abbey House and Gardens, High Street

The Hampshire Chronicle, High Street

The Hampshire Chronicle is a weekly newspaper based on Upper Brook Street in Winchester. The first edition was published on 24 August 1772, making it one of the oldest publications in England. It has proudly never missed an edition throughout its history, regardless of strikes, bad weather or war.

The Hampshire Chronicle used to be based where Zizzi is now at 57 High Street, and it’s there that Iris meets with fellow reporter Kevin Noakes, who helps with her investigation.

The Great Hall, Castle Avenue

The Great Hall in Winchester is a venue I’ve visited before in Death at Crookham Hall when a trial is held at the Hampshire Assizes. The assizes were court circuits presided over by visiting judges from the higher courts.

Criminal trials were held in the Great Hall until the 1970s, when a new courtroom was built to the east of the hall. The Great Hall provides a spectacular setting, built on the remnants of Winchester Castle, with stained-glass windows and medieval aisled halls. Iris describes it as like walking into a cathedral rather than a courtroom.

When the Prince of Wales visited the city, he attended a private luncheon with the Lord Lieutenant in the Great Hall of Winchester Castle.

Westgate Hotel, Romsey Road

Opposite the Great Hall is The Westgate Hotel, a popular haunt for journalists who would drink in the bar when a trial was taking place. It's where Iris and Robbie wait with other reporters while the prince is having lunch in the Great Hall.

From the hotel windows, you could see the court entrance. Reporters would pay a clerk to come out of the court and wave when the jury had reached a verdict.

Morn Hill Camp

A Corpse in Christmas Close looks back at events at Morn Hill Camp during the war.

In the autumn of 1914, a vast transit camp was set up at Morn Hill on the outskirts of Winchester. With military personnel sleeping in tents when winter set in, the 30000 population of Winchester managed to find temporary billets for around 20000 soldiers.

Two million troops passed through the camp during the war, most only staying a few days, with 50,000 there at any one time when it was fully operational.

700,000 US soldiers, half of all those who served on the Western Front, stayed before being sent to mainland Europe.

The Stanmore Estate (aerial view 1928)

As part of his visit to Winchester, the Prince of Wales was driven ‘through cheering crowds to the Garden City at Stanmore’ to plant a commemorative tree that remains to this day.

The new garden suburb was erected under the national building scheme after the government promised to provide ‘homes fit for heroes’ for the soldiers returning from the Great War.

Five years on, in 1923, many councils were still struggling to clear away city slums and replace them with good quality housing. Stanmore was an ambitious project consisting of an estate of five hundred and sixty medium-sized red-brick houses surrounded by trees and gardens.

The houses included bathrooms with hot and cold water and ground floors ‘finished on concrete with a lino-like substance, which will make all who now occupy dry-rot houses envious'.

The plans for this contemporary estate were displayed at the Wembley Exhibition in 1922.

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