Danny Howell writes:
No.45 Market Place, Warminster, was included among the properties sold by the Longleat Estate in September 1919 (about 100 houses, cottages, shops, pubs, farms and smallholdings – described as the largest property sale ever held in Warminster).
The sale catalogue described it as follows:
Lot 42.
45 Market Place, Warminster.
A lock-up Shop, 14ft. 6in. x 17ft. 6in., with Office at back, with Cellar, 4 Bed or Store rooms, now let, together with Garden adjoining the Avenue, to Messrs. J.W. Titt & Co. on a half-yearly tenancy at £15 per annum.
There is a right of way over the Bath Arms Yard to the Garden, and also a right from the gate in the Avenue, but the Garden is not sold with this lot.
This Shop has a good frontage to the Market Place.
There is a doorway in the top room communicating with the Bath Arms.”
The auction sale of the these Longleat Estate properties was spread over two days, Friday 5th September and Saturday 6th September 1919, at the Town Hall, Warminster. The auctioneer was David Waddington of Messrs. D. and D.H. Waddington, and Messrs. Ponting & Marshall were solicitors for the vendor, the Marquess of Bath, K.G.
No.45 Market Place, Warminster, was put up for auction on the first day of the sale. It was purchased by a Mr. Crook, of Torquay, for £335. Crook also purchased the Bath Arms Hotel and the adjoining house, number 46 Market Place, occupied by Walter Scott.
[This shop, 45 Market Place, Warminster, has since been incorporated into what was the adjacent Bath Arms Hotel, forming the eastern end of the hotel, now [2023] J.D. Wetherspoon’s. And the addresses of what was the Bath Arms Hotel and this shop have since changed and are now 41 Market Place, Warminster BA12 9AZ.]