The Allen Gallery buildings

The Allen Gallery consists of a group of 16th and 18th century buildings that were bequeathed to the Curtis Museum in 1957 by William Hugh Curtis, the grandson of the founder of the museum.

John Curtis, apothecary, the founder of six generations of the family in the town, came to Alton in 1720, and established himself in the house in the High Street of widow Inwood, whose daughter he married two years later. By 1736 he was renting the property in Church Street, so conveniently adjacent to the end of the High Street garden. He acquired the copyhold and a hundred years later his grandson purchased the freehold. By the time the surveyors for the Tithe Commissioners came to look at the property in 1839 the cottage with an outbuilding behind it were occupied by the doctor’s groom along with a coach house. Beyond that was a stable with a wide gateway between them leading to a cobbled yard. Above, a long and ample loft linked the two buildings.

The land at the rear beyond the yard had been taken into the garden of 4 High Street, adding a spacious prospect to the somewhat confined lawn and borders behind the main house. Eventually, about a hundred years ago, the generous provision of stabling became unnecessary and the Church Street buildings were again turned into cottages. William Hugh Curtis eventually occupied 10 Church Street, whilst some 60 years ago a Mr Osborne ran a small grocers shop next door.

The alterations of the late 1970s saw the old gateway enclosed as a reception area, and the yard transformed. The garden beyond, once again part of Church Street, has retained the layout created by the Curtis family.