St Mary's Hall Coventry, a miraculous survival

As the seat of civic government and the centre for festive occasions, St Mary's Hall was probably the venue for most performances by touring entertainers before the mayor and city officials during the Elizabethan and Stuart period.

The hall continued in use by performers into the 18th century, including the famous Shakespearean actress Sarah Siddons, among others.

When the bombs fell on Coventry in November 1940, destroying three-quarters of the city centre and St Michael’s Cathedral, St Mary's Hall in narrow Bayley Lane directly across from the Cathedral, miraculously survived. The arched entrance from the street still leads to a courtyard with the red sandstone hall on the upper storey in the west range, the entrance via a narrow, winding staircase accessed through a door in the east range.

The hall itself, boasting an intact minstrels gallery, would have been a splendid performance space, 30 foot wide by 72 foot long, rivalling palace halls and theatre stages in London.

A special feature remains at the high end – a late 15th century tapestry and the stained glass window commemorating Henry VI and his lineage. The tapestry was commissioned by Henry VII to hang in St Mary's Hall as part of a plan to canonize his predecessor who was revered by Coventry in part because he had granted the city special status as a county. Probably Flemish in design and weave, it represents the Assumption of the Virgin with the apostles and kneeling figures of Henry VI and his Queen.

What an evocative backdrop to staging in front of (but not on) the dais the tapestry and windows would have made for companies known to have had the Henry VI plays in their repertory!

Pembroke’s company, perhaps with Shakespeare among them, played Coventry on their 1593 tour when all three Henry VI plays were available to them – probably around the same time that they visited the Berkeley family at Caludon Castle nearby. The King’s players also toured through Coventry several times, starting with their first tour, when they were driven from London by the plague in 1603.

By Sally-Beth MacLean, REED General Editor

They too would have had some of Shakespeare’s history plays in their repertory, a good choice and likely a popular one in the city which features as a rallying point in several of the plays. The King’s Men are known to have appeared at Coventry some time between 19th May and 31st October 1603, with a reward of 40 shillings; on 29th October 1608 for a reward of 20 shillings; sometime during a year running from 1st November 1613 to 31st October 1614, again for 40 shillings; and on 10th January 1620, with 33 shillings received from the mayor’s purse.