16: Pia/ Brook Street Bureau
Nos. 13–16 High Street were built in 1773–4 by John Gwynn to form the frontage to the new covered market and were known as "New Parade".
There is an avenue into the market in the centre of this group between Nos. 14 and 15, and one each side.
No. 16 is Grade II listed (ref. 1485/611).
The London & County Bank was situated here at 16 High Street from 1842 to 1868. The London & County Joint Stock Banking Company reported in December 1842 that at the close of that half-year three new branches had been successfully opened, one of which was at Oxford, "where the respectable Bank of Davenport Walker & Co. has merged with the London & County Bank".
At the time of the 1851 census the manager of the bank, Captain Henry Strong, lived upstairs with his wife, his daughters Henrietta (20), Emily Frances (10), Marion (8), Ethel (5), and three general servants. Emily Frances Strong became a writer on art, and ten years later she married Mark Pattison, the Rector of Lincoln College, who was 27 years her senior. (It has been suggested that their relationship inspired that of Casaubon and Dorothea in George Eliot’s Middlemarch.)
The bank (later the National Westminster) moved to its present large premises on the corner of Alfred Street in 1868.
The booksellers Slatter & Rose moved here in 1901 (when they had to move from Nos. 2 and 3 because of the building of Lloyds Bank), and remained until 1956. The picture on the left shows their shop in about 1905.
The guest rooms of the Mitre Hotel next door extended over this shop.
| Occupiers of 16 High Street since 1842 | ||
| Main downstairs shop | Right-hand entrance and downstairs |
|
| 1842–1867 | London & County Bank | |
| 1869 | H. Adamson Draper |
|
| 1871 | G. M. Webb | |
| 1875–1887 | Mappin & Webb Cutlers and electro-platers |
|
| 1889–1900 | Frank Edward Webb Jeweller, silversmith and cutler Agent for Mappin & Webb Gun maker and optician |
|
| 1901–1956 | Slatter & Rose Ltd. Booksellers |
|
| 1958–1967 | Wymans Newsagents |
|
| 1968–1973 | John
Menzies Newsagents |
|
| c.1987 | ?Indian/Oriental emporium? | ? |
| By 1993–1998 | Tecno shop | Brook Street Bureau |
| 2000–2007 | Jessops Photography | |
| 2007–present | Pia | |