High Street (east): No. 51

This rubblestone façade would once have been rendered: most of the window surrounds have been pecked to allow render to adhere properly, in an 18th-century attempt to create a 'polite' frontage matching that to the right (Nos. 53–9). In 1851 the occupier was a carrier, and in 1861 Robert Woods, 'lessor of houses'. From 1891 to 1915 it was George W. Matthews, 'insurance agent, assistant overseer, and collector of gas and water rates', who probably inserted the present late 19th-century windows and perhaps removed the render. By 1941 it included a fish, fruit and vegetable shop; the current shopfront has plate-glass windows, that to the right installed for a jeweller in 1953 (local inf.). In 2007 the building contained a gift shop.

(photo by Heather Horner, Oxfordshire Buildings Record)