Clair's Emporium in Rugeley was once the town's police cells.

Clair's Emporium shop in Rugeley was once the town's police cells. Owner Clair Meeson explains.

Transcript

00:00 Right, okay, okay Claire, you're the owner of Clare's Emporium in Rugeley and I

00:05 believe it used to be police cells, is that right? That is correct, yes, from 1843

00:10 to 1878 it was the original police station of Rugeley. It moved from Horsefair

00:16 and then it came to here for a certain number of years and then it moved

00:20 on to the Town Hall. We believe the police cells are underneath the building,

00:26 however there was some afterwards in a stable block at the back but that was

00:31 much later on and as we all know that William Palmer was arrested in 1856

00:38 and we think that he stayed in this building after his arrest. Because you've

00:43 actually got records of that haven't you? We have got records, yes, here on the wall

00:47 we've got the hanging of where he was hung at Stafford Prison and we've

00:52 also got a lot of history and the pictures of the cells all around the building.

00:56 Wow, so how long have you been here Claire? We opened in January

01:00 '23 so about a year and four months now and yeah I'm very pleased that we did it.

01:07 We took 18 months to do the building up, there was a lot of hard work but we got

01:11 there and I'm very proud of what we've done. Absolutely and it's proven a

01:14 success. It's doing well, yes, yeah, very pleased. And you say not many people

01:20 know about the cells? Well not many people knew it was a police station

01:24 let alone the cells and so the more, yes, the history is a big thing with this

01:28 building. Everybody knew it as the old AVH hardware shop but yeah they didn't

01:33 realise it was a police station like I say 1843 to 1878.