In 1895, he was convicted of ‘acts of gross indecency with another male person' and sentenced to two years with hard labour. Oscar Wilde, the poet and playwright, was the most famous inmate of Reading Gaol. He also restored Reading’s Abbey Gateway in 1861. Scott’s gothic revival masterpieces include the Midland Grand Hotel at St Pancras Station and the Albert Memorial in Hyde Park, London. In his later years, Scott was recognised as one of the most influential and prolific architects of his generation. The main building was for men, and there was a separate wing (since demolished) for women.īetween 18, Scott and Moffatt also designed over 50 workhouses, 15% of the national total.

Berkshire Record Office has the original plans for the 1840s Gaol. The London Illustrated News of 17 February 1844 was impressed by the new building: ‘Standing as it does, on the rising ground at the entrance to Reading, and close to the site of the venerable abbey, this new prison is from every side the most conspicuous building, and architecturally, by far the greatest ornament to the town’. Their design was based on the new model prison at Pentonville, implementing the ‘separate system’ of solitary confinement. He designed it with his partner William Bonythorn Moffatt.

The present neo-Tudor building was built between 18 and was one of the earliest designs by George Gilbert Scott (later Sir Gilbert). The Compter Gaol was known as the ‘counter’ in 1560, and was later located within the former main gateway of Reading Abbey adjacent to St Laurence's church. It seems to have been used by the Borough as a debtor prison until it was closed and partly demolished in 1786. However, by 1578, it had become a hospital for the poor and from the early seventeenth century it was the Borough Bridewell and house of correction. The Borough Bridewell opened after King Henry VII gave permission for the town's guild (the predecessor to the Borough Council) to have a gaol 'in some convenient place within said borough'. In 1543, the nave of the former Greyfriars church was acquired for use as the Guild Hall. Men and women shared a day room, but had separate night rooms. It housed both convicted felons and debtors. This was probably both the King's and Abbot's gaol in the medieval period. The County Gaol was in Castle Street on the site now occupied by St Mary’s Church. For many years, Reading had three locations for imprisonment: the County Gaol, the Borough Bridewell, and the Compter Gaol.

The ballad of reading gaol text