Place Name
The idea of a customs duty had been introduced under King Ethelred in AD979 but the first customs house wasn’t built until 1275, which was laid out a little to the east of this street at the old Wool Quay. It was a haphazard affair and in 1599 a law was passed that goods could only be brought into England at designated places. In 1714, the fourth Customs House was laid out on the foundations of one built by Wren following the Great Fire, after it had been badly damaged in a gunpowder explosion.
