Building MPM1465 - 1-2 St Michael's Road

Building formally used as the Board of Guardians Offices, Out Relief Dispensary and the Portsmouth Register Office. Later became The Registry public house (1990s-2014), now converted to flats.

Red brick two-storey building with tower and slate roof built c.1870 [1] (the building does not show on the Ordnance Survey map for 1870). The building was extended between 1898 and 1910 [2 & 3].

The earliest listing in the Kelly's Directories for the address appears to be in the edition for 1888-89. At this date the Portsea Island Union Offices and Portsea Island Overseers' Offices (next door, see MPM1466) are recorded in St Michael's Road. By 1897 the Portsea Island Union Offices, Office of Registrar of Births, Marriages and Deaths and Portsea Island Union Out relief Dispensary are listed at the address. After the Second World War the Welfare Services Committee replaced the Portsea Island Union Offices (also listed in the Kelly's as the Parish of Portsmouth Board of Guardians Offices), and is still listed in the 1976 Kelly's (last edition published). The Coroner's Court is also recorded at the address during a brief period in the 1950s? [4] The Portsmouth Register Office moved to Milldam House in Burnaby Road around the mid-1990s, and the building then became a student pub called The Registry. The pub closed in 2014, and the building has now been converted into flats (2015).

<1> Portsmouth City Council, 2011, City of Portsmouth Local List of Buildings (Bibliographic reference). SPM37.

<2> Ordnance Survey, 1898, Ordnance Survey Map 1898 (Map). SPM265.

<3> Ordnance Survey, 1910, Ordnance Survey Map 1910 (Map). SPM266.

<4> 1800s - 1976, Kelly's Street Directories (Bibliographic reference). SPM38.