Costa Coffee

According to local historian Reginald Drake the hall was built on the site of a house and shop, known as the Mansion House in 1739 and occupied by a Wlliam Tolke, of whom nothing is yet known. In the 19th century the house, with numerous warehouses and arched cellars, was occupied by David Martin, ironmaker and seller of china and glass.

A David William Martin is recorded in the Marketplace in 1851 as a grocer and ironmonger, but the location is not precise.

The premises next door, according to Drake, was a library and reading room.
In 1845 one dwelling was occupied by Robert Baker, as yet untraced, and the other was unoccupied.

As the railway arrived in Norfolk during the 1840s and 50s – the assent for a railway between Lynn and Dereham was granted in 1845 – the farming community and the estate owners realised the potential of a railway for agricultural use. Corn Exchanges were built by entrepreneurs in the local towns, amongst them Swaffham, ready for an influx of trading.

Unfortunately, the expected influx did not arrive, traders preferring to send their goods to larger markets. Even a change of market day from Saturday to Monday in 1869 did not halt the decline.

The Corn Hall has served many purposes since then: a Salvation Army citadel; an Armoury; billets for soldiers; a concert room; a Young Men’s club; a billiards and reading room; lectures, a YMCA canteen; an Anglo-American club and canteen during World War II; a practice room for the Town Bands; a local Job Centre; an accountant’s business (upstairs) and now, from 2010, a café.