The Grand Ipswich timeline
This page will be added to and, no doubt, corrected. Email us if you wish to contribute.

AD60-66. The Iceni tribe, led by Queen Boudicca, made a final stand against Roman occupation. They sacked and burned Colchester (Camulodunum, the capital of the Roman province of Britannia), St Albans (Verulamium) and London (Londinium) before being defeated at the Battle of Watling Street (exact location unknown).
250-400. Roman settlements at Whitton and Roman burial ground within the borough boundary.
500-600. Anglo-Saxons interred their dead near the present Hadleigh Road and Stoke parish.
c.600.  Gipeswyc was founded at the first available fording point (the site of Great Whip Street and Foundry Lane) of the river moving up from the estuary as the first new English settlement after the Roman occupation of Britain.
625.     The first traces of the manufacture of Ipswich Ware, pottery thrown on a slow wheel and traded far and wide. Production continued until around 850; kilns and archaeological evidence of production have been found in Carr Street, Cox Lane, Turret Lane and St Helens Street and, most notably, on the Buttermarket Shopping Centre site (St Stephens Lane) excavated in 1986.
650.     Earthen ramparts dug to form the town boundary. A palisade was probably added on top of the earth mound.
700.     The Church of St Mildred was built on the Cornhill. Parts of the building became the Moot Hall c.1529. 1812 saw the final removal of any remnants of the church which had stood on the Cornhill for a thousand years.
879-918. Danish occupation of the town; the rampart was dug around the medieval core of the town during this period.
884.     East Anglia became Danish (see also the Invasions timeline).
885.     King Alfred’s fleet was in action against the Danes in Stourmouth.
920.     East Anglia submited to King Edward the Elder (870-924).
959-975. Coins of King Edgar (943-975) were minted at Ipswich.
991.     Ipswich was ravaged by the Danes. Danegeld (a tax raised to pay tribute to the Viking raiders to save the land from being ravaged) was instituted.

1066.     The Norman Invasion; Gipeswic was ruled by Roger Bigod (died 1107), a Norman knight and Sheriff of Norfolk and Suffolk. On the northern edge of the dock (opposite St Mary-At-Quay Church), was Bigod's Quay, which became Smart's Wharf in  Elizabethan times (see also Smart Street), then Albion Wharf and, for some reason, 'Regatta Quay' in the 21st century.
1086.    Ipswich appears as ‘Gepeswiz’ in the Little Domesday Book.

1100.     Henry I (1068-1135) reorganised the town courts.
1100-1135. Henry I’s Keepers of the Sea make ordinances at Ipswich.
1130.     Augustinian Priory of St Peter & St Paul, the first priory in Ipswich, was founded by Henry I with a charter for his canons.
1135-1139. King Stephen (c.1096-1154) granted a confirmatory charter for his canons (of St Peter and St Paul).
1153.     Seige of Roger Bigod’s Ipswich castle by King Stephen – it was destroyed in 1176.
1158-1162. Henry II (1133-1189) granted a charter confirming the endowments to the canons of Holy Trinity, and their fair.
1160.     Augustinian Priory of Holy Trinity, ‘Christchurch’, founded with a charter of Henry II (1133-1189) – it was rebuilt after a fire of 1194.
1176.     Bigod’s Castle in Ipswich, built after the Norman Conquest and probably a wooden structure, was destroyed on the orders of Henry II.
1178.     Ipswich Gaol was built near to today’s Old Cattle Market.
1194.     Holy Trinity Priory was rebuilt after a fire.

1200.    On 28 June the Charter of King John (1166-1216) giving Ipswich its Borough status (with the ‘Great Ship Seal’) was received by the burgesses in St Mary-Le-Tower churchyard.
    In October the Borough seal was shown to the burgesses in St Mary-Le-Tower churchyard.
1203-04. The ditch and earthen rampart around the town was redug (see 879-918) in the wake of the granting of the Charter; perhaps more to regulate trade than to form a military defence.
1204.    King John’s confirmatory charter was granted to the canons of Holy Trinity.
1216-1272. Cessation of the Ipswich mint.
1256.    Henry III (1207-1272) granted a charter returning writs and other privileges.
1263.    Henry III purchased a townhouse to found the Dominican Blackfriars.
1271.    The Town Clerk, John le Black, absconds with the Borough records.
1278-9. The Carmelite Whitefriars was founded on the site of today’s Buttermarket Centre.
1284-1291. Ipswich was taken into the king’s hands.
1290.    New Customal was drawn up [def. Customal/custumal: a written collection of the customs of a monastery, a manor, or a locality].
1291.    Edward I (1239-1307) granted a charter of restitution.
1295.    The earliest vessel known to be built in Ipswich was a galley for Edward I.
1297.    King Edward I brought his daughter Elizabeth to St Peter & St Paul to marry John, Count of Holland.
1299.    Murage (a medieval toll for the building or repair of town walls) was granted to the borough for five years.

1317.     Confirmatory charter was granted by Edward II (1284-1327), with new privileges.
1325.     The Guild of Corpus Christi annual processions and feasts on the festival of Corpus Christi (the Thursday after Trinity Sunday) were reconstituted. The gild merchant in the 12th century had acted as an informal town government; after King John’s charter to Ipswich in 1200 the role of the gild merchant diminished to a socio-religious club for all the burgesses. The rededication of the merchant gild to Corpus Christi in 1325 gave it a prominent ceremonial function.
    The grandfather of Geoffrey Chaucer (c.1343-1400) owned a vintry (a place where wine is sold) in Tavern Street on the corner with Tower Street.
1336.     Four merchants were sent to the King’s Council at Oxford (the first MPs).
1338.     The charter of Edward III (1312-1377) to Harwich, infringing the rights of Ipswich, was revoked.
    Edward III’s confirmatory charter to Ipswich was granted.
1340.     The fleet of Edward III sailed out of Orwell Haven for Crecy.
1344.     Ipswich was in the king’s hands because riotous sailors held a mock trial upon his judge of assize.
1352.     The licence to wall and crenellate the town was granted; a licence to crenellate granted the holder permission to fortify their property.
1378.     Richard II (1367-1400) granted a confirmatory charter, with additions, to the town.
1381.     There were riotous attacks by peasant rebels on houses in Ipswich. The Peasants’ Revolt was led by Watt Tyler spread across the country from Kent. John Battisford and Thomas Sampson independently led a revolt near Ipswich on 14 June. They took the town without opposition and looted the properties of the archdeacon and local tax officials. The violence spread out further, with attacks on many properties and the burning of the local court records. One official, Edmund Lakenheath, was forced to flee from the Suffolk coast by boat.
1399. A new house was built by the sheriff for Assize and County Courts.
    Henry IV (1367-1413) granted a confirmatory charter.

1402.     In April Princess Blanche (1392-1409), daughter of Henry IV, prepared for her marriage to Prince Louis III, later Elector Palatine of the Rhine (1378-1436), in Ipswich and visits the Gracechurch shrine in Lady Lane.
1446.     Charter of Henry VI (1421-1471) was granted, constituting the bailiffs and capital burgesses Justices of the Peace and granting exemption from the Admiral of England and Clerk of the Market.
1450.     William de la Pole, exiled Duke of Suffolk, leaves Ipswich.
1452.     Henry VI (1421-1471) visited Whitefriars, the Carmelite friary.
1464.     Ipswich was designated as a Staple port for the export of wool to Calais.
1470.     Thomas Wolsey (1473-1530) was christened in St Mary-At-Elms Church.
1471.     Pykenham’s Gatehouse was built fronting Northgate Street.
1483.     Richard Felaw (c.1420-1483) left his house in Foundation Street as premises for the Grammar School.
1485.     The confirmatory charter, with Admiralty rights, of Richard III (1452-1485) was granted.
1488.     The confirmatory charter of Henry VII (1457-1509) was granted.
1489.     Visit of Henry VII to Ipswich.

1509.     A licence was granted for Edmund Daundy’s (Thomas Wolsey’s uncle) chantry in St Lawrence.
1513.     Grant of Admiralty jurisdiction as far down the river as Polles Head – beyond Landguard Fort – in the Orwell Haven. This was part of a continuing feud with Harwich port for sea commerce and associated tolls.
1516.     Mistress Wentworth was cured of fits at Gracechurch, Our Lady’s Chapel.
1517.     Queen Catherine of Aragon (1485-1536) stayed with Lord Robert Curson (c.1460-1534/5) on pilgrimage to the shrine of Our Lady, Gracechurch.
1519.     The confirmatory charter, with additions, of Henry VIII (1491-1547) was granted.
1520.     Admission by the Great Admiral that Ipswich had Admiralty rights to Polles Head.
1522.     King Henry VIII stayed with Lord Curson on pilgrimage to the shrine of Our Lady, Gracechurch.
1525.     Indulgence was granted for pilgrims to Our Lady of Grace to pray for Cardinal Thomas Wolsey.
c.1525. Thomas Bilney (c.1495-1531) delivered sermons (against images and pilgrimages) in St George’s Chapel, St Georges Street, Ipswich
1528.     On 15 June the foundation stone of Wolsey’s Cardinal College of St Mary was laid. On 3 July, its Charter was granted. On 30 July, Wolsey confirmed the site of St Peter’s Priory (on land to the east of the Church of St Peter), recently suppressed for his Ipswich College. On 5-6 September, the opening ceremonies of the College were held.
1529-1537. The Protestant Reformation occurred, Henry VIII creating the Church of England and imposing its observance on the populace.
1529.     The Corporation granted its Grammar School lands to Wolsey’s College. Much of the College above ground was built by 24 July.
    The indictment of Wolsey occurred under the Statute of Praemunire (a law which prohibited the assertion or maintenance of papal jurisdiction, imperial or foreign, or some other alien jurisdiction or claim of supremacy in England, against the supremacy of the monarch.).
1537-39. The Ipswich priory and friaries were suppressed.
1530.     Commissioners find the endowments of Wolsey’s College forfeit under the Statute of Praemunire.
1532.     Thomas Alvard, stepson of Sir Thomas Rush, ships the materials from dismantled Wolsey’s College to the king’s manor of Westminster to be used to enlarge what was formerly Wolsey’s York Place to become the royal Palace of Whitehall.
    The advowson (in ecclesiastical law, the right to recommend a member of the Anglican clergy for a vacant benefice, or to make such an appointment) of the Church of St Matthew and of the Chapel of Our Lady of Grace was granted to the dean and chapter of Lincoln. (See also our Old Cattle Market page for the Rush-Alvard Chapel in the Church of St Stephen.)
1534.     Reginald Oliver published in Ipswich the Historia Evangelica of Juvencus, the Roman Spanish Christian and composer of Latin poetry in the 4th century.
1535.     The statue of Our Lady was removed from Ipswich by night, in an attempt to save it from Reformation anti-idolatry destruction.
1536.     Thomas Manning, Prior of Butley, was appointed Suffragan Bishop (a bishop subordinate to a metropolitan bishop or diocesan bishop) of Ipswich.
1537.     The suppression of Holy Trinity Priory, which stood on the site of Christchurch Mansion.
1547.     The confirmatory charter of Edward VI (1537-1553) was granted to the borough.
1547-8.  The first books to be printed in Ipswich were produced by Anthony Scoloker.
1548-50. Christchurch Mansion was built by Edmund Withipoll (1510/13-82) on or near the site of Holy Trinity Priory (in today’s Christchurch Park).
1550-51. Wealthy merchant, Henry Tooley’s will leaves money to establish almshouses in Foundation Street. The corporation is made trustee for the almshouses and other charities; the will was proved in 1552.
1553.     Queen Mary (1516-1558) stayed at Wingfield House in Tacket Street on the 31 July, on her way from Framlingham to her coronation in London.
1554.     Two priests serve eleven churches in Ipswich.
1560.     The confirmatory charter was granted by Queen Elizabeth I (1533-1603).
1561.     Queen Elizabeth I stayed at Christchurch Mansion on her ‘Royal Progress’. It would be exactly 400 years until another reigning monarch would make a Royal Progress through Ipswich: the visit by Queen Elizabeth II in 1961 to open the new Civic College on the Potteries site (see the 'Fore Street Facelift 1961' section of the Ipswich Society website; see Links).
1569.     The purchase of the Dominican Priory (Blackfriars) was made by the corporation.
1571.     An Act was passed in Parliament to enable the paving of the town of Ipswich.
1572.     A charter was granted for Christ’s Hospital.
    At the height of Tudor prosperity two Ipswich merchants, John Johnson and Christopher Goodwyn, proposed Ipswich out of England or Antwerp in England suggesting the supplanting of Antwerp and the Low Countries to make Ipswich ‘the one free mart in the known world’.
1579.     Queen Elizabeth I stayed for four days at Christchurch Mansion.
1586-88. Thomas Cavendish (1560-1592), with Thomas Eldred (1561-1624) and Thomas Fuller, circumnavigated the world; they were second only to Sir Francis Drake (c.1540-1596). (See our Isaac Lord page for long-disappeared Thomas Eldred's house.)
1590.     Ordinances for a new company of clothworkers, Ipswich.
1599.     Bequests were made by the wealthy portman, William Smart, to the corporation and to the Drapers’ Hall and Taylors’ Hall, Ipswich.

1603.     The town ramparts were refurbished and a new gate added to the western approach, close to the Gracechurch shrine: the West Gate at the head of today’s Westgate Street.
    An Exchequer order was issued controlling the sale of meat in Ipswich by ‘foreign’ butchers.
1605.     Samuel Ward (1577-1640) appointed town preacher.
1606.     Three ships set sail for the New World with Ipswich families aboard. Discovery, Susan Constant and Godspeed were the three ships which carried people, mostly from Suffolk, to America to settle in Jamestown, Virginia, which was to become the first permanent English speaking settlement in the New World.
1610.    John Speed’s map of Ipswich was published.
1611.     Ipswich ventured £100 in the Virginia Company of London voyage to North America. The first British Colony had been established by Bartholomew Gosnold (1571-1607) of Otley Hall after his voyage in The Godspeed in 1606-7.
1619.     Incorporation of the clothworkers and tailors of Ipswich.
1620.     Planters for the colony of Virginia were recruited in Ipswich.
1631-33. Quo Warranto proceedings (a writ or legal action requiring a person to show by what warrant an office or franchise is held, claimed, or exercised) were taken against the borough.
1634.     The Archdeacon’s commissary, Henry Dade, deplored emigrations from Ipswich, warning Archbishop Laud that two ships, each carrying 120 passengers, were about to sail for New England.
1634-5. The confirmatory charter of Charles I was granted.
1635.     Samuel Ward was put out of St Mary-Le-Tower Church pulpit for life for encouraging emigration to New England (Virginia in North America).
1636.     Visitation by Bishop Matthew Wren, the Bishop of Norwich, unpopular in Puritan Ipswich.
    Pamphleteer, William Prynne, wrote and published Newes from Ipswich, a tract opposing high church practices and popery. Prynne was tortured and imprisoned.
1640.     Plans were laid for the first contested election of Members of Parliament for the borough.
    Mutinous soldiers burned the communion table rails in the Church of St Lawrence.
1641.     A petition of Ipswich to the Commons against Bishops.
               A House of Correction (where those who were "unwilling to work", including vagrants and beggars, were set to work) was built close to the (County) Gaol.
1642.     Plans were drawn up to fortify the town.
1654.     The Great Fire of Ipswich.
1656.    Diarist John Evelyn visited Ipswich and described it as ‘the sweetest, most pleasant, well-built town in England’.
1665.    Charles II (1630-1685) grants his first charter of confirmation to the Borough.
1667.    There was a Dutch raid upon Landguard Fort.
1668.    Charles II visited Viscount Hereford at Christchurch Mansion.
1674.    John Ogilby’s map of Ipswich was published.
1684.    Charles II’s second charter of reconstitution.
1665.    Judge Jeffreys, Lord Chancellor to James II (1633-1701), known as ’The Hanging Judge’, held assizes at Ipswich. His conduct as a judge was to enforce royal policy, resulting in a historical reputation for severity and bias against perceived rebels against the king.
1688.    James II’s charter of reconstitution was granted.
              The publication took place of James II’s proclamation restoring charters and liberties to boroughs.
1689.    The population of Ipswich at this date was 8,308.
1698.    The Shire Hall behind Christ’s Hospital was erected. (Shown on a 1778 map on our Courts and yards page under 'Shire Hall Yard area'.).

1700.    The Unitarian Meeting House was built.
1707.    Puplett – Richard Puplett, town bailiff during the rule of Oliver Cromwell (1653-1658), otherwise ‘Purplett’ (see Purplett Street) – versus the Corporation concerning the building of the Shire Hall.
1711.    Painter Sir James Thornhill (1675/6-1734) describes Ipswich as ‘a town without people, a river without water and streets without names’.
1712.    The Act for repair of the road from Ipswich to Claydon was passed.
1720.    The Ipswich Journal was founded by John Bagnall; books were published in the town again. The Ipswich Journal continued publication until 1902.
1732.    Claude Fonnereau (1677-1740) purchased Christchurch Mansion and Park.
1740.    The assizes were moved to Ipswich because of a smallpox outbreak at Bury St Edmunds.
              The frigate Hampshire was built at St John’s Ness.
1741.    The stage debut of David Garrick (1717-1779) took place, anonymously, at Tacket Street Theatre.
1746.    Thomas Cobbold (1680–1752) moved his brewery from Harwich to The Cliff on the east bank of the Orwell in Ipswich.
1752-59. Sudbury-born painter, Thomas Gainsborough, brought his family to live in Ipswich.
1767.    The first bank was established in Ipswich.
1778.    Joseph Pennington’s map of Ipswich was published.
1779.    The frigate Champion was built at St John’s Ness.
1785.    The act was passed enabling the repair of the road from Ipswich to Great Yarmouth. The Ipswich to South Town [Great Yarmouth] and Bungay Turnpike Trust was inaugurated. (See our Milestones page.)
1786.    The foundation stone for the County Gaol in St Helen’s was laid. (See our County Hall page under 'County and Borough Gaols'.)

1789.     Robert Ransome (1753-1830) came from Norwich to set up his foundry in St Margaret’s Ditches (later Old Foundry Road). (See our Blue plaques page for the plaque to mark this.)
1790s.     Acts were passed for paving, cleansing and lighting of Ipswich streets.
1794.    The Shambles on cornhill was replaced by the short-lived Rotunda. (See our Cornhill page for a pre-1790 painting showing the old Shambles under 'The Cornhill history'.)
1795.     St Matthew’s cavalry barracks had its officers billeted in Berners Street and NCOs (non-commissioned officers) in the slightly less grand houses in High Street.
1798.    Sir Horatio Nelson (1758-1805) purchased Roundwood – on the site of St John’s Primary School – for his wife, Frances, and her father, although Nelson never lived there himself.

1800.    Nelson was chosen as High Steward of Ipswich.
1799.    An act was passed amending the act (1712) for the repair to road to Claydon.
1812.    Removal of the Tudor Market Cross and the Georgian Rotunda (Shambles) from Cornhill. A Palladian Town Hall, forerunner of the present Venetian Gothic one, was built on the site of the Church of St Mildred around 1812. (See our Cornhill page for a pre-1790 painting showing the Market Cross under 'The Cornhill history'.)
1815.    The first steam vessel is seen on the River Orwell. Tavern Street is widened.
1817.    The first gas lighting is installed in Ipswich.
1820.    The Duke of Wellington visited Admiral Benjamin Page (1765-1845), whose house was in Tower Street (site of a commemorative plaque).
1821.    Sir Robert Harland defeats the Duke of Wellington in the election for High Steward.
1835.    The Old Corporation was reformed under the Municipal Corporations Act; Mayor, aldermen and councillors instituted to replace the Portmen, Bailiffs, Burgesses, and Commonalty of the town.
1837.    The Ipswich Dock Act prepares the way for the eventual construction of the Wet Dock, engineered by H.R. Palmer (commemorated by a plaque on Christie's warehouse).
1839-42. The creation of the Wet Dock, all dug by hand, with lock gates half-way up the west quays opening into the freshly-dug New Cut. The 32 acre harbour was the largest Wet Dock in the kingdom.
1844.    The New Custom House was opened on Common Quay on the Wet Dock.
1846.    The Eastern Union Railway links Ipswich with Colchester; the first station opens in Station Street/Croft Street in Over Stoke. The Stoke tunnel was completed in September 1846. The company opened a connecting line to Bury St Edmunds on 7 December 1846. The first Museum was founded in Museum Street.
1849.    The Ipswich to Norwich railway line was opened.
1850.    The Corn Exchange was rebuilt.
1851.    Prince Albert laid the foundation stone of the new Grammar School (‘The Ipswich School’) in Henley Road. (See photographs under 'The Wolsey Gate' on our Curson Lodge page.)
1855.     The last fair was held on the Cornhill. Ipswich Cemetery, lying between Cemetery Road and Cemetery Lane, was consecrated.
1856.    The Corporation Cattle Market moved from Dogs Head Street/Turret Lane to Portman Marshes, to the east of today’s Ipswich Town football ground. (See our Friars Bridge Road page.)
1860.    A new passenger railway station opened on Burrell Road.
1865.    The Venetian Gothic Town Hall was rebuilt and reopened.
1866.    Ipswich goods station opened.
1867.    Ipswich Co-operative Society was set up. Edward White’s map of Ipswich was published.
1868.    Completion of the new Town Hall; the last Borough hustings took place on the Cornhill.
1877.    The Felixstowe Branch Line between Westerfield and Felixstowe Harbour opened, commissioned by Colonel Tomline of Orwell Park.
1880.    Horse-drawn trams made their first appearance in Ipswich. The new Corn Exchange, ‘Exchange Chambers’ in King Street was built.
1881.    27 July 1881: a grand new Post Office was opened on the site of the old Corn Exchange on the east side of Cornhill. Ipswich Museum in High Street was opened, being home to the Victoria Free Library and to the Art School (until Ipswich School of Art and Design next door was opened in 1934). The southern lock into the Wet Dock was officially opened on the same day.
1883.    Ipswich flat races ceased on the Racecourse to the east of the town; the area (and once a pub called The Racecourse, now the site of a supermarket) still bears the name.
1887.    Ipswich football team formed as an amateur club.
1894.    Ipswich Borough acquired Christchurch Mansion and Park.
1898.    Penny omnibuses introduced.

1903.    Opening of the Corporation’s electric power station and tramways station in Constantine Road. Electric trams come into service; to be superceded by trackless trams or trolly buses in the mid-1920s. (See our St Helens Street page under 'Power station, Constatine Road'.)
1906.    Opening of County Hall in St Helens Street.
1909.    Viscount Herbert Kitchener of Khartoum became High Steward of Ipswich. (See Khartoum Road on our Street name derivations page.)
1910.    The Picture House in Tavern Street opened. (See our Wootton's page for a 1958 photograph of the Picture House.)
1912.    The first aircraft landed in Ipswich.
1914.    Creation of the See (the place in which a cathedral church stands, identified as the seat of authority of a bishop) of St Edmundsbury and Ipswich.
1915.    The first World War I air-raid on Ipswich took place on Brooks Hall Road, April 30. (See our Brickyards page under 'Broom Hill Brickyard' for an 1884 map of the road and Brooke's Hall.) The first aeroplane to be made in Ipswich on May 3 brought down a Zeppelin on June 16-17.
1918.    The Corporation planned to build 1,400 houses in Hadleigh Road and Nacton Road.
1925.    Ipswich Corporation Act. Stoke Bridge was erected.
1929.    The Corporation purchased 147 acres beside Nacton Road to create a municipal airport for Ipswich. It was constructed the following year.
1932-3. The Walk was constructed linking Tavern Street and Butter Market. (See our Blue plaques page for images under 'Leslie Barefoot'.)
1935.    Declaration was made of slum-clearance areas.
1936.    Wallis Simpson was granted a decree nisi at the Suffolk Assizes (‘County Hall’) in Ipswich to enable her to marry Edward VIII (later Duke of Windsor). Ipswich Town Football Club turned professional.
1938.    Ipswich Municipal Airport (grass runways) was opened.
1946.    Civil flying resumed at Ipswich Airport.
1953.    Flooding caused extensive damage on January 31. A combination of winds and tidal surge caused damage and deaths internationally.
1957.    The Tollemache and Cobbold & Co. breweries merged to form Tolly Cobbold.
1960.    The Ipswich Society was founded (See details under Links.).
1961.    Ipswich Town Football Club was promoted to the First Division for the first time. The Civic College (later Suffolk College) was opened by Queen Elizabeth II. The last horse trough was removed from the Princes Street/Portman Road junction.
1962.    Ipswich Town F.C. became league champions, managed by Alf Ramsey.
1963.    Trolley buses were withdrawn from Ipswich streets; the internal combustion engine was king.
1963 & 1964. The Beatles played concerts at the Gaumont and brought Ipswich to a halt on both occasions. No doubt the fans listened to every note of the performance.
1965.    The New Towns Act launched an ambitious expansion plan.
1965-7. Civic Drive was created, along with the ill-fated Greyfriars complex.
1967.   April 1: The Jimi Hendrix Experience performed at the Ipswich Gaumont as part of a package tour (including Cat Stevens, Englebert Humberdinck and The Walker Brothers). Footage filmed by a French TV company from the side of the Gaumont (now the Regent) stage was released on YouTube in the 21st century and remastered in 2017: Purple Haze and Wild Thing with a big finish. Mitch Mitchell is seen briefly as Hendrix struggles to remove his jacket. Ipswich audiences can't have known what hit them.
1967.    The 14-storey Civic Centre was opened. The Borough Council largely moved in from the Town Hall.
1968.    Five Iron-Age gold torcs were found during construction of Holcombe Crescent at Chantry/Belstead Hills.
1974.    Reorganisation of local government (following The Local Government Act 1972) led to the amalgamation of East and West Suffolk County Councils and the County Borough of Ipswich. Ipswich lost many of its powers and responsibilities to the newly-formed Suffolk County Council. Ipswich was named the county town and administrative centre of Suffolk.
1975.    The Norman Foster-designed Willis Faber & Dumas building was opened by Harold Macmillan; in 1991 it became the newest Grade I Listed building in Britain. The Corn Exchange was converted into an entertainment complex and the Ipswich Caribbean Association was founded.
1977.    The Queen visited Ipswich as part of her Silver Jubilee celebrations.
1978.    Ipswich Town F.C. won the FA Cup under manager Bobby Robson. The Wolsey Theatre opens on Civic Drive.
1980.    Ipswich Caribbean Association & International Community Centre opened on Woodbridge Road.
1981.    Ipswich Town F.C. won the UEFA Cup under manager Bobby Robson.
1982.    The Orwell Bridge opened; the Ipswich by-pass (A14) was finally completed in 1985. (See our plaques page for more information.) The Ipswich Maritime Festival was held, with an exhibition and visits to the Wet Dock by large sailing vessels; this festival gave rise to the formation of the Ipswich Maritime Trust (see Links).
1984.    Greyfriars complex was largely demolished.
1986.    The £30 million Tower Ramparts shopping centre opened.
1987.    The R. & W. Paul Home Warehouse on Common Quay was refurbished and rebuilt as offices for the Contship company, now Ashton’s solicitors’ offices. October: the great storm affected many parts of the U.K, when 18 people died. 80 knot winds hit Ipswich causing over 200 trees to be uprooted in Christchurch Park, power lines to be cut, damage to property and injury to people.
1992.    Buttermarket Shopping Centre opened. Major archeological discoveries had been made on the site including an intact Anglo-Saxon pottery kiln.
1997.    Ipswich Airport closed, eventually to be developed at Ravenswood housing estate.

2002.    The Queen visited the Wet Dock as part of the Golden Jubilee celebrations to open new walkways on ‘The Waterfont’ and Felaw Maltings. The Cliff Brewery ceased to brew beer.
2006.    Civic Centre closed and Ipswich Borough Council moved its offices from the Birkin Haward-designed block on Civic Drive to Grafton House, Russell Road.
2007.    University Campus Suffolk (UCS) opened with a major building on the Waterfront, bordered by Fore Street and Coprolite Street. The 16th century Curson Lodge was restored by the Ipswich Building Preservation Trust. The 1960s Civic Centre building was sold to developers.
2011.    The University Campus Suffolk new development on the eastern quay, The James Hehir Building, was opened.
2016.    UCS became The University of Suffolk.

See also:
Ipswich invasions timeline to see all the raiders and invaders who attacked Ipswich throughout its history;
Christchurch/Holy Trinity Priory timeline;
Wolsey's College timeline
Kings and Queens timelines (which includes architectural styles);
Historic Maps page for a note about the Ipswich claim to be the earliest continuously settled town in England.
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