The following text is from the original listed building designation:
1. 5275 CATTLE MARKET (West Side)
Nos 6 & 8 TR 3258 1/73
II GV
2. 2 small timber framed early C17 properties refronted in the C18. 2 storeys, one window each, plastered fronts, modern shop windows. No 6 modern casement. No 8 box sash with glazing bars on 1st floor.
Nos 2 to 12 (even) form a group.
Listing NGR: TR3293458200

Description from record TR 35 NW 84:
5275 Nos 6 & 8 Cattle Market (West side) Sandwich TR 3258 1/73 Grade 2. 2 small timber framed early C17 properties refronted in the C18. 2 storeys, one window each, plastered fronts, modern shop windows. No 6modern casement. No 8 box sash with glazing bars on 1st floor. Nos 2 to 12 (even) form a group. (1) "The Mermaids Locker", No 8 Cattle Market, is a long, narrow site, and was probably always a shop. It is timber framed, and was once jettied on the street front, as is shown by a bracket inside the shop. The accommodation in medieval times appears to have been on the ground floor, a shop, a store room, and an open hall at the rear. On the first floor were two rooms, over the shop and store. The premiseswere enlarged in the seventeenth century when an extra room was built at the back, presumably a kitchen as it contains a brick fireplace with the remains of a bread oven. The present building, retains practically all its medieval timber framing intact, including the roof, though of course, it has a modern shop front. The hall is particularly interesting, it has a central tie beam, 9" by 7" near the ends, and slightly cambered in the centre. This is surmounted by a crown post, all sections of which are square,and it is unusually short, being only 2 ft 6 ins high. Above is the usual arrangement of paired rafters with collars, and a collar purlin 3.75" by 6". The rafters average 5.5" by 3.75" and do not overshoot the wall plates, being square ended, and bedded into the wall plates. This was the usual arrangement in town houses where other separately framed buildings were built each side. An interesting feature of the hall is that some time before the insertion of the great fireplace a partition was added on the main tie beam, making half of the hall 'on the shop side' a smoke bay. The reason for this is not quite clear, but it would have enabled the other half of the hall to have a floor inserted, thus providing an additional small room. This practice of changing an open hall to a smoke bay has been noted in East Kent before, notably at Nether Hale in the parish of St Nicholas-at-Wade. The medieval joists between ground and first floors can be felt under cracks in the floorboards, but not enough can be seen to determine theposition of the medieval stairs. This would probably have been in thestore hehind the shop. The shop and building adjoining on the north side - No. 6, is a similar medieval building, but has not so far been examined. The 17th century fireplace in the sitting room is of red brick, with a 9ft beam. The brick jambs and the beam have matching moulding. The old hall would have been rather striking originally, asthe central tie beam and great curved braces rising from the great posts, and meeting in the centre like a great Gothic arch. These braces are 12ins by 4ins in section, and the moulding is carried down on to the posts to the ground level. (2)

A watching brief to the rear of the properties revealed a C19 cross wall, 2 medieval clay dump layers (1 C16-17), a medieval broad foundation raft (C16) and a clay floor layer (LC15/EC16). (3)

Historic England archive material:BF039744 8 CATTLE MARKET, SANDWICH BF110907 The Sandwich Project

English Heritage, List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest (Map). SKE16160.

<1> DOE(HHR) Dist of Dover Kent 1976 13 (OS Card Reference). SKE40951.

<2> Typescript notes unpublished (E W Parkin) (OS Card Reference). SKE50692.

<3> Dover Archaeological Group, 1994, Watching Brief at 6 Cattle Market, Sandwich (Unpublished document). SKE16296.