In 1929 many old buildings were demolished to make way for the Wire Street Arcade. Demolitions also occurred at Smith's Yard and Albion Court. Besides the trenches cut for foundations of the arcade there was an extensive lowering of the surface over much of the area. These operations were observed by Mr E.J. Rudsdale for the Museum. <1> The main discovery was the Roman Street, south of which lat the remains of Roman houses at a depth of 4ft and two red tessellated pavements. A plan of Rudsdales observations is reproduced in Hull's 'Roman Colchester'. <2> In his report Rudsdale further mentions that under the east gutter of Wire Street two walls were found at right angles, bounding a concrete floor, one running N-S, the other E-W. The extent of the floor could not be followed, against the N-S wall was a pila of eight tiles, 8" square.