Isolda Parewastel was a remarkable woman. She travelled on Pilgrimage to the Holy land in 1361, staying there for three years. In 1365 the arrival of a Christian crusade prompted Islamic reprisals on Pilgrims and Isolda was forced to flee. In 1366 she presented a petition to the Pope in Avignon stating that before she had been captured and tortured by some Saracens, when she was stripped and left upside down on a rack and beaten before she managed to escape. She asked the pope to build a new chapel in Bridgwater, although he permitted just a new altar to be established in the Parish Church.
Isolda Parewastel had property in what is now Clare Street. Her plaque is attached to one of the medieval houses that survive here, albeit one heavily modified over the centuries.
Clare Street has been called many things. For a long time it was known as Back Street, simply because it was behind the High Street. The oldest reference to it calls it Oreloue or Horlokes Street, named after the family of Ordlof/Orloc who lived in the town. This today is recalled in Penel Orlieu where Penel Street (named after another prominent family, and is now Market Street) met Oreloue Street. Clare Street emerged at the end of the nineteenth century, and refers to the Royal Clarence Hotel building of High Street, which backs onto it.