Description

SY 08 NE NEWTON POPPLEFORD HIGH STREET, AND HARPFORD Newton Poppleford 5/70 Nos 1 and 2 Church Green 30.6.61 Cottages

GV II 2 cottages, occupying part of an original larger house. Late c15-early C16 with major later C16 and C17 improvements, subdivided in late C18 or C19. Plastered cob on stone rubble footings; stone rubble and brick stacks topped with C19 and C20 brick; thatch roof, slate to service extension of No.1. 2 cottages facing north. No.1 occupied the 2-room inner room end to the left (east) and No.2 occupies the hall and through-passage of the original 3-, later 4-room-and- through-passage plan house. The service end adjoining to right (west) has been demolished and completely rebuilt. The hall (No.2) has a large projecting front lateral stack. Of the 2 rooms of No.1 the inner has a brick rear lateral stack (probably a C19 rebuild of the original) and the outer room a late C18-early C19 end stack. The inner room also contains a rear projecting newel turret. There is a C19 single storey service outshot projecting at right angles to rear of the outer room serving No.1. In No.2 the kitchen has been contrived into the rear section of the hall. Main block is now 2 storeys throughout. Overall irregular 4-window front of various C19 and C20 casements with glazing bars. The doorway to No.1 is towards the left end and has a C17 oak frame with chamfered surround and worn (probably scroll) stops. It contains C20 door and semi-conical thatch hood. The front passage door to No.2 at the right end is C20. The large hall stack is plastered but may be ashlar stone since it has weathered offsets. The shaft has been replaced with brick. The roof is hipped to left and joins the roof of the adjoining house to right. The rear wall includes the remains of a tiny unglazed C17 oak 2-light window frame with ovolo-moulded mullions under the eaves in the main inner room chamber (No.1). Good interior of a house with a long structural history. The oldest feature exposed is the roof truss at the upper end of the hall, now closed and forming the party wall between the 2 cottages. It is probably a jointed cruck but the lower parts are plastered over. Only the apex is exposed in the roofspace but this is enough to show that it is late C15-early C16. The principals are held together here by a yoke and the ends finished to clasp a square-set ridge purlin (Alcock's apex type H). It is smoke-blackened on both sides indicating that the late C15-early C16 house was open from end to end, divided by low partition screens and heated by an open hearth fire. One of these low partition screens probably survives at the upper end of the hall but is mostly hidden. Only at the rear end on the hall side is a shoulded- headed doorway exposed but an oak plank-and-muntin screen may be assumed. Between the passage and the hall (in No.2) the head beam of another oak plank-and-muntin screen shows and more of the screen may survive plastered over towards the rear. The inner room (No.1) was floored over first and the chamber was jettied over the screen into the hall. On the hall side the large oak floor joists project with rounded ends to carry the bressumer of the large-framed crosswall which infilled the original truss. This probably took place in the mid C16. The crossbeam exposed in No. 1 is of large scantling and soffit-chamfered with runout stops. The fireplaces were probably added in the late C16. That in No. 1 is blocked (and probably rebuilt) but the hall fireplace in No. 2 is exposed. It is large with Beerstone ashlar sides, one containing a tiny fire-window light, and oak soffit- chamfered lintel. The hall was floored over about the same time or a little later. It has an intersecting beam ceiling with broad soffit-chamfers. The joists in each panel run in opposite directions to those in the neighbouring panels. 6 of the 9 panels are exposed. The rest of the roof structure over the hall and passage was replaced in the C18 and C19. It seems that the inner room end (No. 1) was extended from 1 to 2 rooms in the early C17. There is an oak crank-headed doorframe of that date in the rear wall from the outer room to the later service extension. The roof truss over the inner room is also of this date, a side-pegged jointed cruck with pegged and dovetail-shaped lap- jointed collar. The inner first floor chamber has a relatively simple early C17 ceiling of ornamental plasterwork. There is a hand-run reeded cornice and similarly-moulded ribs making diagonal crosses and the spaces filled with moulded plaster thistle motifs. The proximity of these cottages to the church and the relatively high standard of craftsmanship suggests that this was a church house. However the moulded plaster diagonal crosses and thistle motifs surely suggest St Andrew rather than St Luke.

Listing NGR: SY0853989731

External Links

• Wikidata Q26434182

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Recommended Books

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  Berkshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
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  Bristol (Pevsner Architectural Guides: City Guides)
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  Somerset: North and Bristol: The Buildings of England (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
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  Bedfordshire, Huntingdonshire, and Peterborough (Pevsner Architectural Guides): Written by Charles O'Brien, 2014 Edition, Publisher: Yale University Press [Hardcover]
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  Yorkshire West Riding: Sheffield and the South (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
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  Kent: North East and East (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)