Summary

Pair of very simple, vernacular, early C19 labourers' cottages.

Description

MATERIALS
Red and yellow brick (thought to be locally made) laid in English garden wall bond. Pantile roof, angular clay ridge tiles.

PLAN
Single depth, mirrored pair with entrances together and stacks to the gable ends. The entrance to each cottage opens onto a small lobby with a demountable ladder stair giving access, via a trap door, to the upper floor. To the rear is a small pantry; to the side, the single heated room. The upper floor of each cottage is divided into two directly connecting rooms.

EXTERIOR
Front (south): Ledged and braced plank doors beneath inserted concrete lintles that infill segmental brick arches with flat heads. That to the eastern cottage with a C20 timber porch. Windows (each cottage with two to attic floor, one to ground floor) lack lintles and at the time of the inspection survive in varying states of disrepair. Those to the eastern cottage have been replaced with some alterations to openings, those to the western cottage generally retain multipane Yorkshire sashes with slim glazing bars of a pattern typically dating locally to around 1810 onwards. Dog tooth eaves course, modern gutters.
Gable ends: Central, truncated, ridge stack flanked by small attic windows. Plain verges. East gable has scaring from a now removed C20 lean-to.
Rear: Blind except for two side hung, multipane pantry windows beneath segmental brick arches.

INTERIOR
Each cottage has a chamfered beam supporting the attic floor joists, although both have runout stops at one end only, possibly suggesting that it was a longer reused beam that was cut in half. East cottage at least has broad attic floorboards. Doors are planked, some with regular, narrow planks (typical of C19 date), others (particularily the trap doors) include mixed sized, broad planks more typical of early C19 or C18 date. Some retain original strap hinges although all appear to have been rehung. Both cottages retain simply constructed, demountable ladder staircases for access to the upper floor. The west cottage has a 1950s tile fireplace, the east cottage a small Edwardian cast iron range, both served by straight flues. Clasped purlin roof structure with nailed rather than pegged joints with rough hewn timber for rafters and sawn timber for other elements. Principal rafters are little different to the jack rafters, and are coupled by deep, high set collars. Rafters are oversailed by laths which are rendered internally with lime and horse hair.

History

The pair of cottages, 12-14 Old Post Office Lane, are thought to be early C19 in date, based on the materials used and the style of construction (see details below). The building is possibly shown on an 1820 map of the Barnetby Manor and Estate reproduced in Aspects of the History of Barnetby-le-Wold 1766 to 1901, published by The Barnetby Branch of the Workers’ Educational Association in 1983. The building is certainly thought to date to before 1848 and the coming of the railway which led to an expansion of Barnetby using imported brick and slate. The cottages were probably built as agricultural labourers' dwellings as a response to improved local economic conditions in the years following the parliamentary enclosure of Barnetby's open fields which occurred in 1768. The cottages are first shown on the first edition Ordnance Survey map published in 1887. They were inhabited up until the 1970s and early 1980s and have subsequently been used for storage.

Reasons for Listing

This pair of very simple, vernacular, early C19 labourers' cottages is designated at Grade II for the following principal reasons:
* Rarity: This pair of cottages represent a very rare survival of what was the typical standard of rural housing in the early C19.
* Plan: The very simple, unaltered plan form, especially the ladder staircases, is of particular note.
* Vernacular architecture: A good example of simple vernacular building construction.

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26675397

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Selected Sources

• WEA, Barnetby Branch, Aspects of the History of Barnetby-le-Wold 1766, (1983)

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