Description

SS 92 SE MOREBATH

6/115 Holwell Farmhouse
-

GV II

Farmhouse. Circa early C16 origins, remodelled in the late C16/early C17, some late
C18 refurbishment. C20 renovations. Whitewashed rendered cob and stone; slate roof
(formerly thatched), gabled at ends; axial stack with brick shaft, stone stack at
right end.
Plan: Present plan 3 room and passage arrangement; hall stack away from passage,
unheated inner room, heated lower end room to right, gabled rear stair wing to rear
of passage, rear left and right outshuts. The origins of the house are a late
medieval open hall which extended from the left end of the range at least as far as
the axial stack. This building appears to have been divided into 2 rooms with 2 open
hearths. In the circa late C16 the building was floored and either remodelled or
extended to the right of the inserted axial stack giving the present main range
arrangement with its unusually large inner room. The rear outshuts are probably C18
in date and the lower end room was refurbished in the circa late C18. A short
section of the inner room, immediately to the rear of the hall stack, has been
partitioned off and subdivided between a store room to the rear and a small unheated
chamber to the front.
Exterior: 2 storeys. Asymmetrical 5 window front with a circa early C17 panelled
studded door to the passage to right of centre, some of the panels replaced with
glazing, ovolo-moulded stopped doorframe; C20 door to left into inner room. 3- and
4-light casements with C19 or C20 glazing, the hall and lower room windows with
probably C18 frames (Hulland). The rear elevation has a 3-light ovolo-moulded timber
mullioned stair window.
Interior: Good survival of carpentry and joinery. The inner room and hall have
deeply-chamfered step-stopped crossbeams. The hall has a large open fireplace with a
chamfered lintel; hearth seats and a bread oven; the fireplace lintel is carried over
a cream oven at the left end. The lower end room has no exposed beams but a probably
late C18 decorated plaster cornice and an open-fronted china cupboard. Stair to rear
of passage divides at landing: turned balusters and open string, probably mid/late
C17. 1 first floor chamfered stopped doorframe and several doors (first and ground
floor) with HL hinges.
Roof: 2 smoke-blackened jointed cruck roof trusses over left end of range with a
sooted ridge. The apex of the left hand truss has wattle and daub infill which is
sooted on both sides, the infill is fixed to nailed studs and evidently extended
below the collar at one time. Trusses to the right of the stack not seen at time of
survey (1986) but described by Hulland as clean A frames "with typical curved end
collars of C17".

Hulland, Charles "Holywell, Morebath" survey record including ground plan deposited
in West Country Studies Library.

Listing NGR: SS9654023278

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26462699

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  Nottinghamshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Kent: West and the Weald: The Buildings of England (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Period property manual, victorian house manual 2 books collection set by ian rock
• 
  The Listed Buildings and Other Principal Structures at the Royal Gunpowder Mills Waltham Abbey
• 
  This Old House: Restoring, Rehabilitating, and Renovating an Older House
• 
  Suffolk: East (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)