Description

WEST MALLING

TQ6757 NORMAN ROAD
1156-0/2/118 No.91
Puckle Cottage

II

Cottage, formerly Pest House and later 2 cottages. Earliest
part comprising 1 room on ground floor and one on 1st floor
was built as a Pest House c1760 after a plague in 1756 which
killed 64 people in one week in the town and the building was
isolated 1/4 mile from the town. This was extended soon
afterwards to add 2 more rooms, then in the late C18 an
adjoining 2-up 2-down cottage was built and the whole now
forms an L-shape. Timber-framed building clad mainly in
weatherboarding with stone and red brick to ground floor and
right end, and tiled roof with 2 brick chimneystacks. Front
has 3 windows with a 12-pane sash, a 9-pane sash and a central
sliding casement. Ground floor has C20 modern window, C20 door
and French window. Right side elevation has 1 sash to ground
floor and extension with 2 casements and left side mid C19
doorcase with penticed weather hood on brackets and 4-panelled
door, the top 2 panels glazed. The rear elevation has a
weatherboarded mid-C19 outshut with 1 sash with 4 panes, a
casement and C20 plank door.
Interior has a dining toom ceiling with criss-cross timbers
including sections of hop poles and pieces of reused timbers,
showing the Pest House was erected in haste and at minimum
cost. A plank in the kitchen has the Roman numerals VI to XI
in foot measurements and was obviously an C18 measuring rule.
This was removed from the 1st floor. 4-plank doors. The 1st
floor room above formerly had carvings of names from 1763 on
the original doors but these were destroyed in a fire in 1979.
By the time of the Tithe Map survey of 1841 the building was
no longer in use as a Pest House but was occupied by 2
labourers and their families and known as Pest House Cottages.
History of building researched and included in a report by Mr
Vernon Leonard, a former owner of the building.

Listing NGR: TQ6747757877

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26513400

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

• 
  Devon (Pevsner Buildings of England)
• 
  Somerset: North and Bristol: The Buildings of England (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Devon (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  The green guide for historic buildings: how to improve the environmental performance of listed and historic buildings
• 
  Period property manual, victorian house manual 2 books collection set by ian rock
• 
  This Old House: Restoring, Rehabilitating, and Renovating an Older House