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Summary

Fifteenth century hall house with 17th century and later alterations

Location

Protected Status: none recorded

Other References/Statuses

• Old DCC SMR Ref: SS60SE/93
• Old Listed Building Ref (II): 92962

Monument Type(s) and Dates

• FARMHOUSE (XV to XIX - 1401 AD to 1900 AD (Between))

Full description

Child, P., 1998, Staddon Farmhouse, North Tawton (Correspondence). SDV346847.

Visited 23rd April 1998. The house has a splendid medieval roof with four sets of jointed cruck trusses (very similar to the surviving truss at Incott), face-pegged with slip tenons and block ridges. All these are early features in this type of truss and would almost certainly indicate a 15th century date for the original open hall house. It also has a remarkable fireplace in the hall which reaches to the ceiling and which convincingly appears to have been inserted before the hall was floored in, ie it was a fireplace within an open hall, which is very rare in Devon, or at any rate difficult to prove. The cross passage is lined with two good stud and panel screens. The house is therefore a very good example of a medieval Devon farmhouse with good evidence of evolution through time.

Child, P., 1998, Staddon Farmhouse, North Tawton (Un-published). SDV346849.

The owners say that the four jointed cruck trusses have block apexes and are all smoke blackened. The main range therefore appears to be an early five bay medieval hall house.
The hall now has a granite fireplace which reaches to the ceiling and against which the ceiling beam is butted (now held by metal bracket, but previously apparently by a wooden post). The fireplace has a hollow moulding. This has every appearance of having been a fireplace within an open hall. There is however a fireplace with a similar moulding in the front west wing which therefore may be contemporary (roof not inspected).
The cross passage is flanked by stud and panel screens, the lower with diagonal cut stops but without mason's mitres. The surviving part of the upper screen has mason's mitres but no stops survive.
The ceiling beam in the hall is now plain but in the lower room the ceiling beam has scroll stops.
There is a single storey dairy wing on the noth-west end of the house and a small two-storey wing on the south front of the house at the east end, ie at the further end from the parlour wing. This has a late roof without purlins and cuts into this end of the house where the medieval roof is truncated. The west end of the medieval house has a hip cruck. There is a projecting staircase turret here which divides and serves the room over the parlour as well as the chamber above the inner room. The latter has no fireplace.

English Heritage, 2011, Historic Houses Register (List of Blds of Arch or Historic Interest). SDV346128.

Staddon Farmhouse.
Farmhouse. Seventeenth century very possibly with earlier origins. Rendered cob walls. Thatch roof hipped to left end, gabled to front of wing at right-hand end. Twentieth century brick stack at left gable end and projecting rendered rubble lateral stack at front.
Plan: 3-room and through passage plan, lower room to the left heated by gable end fireplace and hall heated from front lateral stack. Circa late 17th century or 18th century unheated wing built on at the front of the inner room.
Exterior: 2 storeys. Asymmetrical 2-window front of 20th century casements - all 3-light except for central first floor window which is 2-light. Below it is 19th century panelled door to passage. Twentieth century plank door at left end. Wing projects from right-hand end.
Interior: inaccessible at time of survey but very likely to contain early features such as beams open fireplaces and possibly medieval roof trusses.

Sources / Further Reading

Associated Monuments

Associated Finds: none recorded

Associated Events: none recorded

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