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Summary

A well-preserved late medieval house.

Location

Protected Status

• Listed Building (II*) 1207782: KIRKHAM HOUSE
• Listed Building (II*) 1207782: KIRKHAM HOUSE
• Listed Building (II) 1298318: WALLS AND PUMP TO SOUTH OF KIRKHAM HOUSE
• Listed Building (II*) 1207782: KIRKHAM HOUSE
• Listed Building (II*) 1207782: KIRKHAM HOUSE

Other References/Statuses

• Old DCC SMR Ref: SX86SE/4
• Torbay HER: MTO8875

Monument Type(s) and Dates

• HOUSE (Built, Late Medieval - 1401 AD (Between) to 1539 AD (Between))

Full description

Torbay HER record (SMR record). SDV361984.

This well preserved late medieval town house is situated at the northern edge of medieval Paignton. Its early history and precise date are still uncertain. The mouldings on the woodwork suggest the late fourteenth century but other details may point to a slightly later date; they may, in fact, be an early modificaiton. The name Kirkham 's Hill (or Kirkham's Hall) seems to have attached itself to the building before the street aquired its present name. There is no documentary evidence to support the suggestion that it was a priest's house, nor is the plan of the house inconsistent with the house of a prosperous tradesman. From some point in the (?)19th century until the 1950s the building was divided into two cottages. Visited by an OS fieldworker in 1952 it was described as derelict and in a poor state. [1]
It was left to the nation by its last owner Mrs Ada Frances Jennings, with £9,000 for its maintenance, and restored in 1960 with the removal of the cottage divisions by the then Ministry of Public Buildings and Works (MPBW) and administered as a Property in Care by its Ancient Monuments Division. The repair works on behalf of the Ministry were exemplary of their time. Its administration was taken over by the Department of Environment in 1973 and passed to English Heritage in 1985.

The building is of local red sandstone conglomerate (breccia) and exhibits a traditional three-room plan but is otherwise a fine and unusual example of a small-scale but high-quality medieval house with unusually grand provision for eating and washing. The twelve-arched doorway in the north wall is 1.2 metres wide and 2.2 metres high.The wooden mullioned windows are all restored although the ogee-headed oak front door is original. The much restored roof is of slate, with chimney stacks of stone with rhomboidal caps. The roof consists of two types of trusses. Some A-frame trusses, the principals having curved feet, and the others, unusual for Devon, having ashlar pieces and sole plates. There is a screens passage with a pebble floor and well preserved stud-and-panel screens with shouldered-headed arches. On either side are the hall and parlour. The moulded beams and stone-hooded fireplaces with embattled cresting (also originally a stone laver in each room) are also signs of a house of some consequence. Part of the open hall is filled by an upper chamber jettied out over the screens passage - a later addition. The room beyond the hall is unheated; the kitchen was a separate building at the back of which the foundations remain. The three chambers on the upper floor are reached by a reconstructed staircase and a timber gallery in an extension along the back of the house. The room over the parlour has a hooded fireplace, the room at the opposite end a simpler fireplace on the end wall, and a corner garderobe. A remarkable feature of the interior was the provision for domestic piscinas. There were originally two, one in the hall and one in the parlour with some evidence that they were fed from lead tanks in the outshut. Regrettably, in 1910 it was decided that they were of ecclesiastical origin and were removed, one to the vestry of the parish church of St John the Baptist and the other to the parish church of Goodrington. [2]

The house was imaginatively furnished in 1980-1 with modern craftsman's work, commissioned to display traditional English timber and joinery techniques. [4] The list description is at [5]

A Watching brief was undertaken by Exeter Archaeology during the excavation of observe test pits in 1998 - nothing of significance was observed. [6]

The management of this site is to be transferred from English Heritage to the Paignton Preservation Society (2001).

Waterfield, R., 1932, Proceedings at the Seventy-First Annual Meeting, held at Paignton, 20th to 24th June, 1932, 37 (Article in Serial). SDV362423.

Some old buildings at the east end of Kirkham Street which contain some medieval doorways and fireplace. They are suggested to be part of a monastic cell; according to tradition the monks who lived here were employed in baking bread.

Cherry, B. + Pevsner, N., 1989, The Buildings of England: Devon, 841 (Monograph). SDV325629.

Kirkham House dates to the late medieval period. It was restored by the Department of Environment in 1960.
Traditional three room plan, with details suggesting that it was a house of superior status.
See entry for full details.

Ordnance Survey, 2024, Mastermap 2024 (Cartographic). SDV365834.

Kirkham House, marked as a museum.

<1> Ordnance Survey, 1952, Archaeological Observations, SX88586099 (Personal Comment). SDV362057.

X

<2> Ministry of Public Buildings and Works, 1963, Kirkham House, Paignton, Devon (Pamphlet). SDV362180.

X

<4> English Heritage, 1985, Kirkham House (Pamphlet). SDV362179.

X

<5> Department of National Heritage, 1993, Revised List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest, p.53-4; 1947-1/5/41 (List of Blds of Arch or Historic Interest). SDV362109.

X

<6> Dyer, M. J., Archaeological Observation at Kirkham House, Paignton (* Torbay Report - Interim/Research/Specialist). SDV362342.

X

Sources / Further Reading

Associated Monuments

Associated Finds: none recorded

Associated Events

• EDV7826 - Site visits by V. Fiorato - 1999
• EDV7901 - Archaeological Observations at Kirkham House, Paignton 1998
• EDV7953 - Site Visits by OS Fieldworker - Nov 1952

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