Summary

This is the site of Stowe Barton Mansion.

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Most Recent Monitoring

None Recorded

Monument Types

Description

Old Stowe House has been described by Dew (1926) as a "huge rambling building, half castle, half dwelling house with quaint terraces, statues, knots of flowers, clipped yews and hollies". It was the ancestral home of the Granville family, and was demolished by John Granville, Earl of Bath in 1680 to be replaced by another building demolished soon after in 1739. This latter building was not considered to have been an architectural triumph; Hawker described it as a huge Palladiam pile bedizened with every monstrosity of bad taste …. Like most other things that owed their existence to the Stuarts it arose only to fall again". The staircase from the later house survives at Prideaux Place, Padstow, while the cedar wood of the chapel was bought by Lord Cobham for his mansion of Stowe in Buckinghamshire. Gascoyne's plan of 1693 shows that later house, with ornate gardens, fishponds, stables and outhouses, a tennis court was also included in the complex. Fields close to the house were apparently under cultivation. Earthworks visible today represent a number of phases of buildings and the gardens (National Trust 1985).

Summary of Prliminary Report from 1996 Geophysical Surveys:
1-5 July 1996 the Department of Archaeological Sciences conducted geophysical surveys at Stowe Barton, North Cornwall; the property is under the ownership of the National Trust. The field team was as follows: A. Schmidt, M. Griffith, F. Scully, T. Sutherland and M. Whittingham. Background information on the site, its history and previous earthwork surveys was published by Wilson-North in 1993. The aerial photograph relevant for this site is indexed as F26/23/SS213113. This report includes a copy of the earth work survey which indicates where the geophysical surveys were undertaken.

The surveyed areas are as follows
Area A: This area covers the lower lying field east of the retaining wall and south of the farmhouse, including a paddock and the farms garden.

Area B: The site of the now demolished 1670s house.

Area C: A ditch north of the enclosing wall.

Area D: Northern Platform.

Area E: The non-sloping area in Chapel field, near the road.

Summary of results:
In area A little more than an indication for a gatehouse was discovered. This rules out any theory that would suspect the remains of the earlier house (Elizabethan) under the current surface of the area. The surveys of the great house show the basic outline of its foundations. The partition of the basement cannot be revealed. However, an indication for the external stairways was discovered. The pseudo-section in area C did not indicate any buried substructure below the ditch. The ditch may, for example, have served as a Ha-Ha. Since the wall associated with the 1670s house, intersects the ditch, the ditch must predate the wall and hence the great house. Area D is difficult to interpret from the current results. It seems to be a mixture of garden features, a pond or reservoir for the fountain and subsurface geology. Area E indicates some remains not directly related to the artificial banks.

The report lists suggestions for further work including geophysical surveying, excavations, and other surveys.

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