Description
Two storey, two cell building with front lateral stack and oven, the front elevation angled slightly to the line of the road. The southeast end has a single storey porch on angled pillars, which butts onto a stair turret which is rounded, then rectangular, in external plan. The rectangular part is built against the two storey rear wing, which is essentially a single cell. A lean-to is set against the north end of this wing wall, with a small porch on the southwest end. The northwest end has an axial stack and an outbuilding which is set slightly back from the line of the front. On the rear elevation a single storey lean-to passage provides cover from the house to a garden store, which is a single storey lean-to on the larger gabled outbuilding.
The house and wing are gabled, with a hip at the southeast end of the house, but a small gable is apparent above this. The front first floor window is a gable dormer, the walls have probably been raised. The roof continues down over the stair turrets, and both the bathroom and bedroom windows are raked dormers.
Roof of house double roman tiles with matching ridge. Southeast hip, plain ridge tiles. Small southeast gable boarded. Oven roofed with neatly shaped slates. Wing as house. Kitchen lean-to roofed with corrugated "Onduline".
Stone walls, mainly waterworn rubble with some blue lias, and slightly larger material in the quoins. Segmental arch over dining room window in front elevation. Southeast ground floor window with brick jambs. Remnants of paint suggest that the walls were once whitened.
The porch has three rubble stone pillars and segmental stone flattened arches, the southeast opening is blocked with hit and miss boarding. Wing has similar walls but jambs and arches are brick, as is the quoin near the north junction with the house. The chimney flue shows in the wall and has been rebuilt with brick. The window sills are slate. Kitchen lean-to of brick.
The house seems to contain the hall and parlour ( or inner room) of the 16c/ early 17c three room cross-passage house typical of Bossington. If it was so then the lower room and cross-passage, to which the blocked doorway in the sitting room would have given access, must have been removed before the drawing up of the Tithe Map in 1841. The rear wing certainly existed then, and may have replaced the lower end.
Mrs Wood ( tenant at time of survey) told us that the house was renovated for her father's mother, when she moved down from London. Her father was a "nipper" when they moved in. He remembered that it took eighteen months for the house to be ready, and the men did a lot of woodwork - presumably the many wooden partitions in the house. He died in 1985 aged 81, so was born around 1904. These renovations must then date soon after this.
House built late 16c, possibly three cell and cross-passage of which only the hall and inner room survive. Alternatively it may have been built as a two cell house and the blocked door in the south wall which could have given access to the cross-passage ,may have been a new addition with the re-building of that wall. The extraordinary thickness of the south part of the rear wall ( 0.7m enlarging to 1.05m) suggests that the original building may have been late medieval, and this is the last vestige of it. The external walls have been raised, and there are remains of thatch on the ceilings, so the roof was thatched with a half-hip at the north end, later it was swept round the south corner and along the wing. The circular stair turret gave access to the first floor.
If there was a lower room and cross-passage they were removed in the late 18c/ early 19c, and the rear wing added. This may have been a separate cottage, as it seems to have had a separate stair turret with rectangular external plan. If the house and wing had one tenant, then the second stair turret would give access to the wing rooms, and the rear wall of the house still divided it from the first floor.
In the late 19c/ early 20c a marble surround and mantelpiece were put in, possibly in the dining room. The house was renovated, and a great deal of woodwork done. The present stairs probably date to this time, with the board partitions and the removal of the south end of the rear wall of the house from the first floor upwards. The two bedroom fireplaces belong to this renovation, and possibly the wing stack.
The open fireplace in sitting room blocked in 1920s/ 1930s, and the marble surround put in front. If this did not come from dining room, it may have been moved from elsewhere on the estate. The Acland family certainly provided several houses on both estates with these surrounds. The present fireplace in dining room was put in. The larder ( in the wing) was halved in size in the 1980s, part became the present coat cupboard, a new partition was put in and the rest enlarged the kitchen.
Important Features:
External appearance with front lateral stack ( 16c/17c), oven and stair turrets.
Mullioned window in south end of front ( 16c/17c).
Chamfered beams in living room and dining room ( stops visible in dining room) late 16c.
Open fireplace ( now blocked) in living room, with marble surround.
Early 20c fireplaces in bedrooms H and K.
In a good state of repair.
Outbuildings:
Wood/ Coal Shed: Single storey outbuilding on north end of house, ridge lower, gable-ended, with garage lean-to on west side. Roof of double roman tiles with matching ridge tiles. Walls of rubble stone, waterworn, larger squared stones in quoins, roughly coursed. 18c/ early 19c, possibly on 1809-12 Holnicote Estate map but indistinct. Shown on 1841 Porlock Tithe map. Important features: external appearance, roof structure, cobbled floor. In a fair state of repair.
Garage/ Trap house, now store/ garden shed: Lean to on west wall of above, roof catslide. Continues to wing of house as corridor lean-to on west wall of house. Roof of double roman tiles, walls vertical split planks on frame, lined with felt. Not marked on OS Somerset sheet XXXIV.2, but shown on revised 2nd edition. Important feature: large door. In a fair state of repair.
Garage: Large garage with double doors, ridge offset to east, walls on stone plinth. Hit and miss planking walls. Erected 1992. In a good state of repair.
The house was recorded as part of the Holnicote Estate Survey in 2001 and is described as 'an L-shaped building, two storey with tiled roof and external front stack with oven. It is probably a combination of parts of two houses. Front range possibly the hall and inner room of a late16c-early 17c house, with a stair turret in the south east corner while rear wing is possibly a rebuilt remnant of another house. It has a square stair turret butting onto the rounded turret of the front range. An agricultural building butts onto the north gable of the house. Roof timbers replaced, but not similar on the two parts of the buildings. Beams and ovolo moulded window suggest the dating.' [2]