Description

WHIMPLE THE GREEN, (west side), Whimple
SY 0497-0597
10/216 Fordton Farmhouse
15.ll.82
GV II*

Small former farmhouse. Early C16 with major later C16 and C17 improvements,
modernised circa 1981. Plastered cob on stone rubble footings; stone rubble and cob
stacks topped with C19 brick; thatch roof.
Plan and development: 3-room-and-through-passage plan house facing south-south-
east, say south. At the right (east) end is an inner room parlour with a projecting
gable-end stack. Next to it is the hall with a projecting front lateral stack. At
the left (west) end is a narrow unheated service end room, now used as a kitchen.
The original house was essentially the same size and had the same plan as the
present house but it was then open to the roof from end to end, divided by low
partition screens and heated by an open hearth fire. Probably around the mid C16
the inner room was floored with the chamber jettying into the open hall. It is not
clear when the lower end was floored over but presumably there was a chamber there
by the circa 1600. According to the detail of the hall fireplace the hall stack was
inserted in the early - mid C17 and the hall was floored over about the same time or
maybe a little later. In the late C17 the inner room end was rebuilt as a parlour
with master chamber over and given a new stack. The winder stair in the hall
probably dates from the same time. The rear outshots include a mid - later C17
bakehouse with the remains of the stack.
House is 2 storeys with secondary outshots to rear.
Exterior: irregular 3-window front of circa 1981 uPVC casements with leaded diamond
pane effect. The passage front doorway is left of centre and it contains a late C19
6-panel door behind a contemporary gabled porch with wavy bargeboards and trellis
sides. The main roof is half-hipped to right and gable-ended to right.
Good interior: no carpentry detail is exposed in the present kitchen/former service
end room and the lower side passage screen is C20 and made up from pieces of old
timber. The upper passage screen however is probably an original low partition
screen; an oak plank-and-muntin screen with an unusual sequence of carpenter's
assembly marks. It is much restored and the planks have been removed. In the
former hall, at the upper end, there is another oak plank-and-muntin screen. Its
muntins are chamfered with cut diagonal stops high enough to accommodate a bench
below. This screen is probably mid C16 and associated with the flooring over of the
inner room; the screen includes 2 doorways and the left one (blocked with boards in
the late C17) was presumably a stair door. The hall fireplace is stone rubble, much
patched with C19 brick, and its oak lintel is ovolo-moulded with scroll stops. The
hall crossbeam has double ovolo-mouldings with runout stops. The oak-framed winder
stair is probably late C17. The features of the inner room parlour end are all late
C17. The parlour axial beam is roughly chamfered. The fireplace is limestone with
curving brick pentan (back) and plain oak lintel. Alongside to right is a cupboard
with fielded panel doors. In the chamber above a small fireplace maybe original.
Alongside to right is a blocked late C17 window; 2-lights with flat-faced mullion.
The doorway contains a 2-fielded panel door. A plank door in the service end is
hung on mid C17 ornamental wrought iron strap hinges.
The roof is mostly original. It is 2 long bays with a central side-pegged jointed
cruck truss of large scantling. There is a hip cruck at the service end. There is
a mortise at the inner end of the ridge for another hip cruck but the roof this end
was altered when the end stack was built. Another side-pegged jointed cruck was
erected there. This late C17 truss is clean but the rest of the structure including
a complete set of common rafters, battens and the underside of the thatch at the
front are heavily smoke-blackened from the original open hearth fire.
Fordton is a very well preserved and an unusually small example of a late medieval
farmhouse. The AFU record (see below) was made before tne 1981 modernisation and
then there was a couple of interesting features which no longer remain. There was a
plank door to the cupboard under the hall stair which was inscribed RN 1745. More
interesting was an original oak window in the back wall of the hall which was
blocked by the hall first floor structure. It had survived virtually intact. It
was unglazed, 4 lights with chamfered mullions and trefoil heads cut into the
headbeam. A 2-tier effect was made by a board with trefoil heads applied across the
inside face.
Source: Exeter Museums Archaeological Field Unit archive record dated June 1981 by
John R.L. Thorp includes measured ground plan, long elevation and details.

Listing NGR: SY0416497528

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q17546725

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

• 
  [(Cumberland and Westmorland)] [By (author) Nikolaus Pevsner] published on (January, 1967)
• 
  Harrow on the Hill: A photographic portrayal of listed buildings and structures (Historic Buildings Picture Guides)
• 
  Berkshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Gloucestershire 1: The Cotswolds: Cotswolds Pt. 1 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Central Leinster: Kildare, Laois and Offaly (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of Ireland)
• 
  Pioneers of Modern Design: From William Morris to Walter Gropius (Penguin Art & Architecture)