Description

WINKLEIGH QUEEN STREET (north side), SS 6308 Winkleigh 11/183 Church House and Almshouses GV II Pair of houses formerly church house and reputedly almshouses. According to sources the church house was built in 1535 at the cost of £28 - 14s - 4d. Restored in late C20. Partly rendered cob and rubble walls. Thatch roof gabled to left end, half- hipped to right. 3 brick stacks: one at left gable-end and 2 axial - the right- hand one larger constructed of older bricks. Plan: the plan has been considerably altered during the late C20 restoration but can be partially deduced from G. W. Copeland's description in "Devonshire Church Houses" written in the mid C20 before the restoration. The building is in fact in 2 distinct parts with the church house section to the left and it is unclear whether the 2 parts are coeval or what was the purpose of the right-hand part which is reputed to have been an almshouse. In the typical form the church house, according to Copeland, consisted of the standard large room on the 1st floor, although more unusually heated by 2 gable-end fireplaces. This room was entered by a doorway on the north, churchyard side. On the ground floor were 2 larger heated rooms, the left-hand one with an oven so presumably the kitchen, and between them was a small store room. This plan also complies with other church houses. The right-hand cottage appears to be of 2-room plan, each heated by a central axial stack with lobby entry in front of it. Exterior: 2 storeys. Asymmetrical 4:2 window front all of late C20 diamond leaded- pane 3-light casements. Church house to left has roughly central C20 plank door under thatch doorhood supported on wooden poles. Almshouse has central C20 plank door, directly in front of axial stack. Rear elevation facing onto a churchyard is virtually blank apart from doorway at right-hand end approached by old granite steps. Interior: Church House only accessible at time of survey. Right-hand room on ground floor has fireplace with chamfered and jewel-stopped wooden lintel. Chamfered unstopped ceiling beams throughout ground floor rooms. Smaller fireplace at right-hand end on 1st floor has cambered wooden lintel, chamfered with similar stops. The fireplaces at the left-hand end survive in more altered forms and may in fact be later insertions. The roof structure has been completely renewed in Church House but imitating an early C17 construction form which apparently it replaces. It is unclear whether the roof in Almshouse was also replaced - if not the C17 structure may survive, and other early features could also exist. Source: G. W. Copeland - "Devonshire Church Houses Part IV "T.D.A."

Listing NGR: SS6329508040

External Links

• Wikidata Q26398526

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