Listing Text

TIVERTON

SS9512 ST PAUL'S STREET, Tiverton
848-1/6/275 (South side)
14/12/72 Nos.4-18 (Even)
(Formerly Listed as:
ST PAUL'S STREET
Nos.1 to 17 (odd), Nos.4 to 18
(even))

GV II

Terrace of 8 middle-class houses, No.4 truncated at east end,
the original No.2 presumably demolished. Architect unknown to
date. The houses were erected in the 1860s by Caroline Brewin,
John Heathcoat's daughter, married to Heathcoat's business
partner, Ambrose Brewin. The rentals were intended to endow
the church of St Paul's built at the end of the street on a
site donated by John Heathcoat. The income from the houses was
covenanted to the church.
MATERIALS: Flemish bond yellow brick, rear elevations
roughcast but are probably purple stone rubble with brick
dressings, matching those on the other side of the street;
natural slate roofs; cast-iron window sills, probably made in
the Heathcoat foundry; stacks with brick shafts and tapering
yellow chimney-pots; cast-iron rainwater goods with downpipes
recessed in chases in the front wall. No.4 has had its left
end bay knocked off and replaced with a C20 single-storey
shop.
PLAN: one of two terraces, lining St Paul's Street and
conceived architecturally as a sight-line to St Paul's Church,
which stands at the west end of the street. The west end
corner is recessed and rounded but this is included with
Nos 35-41 (odd) Church Street (qv). Each house is
double-fronted with end stacks and a central entrance.
The original plan was probably the same as Nos 1-17 (odd) - 2
principal front rooms with a central passage, originally
ending in the stair; rear left kitchen, rear right scullery
and pantry; rear courtyard bounded by stone rubble wall
contains laundry and lavatory.
The rear service yards and buildings have not been preserved
on this side of the street.
EXTERIOR: 2 storeys and attic. Each house has a symmetrical
3-bay front with deep boxed eaves and a central, recessed,
round-headed doorway with rusticated surround and incised
Greek key on the doorcase. 4-panel door with fanlight with
spoke glazing bars. Outer windows are 16-pane hornless sashes,
the central first-floor window is a 12-pane sash. Original
attic dormers, 2 to each house, are gabled with slate-hung
sides, plain bargeboards and glazed with 2-light casements, 2
panes per light. Rear elevation of the terrace preserves most
of the original 16-pane sashes.
INTERIOR: not inspected, but see Nos 1-17 (odd).
HISTORY: These houses have sometimes been confused with
Heathcoat's industrial housing for lace makers and other
workers in Tiverton. Visually they are connected to the
industrial housing as relatively plain, although very late
versions of the simple Georgian style favoured by Heathcoat,
and they do have the cast-iron window sills that characterise
many of the factory-workers' housing and which were probably
made in the Heathcoat foundry. Brayshay, however, reports that
there is no evidence in the Census Returns that they were ever
tenanted by lace-workers and describes them as "a small
middle-class enclave in the midst of an essentially working
class district".
(Southern History: Brayshay M: Heathcoat's Industrial Housing
in Tiverton, Devon: 1991-: 82-104).

Listing NGR: SS9517612529