Description

TIVERTON

SS9512 ST PETER STREET, Tiverton
848-1/6/306 (West side)
12/02/52 Chilcot School, including No.4 at
rear
(Formerly Listed as:
ST PETER STREET
Chilcot School and No.4)

GV II*

Includes: No.4 ST PETER STREET Tiverton.
Council meeting room and house, formerly school and
headmaster's house. Dated 1611; minor additions at rear.
MATERIALS: squared purplish stone rubble with most details in
dressed limestone, possibly from Beer; the front doorway
appears to be of a local volcanic stone, refaced with cement.
Storehouse rendered. Slated roofs with stone parapets on the
gable ends; storehouse roof of corrugated asbestos. C20 metal
ventilator on centre of ridge. House has stone chimney
(probably C19) at front end and red brick chimney at rear.
PLAN: school consists of an open hall along the street
frontage with a through-passage at the left-hand end; gallery
above the passage. Headmaster's house lies behind, at right to
the right-hand end. Opposite it, to the left of the courtyard,
is a 2-storey building (probably a C19 addition) with a
storehouse adjoining.
EXTERIOR: school single-storey. Front has 4 mullioned and
transomed windows of 4 lights each with king mullions;
ogee-moulded mullions, continued hoodmoulds. At left-hand end
is a round-arched doorway with moulded jambs, imposts and
archivolt; keystone projects, and appears originally to have
had a pendant. Hoodmould with lozenge terminals. Studded plank
door, much repaired with round-arched wicket-gate cut into it.
Above the door is a square moulded plaque with inscription:
Robert Comin als Chilcot borne in this towne founded this free
English Schoole and indowd it with maintenance for ever anno
dni. 1611. Above the plaque is a 2-light mullioned gallery
window with continued hoodmould. Projecting plinth with
chamfered coping of volcanic stone. Moulded corbel table under
the eaves.
Rear wall has 2 windows to left, matching those at the front.
Rear doorway to passage has Tudor arch with straight
hoodmould; masonry encased in cement. Rear extension, forming
in the ground storey a lobby to the rear courtyard, has a
plain segmental stone arch and a studded plank door.
Headmaster's house is 2-storey with a 3-window front facing
the courtyard. Centre doorway concealed by C19 or C20 gabled
porch. Ogee-moulded, stone-mullioned windows; those in ground
storey are of 4 lights with hoodmoulds and relieving arches,
those above are of 3 lights at either end and 2 lights in the
middle.
Rear gable wall (prominent in the view from Exe Bridge) has 2
stone-mullioned windows in each storey. Those in ground storey
have 3 lights to left and 2 to right; those in second storey
have 2 lights, the left light of the iron casements with small
oblong leaded panes.
INTERIOR: through-passage divided from schoolroom by a
stone-rubble wall containing a Tudor-arched limestone doorway
with ovolo and ogee mouldings, carved spandrels and large
pyramid-like stops; studded plank double doors with moulded
ribs. Schoolroom plain.
In rear wall to right a segmental-headed fireplace with
double-ogee moulding. barrel-vaulted ceiling with moulded ribs
having carved bosses at the intersections.
Gallery woodwork is probably entirely of 1907; a plaque
records that in that year the school was incorporated into a
gymnasium. Interior of house not inspected.
HISTORY: Robert Chilcot was the brother-in-law of George Slee
(qv The Great House of St George, St Peter's Street), another
Tiverton wool merchant and the nephew of Peter Blundell (qv
Old Blundells' School), a wool merchant with Tiverton links.
An outstanding example of a school of this period, Tiverton
also boasting Blundell's School (qv).

Listing NGR: SS9537812585

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q17531580

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

• 
  Gwent/Monmouthshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of Wales)
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  Oxfordshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
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  Churches: An Architectural Guide (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Introductions)
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  Norfolk 1: Norwich and North-East: Norwich and North-east v. 1 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
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  Devon (Pevsner Buildings of England)
• 
  Bedfordshire, Huntingdonshire, and Peterborough (Pevsner Architectural Guides): Written by Charles O'Brien, 2014 Edition, Publisher: Yale University Press [Hardcover]