Hole Farmhouse Including Garden Walls and Mounting Block Adjoining to North, Chagford, Devon

Description

SX 68 NE,
3/37

CHAGFORD,
Hole Farmhouse, including garden walls and mounting block adjoining to north

20.02.52

G.V.

Farmhouse, a Dartmoor longhouse. Early C16 with major late C16 and C17 improvements,
one probably associated with inscribed date of 1668. Most is built of massive
coursed blocks of granite ashlar although much of rear rebuilt with granite stone
rubble; granite stacks one with granite ashlar chimney shaft; thatch roof to main
house, corrugated-iron roof to shippon.

PLAN AND DEVELOPMENT: L-shaped building with the main block built down the hill slope
and facing the farmyard to north. Main block has a 3-room-and-cross-passage plan. A
small unheated inner room at the right (west) end is terraced into the slope. The
hall has an axial stack backing onto the wide passage and with a stair rising
alongside, its turret projecting a short distance to front. The passage was
presumably a through passage although it is difficult to prove a blocking of the rear
doorway in the masonry there. 2-storey porch in front of the passage. Large shippon
with hayloft over on the left (eastern) end with its own cow door alongside the
porch. Parlour wing with end stack projects at right angles to rear of the inner
room end. In C20 this was divided into 2 rooms.
It is not easy to work out the development of the house in detail although the main
block originated as a late medieval hall house open to the roof and heated by an open
hearth fire. Through the late C16 and C17 the house was progressively floored over
and fireplaces were added. The house probably achieved its present form after the
1668 refurbishment. By this time the small inner room was probably a dairy and the
hall was used as a kitchen. The parlour wing provided the principal room with its
own staircase (since replaced by one in the inner room) to the principal bed chamber
over. 2 storeys throughout.

EXTERIOR: irregular front fenestration. Hall and inner room and their chambers over
have 1 window each, another small one to the stair turret and one more to the room
over the porch. Only the inner room and the chamber over have original (that is to
say C17) 4-light windows with chamfered granite mullions, the lower one with
hoodmould. The rest are C19 and C20 timber casements with glazing bars. The porch is
gabled and its outer arch is shoulder-headed and the date 1668 is inscribed to left
of it. Wooden benches either side of the porch. The front passage doorway behind
contains a probably contemporary oak door frame; a Tudor arch with bead moulded
surround and carved foliage in the spandrels. It still holds the original studded
oak plank door with oak lock housing. The cow door immediately left of the porch
contains a C19 door of 2 flaps. 2 slit windows to left and another to the hayloft
over the door. Central hayloft loading hatch. Roof is hipped to right and gable-
ended to left.
The impressive ashlar gable end of the shippon contains 2 slit windows to the
hayloft, 3 to the shippon and the blocked central drain hole in the rubble footings.
Rear of the main block has a fixed pane window containing rectangular panes of leaded
glass awkwardly set between hall and passage with a relieving arch over. Slit window
in the rubble pitching to rear of passage and irregular series of slit windows. C20
casement with glazing bars over rear of passage. Inner side of parlour wing has a
curious projection (maybe a disused garderobe or stair turret) adjoining the main
block. The rest contains one C17 4-light window with chamfered granite mullions, the
others are C20 and timber. Roof is gable-ended and to rear the eaves are nearly at
ground level.

INTERIOR is good and well-preserved. It shows a house with a long and complex
structural history. The oldest feature is the 2-bay roof over the hall and inner
room which is carried on a face-pegged jointed cruck. It is smoke-blackened on both
sides suggesting an early C16 date and a house then open to the roof and heated by an
open hearth fire. The features below are difficult to date. At the upper end of the
hall there is an oak plank-and-muntin screen, its muntins chamfered with step
stops. The original doorway now leads to C19 stair and a secondary doorway knocked
through to the inner room/dairy. Probably in late C16 inner room floored over and
jettied out to fill the original truss. Probably about the same hall fireplace
inserted with its newel stair alongside (with crank-headed oak door frame). The large
granite ashlar fireplace has a chamfered surround and a side oven (renewed in late
C19) under the stairs. Contemporary passage chamber and full height stone rubble
cross wall on lower side to shippon. Roof slung between this cross wall and the stack.
In the passage the back of the fireplace is granite ashlar with chamfered plinth and
cornice. Contemporary oak segmental-headed door frame from passage to hall and beyond
this the cross wall is continued in same style as the back of the fireplace.
The parlour was probably added as part of the 1668 scheme but could be earlier.
Doorway from hall to parlour contains oak Tudor arch with chamfered surround. It
contains a tall but relatively narrow granite ashlar fireplace and 3-bay ceiling
carried on soffit-chamfered and step-stopped crossbeam. 2-bay roof with another
face-pegged jointed cruck roof truss which is dark but not apparently smoke-
blackened. Hall floored over at or about the same time with similarly finished
crossbeams.
The shippon has a 5-bay ceiling of roughly finished crossbeams of indeterminate date.
The cow stalls are intact but are early C20 and the drain was rebuilt in concrete at
the same time. The roof was also extensively repaired at the same time although much
of the earlier roof survives. It is 4 bays and comprises pegged A-frame trusses;
probably late C17 or C18.
A small garden in front of the hall and inner room is enclosed by a low boundary wall
of granite stone rubble and includes an external mounting block.

Hole Farmhouse is one of the best-preserved examples of the Dartmoor longhouse type
which are of national importance. It is remarkably complete, at least from circa
1668 when the house completed its development from late medieval origins.
Furthermore it is a particularly attractive Dartmoor building with its granite ashlar
construction and also as part of a group with its associated farm buildings, the best
of which are also listed.

Listing NGR: SX6852286103

External Links

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