Description

WEST ALVINGTON MAIN STREET
SX 74 SW
5/204 Old Stones, Pay Cottage and School
Cottage
25.10.51 (Pay Cottage only)

G. V. II*

3 cottages formerly almshouse/church house. Circa early C16 with late C18
addition. Slate stone rubble walls, roughly coursed at the front. Gable ended
slate roof with Victorian decorative ridge tiles, hipped roof to front wing. 2
brick gable end stacks, one at side of front wing and stubby rendered rubble
lateral stack at front.
Plan: original plan or room use not entirely clear due to later subdivisions but
may have been built as 3 cottages on the ground floor with one large public room
above. A through-passageway runs from front to back left of centre with the
doorways to Old Stones and Pay Cottage opening off it. School Cottage has an
original outside doorway at the rear and a small wing at the back which may have
been either a garderobe or staircase wing. At the front of it a late C18 parlour
wing was built on. There appears originally to have been external access to the
first floor judging from the doorways that exist at both front and rear, although
the steps have gone. Either the front or the rear lateral stack would have heated
this floor.
Exterior: 2 storeys, Asymmetrical 5 window front with partly slate-hung wing
projecting from right-hand end of School Cottage. Most windows to main range are
2 or 3-light circa late C19 casements. The ground floor windows are in original
chamfered openings, the 2 left-hand ones with shouldered heads. On the first
floor the left-hand window is an original 4-light moulded stone mullion with 4-
centred heads and leaded panes. The window to right of centre was probably the
same but its mullions have been removed and only the jambs survive. Between these
two is a window in what was formerly an original doorway with a roundheaded
voussoir arch. Below it is an identical doorway with C20 plank door. The wing of
School Cottage has 2 replacement 16-pane sash windows on its front face and a
leanto porch against its inner face with a hall door. The rear elevation has a
very small gabled wing at the left-hand end, 2 similar roundheaded doorways on
the ground floor; one towards left-hand end and one to rear of passageway. The
latter has an identical doorway, now a window, above it to the right. To the left
of these doorways is a projecting rubble stack cut off at the eaves. Several of
the windows are in original chamfered openings with shouldered heads.
Interior: Pay Cottage has unstopped chamfered cross beams. Original roof
survives over whole range consisting of 6 bays (2 missing) of substantial
principals, some with curved feet and some side pegged jointed crucks, with plain
morticed cambered collars and threaded purlins. Although darkened in colour the
timbers are unlikely to be smoke blackened.
This is an interesting survival of a late medieval building, of a type fairly
characteristic of this area (q.v. South Milton and Thurlestone) which remains
surprisingly unspoilt externally and, unusually for South Devon, retains its
medieval roof structure.

Listing NGR: SX7244043836

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q17534507

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.

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