Details
SE 82 SW TWIN RIVERS MAIN STREET
(south side)
Whitgift
1/38 Whitgift Hall, including
attached walls to north,
outbuildings and screen
14.2.67 wall to south-east
(formerly listed as
Whitgift Hall, Whitgift
Parish)
GV II*
Small country house, including attached screen walls and outbuildings.
Early C18 for Stephenson family, with later C18 and early C19 alterations
for the Stovin and Coulman families, including wing walls to north front,
bow windows and screen wall to south front, interior remodelling. Minor
later alterations. House and northern wing walls of red brick in Flemish
bond with scored joints; south front of kitchen wing stuccoed and incised in
imitation of ashlar. Limestone and sandstone ashlar dressings. Welsh slate
roof. Lead and felt roofs to dormers. South-east screen wall of red brick,
partly stuccoed, with stone coping. Main range had double-depth plan with
2-room central entrance-hall north and south fronts, single-bay wing walls
flanking north front, kitchen extension and later outbuildings to east.
Main range: 2 storeys with basement and attic. North front: 2:1:2 bays with
central bay breaking forward and low 2-storey, single-bay wing walls to
either side. Basement forms plinth, with recessed 6-pane sashes to side
bays in plain ashlar surrounds linked by plain ashlar band at ground-floor
level. Chamfered quoins to main range and central bay. Entrance has C19
swept flight of 10 stone steps with wrought-iron balustrade of alternate
plain and wavy bars carrying wreathed handrail. Fine ashlar doorcase with
architrave flanked by fluted Ionic pilasters carrying entablature with
dosserets, plain frieze, dentilled cornice and dentilled segmental pediment
breaking forward over dosserets. 6-fielded-panel door and radial overlight
in reveal. Ground floor: recessed 12-pane sashes in ashlar architraves with
projecting corniced sills. Ashlar entablature with stepped frieze and
moulded cornice forming first-floor band. First-floor sashes similar to
those of ground floor. Deep, finely-dentilled ashlar eaves cornice breaking
forward over the quoins. 4 drain-pipes with moulded rectangular rainwater
heads bearing raised roundel ornament. 3 full dormers with unequal 9-pane
sashes in flush wooden architraves, the central dormer with a radial
overlight beneath an elliptically arched head, the side dormers with
triangular pediments. 4-sided hipped roof. Pair of large ridge stacks to
sides, with remains of stucco, ashlar dentilled cornices and blocking
courses. Wing walls each have plinth and impost band to central full-height
round-arched recessed panel containing single ground-floor opening with
dummy 6-pane casement above recessed panelled apron in ashlar architrave,
and single first-floor segmental-headed dummy 6-pane sash with painted
glazing bars in ashlar architrave with sill; moulded ashlar cornice and
blocking course in line with first-floor band of main block. South front:
3 bays, with central bay breaking forward, flanked by full-height
semicircular bows; single-storey kitchen extension set back to right.
Plinth and quoins similar to north front, but without quoins to central bay.
Central 6-pane basement window beneath entrance stairs; single blocked
windows to each side. C19 entrance has flight of 8 stone steps with
wrought-iron balustrade of alternate plain bars and geometric panels,
wreathed handrail and baluster-shaped newels. Sandstone Doric porch with
columns on tall pedestals carrying dosserets with triglyphs and guttae,
moulded cornice and open pedimented roof. Pilasters flanking original
entrance with 6-fielded-panel door, moulded lintel and radial fanlight in
eared architrave beneath entablature with plain frieze and moulded cornice.
Flanking bows each have three 12-pane ground-floor sashes in wooden
architraves with ashlar keystones. Slight differences in bows suggest 2
separate builds. First-floor moulded band. First-floor sash to central bay
and bows similar to those of gound floor, but with shallower keyed flat brick
arches. Moulded cornice and flat roofs to bows. Deep moulded cornice to
main range. 3 full dormers similar to those on north front but without
radial overlight to central flat-headed window, similar drain-pipes
as to north front. Kitchen wing to right has inappropriate C20 casement,
parapet with moulded ashlar band (a continuation of the first-floor band to
main range) with blocking course. Early C19 flat-roofed projecting canted
first-floor bay to east side of main range, contemporary with bows, has
central dummy window flanked by single 12-pane sashes in surrounds similar
to those of south front, moulded cornice similar to bow windows. Coped
screen wall attached to kitchen wing curves round to south east, and has
pair of doorways and a boarded window, all with wooden architraves beneath
rubbed-brick flat arches. East end ramped down to early C19 single-storey
privy, square on plan, with south front containing 6-fielded-panel door and
12-pane sash in architraves beneath segmental arches; stepped eaves,
temporary C20 flat roof (formerly with a hipped Westmorland slate roof).
Similar 12-pane sash to rear. Interior. Entrance/stairhall has oak
fielded-panelled dado with moulded ramped corniced dado rail, fine early C18
open-well cantilevered staircase with ramped and wreathed corniced handrail,
twist column newels, carved profiled tread-ends and 3 balusters to each
tread, with alternating twist, column, and fluted columns on bulb-and-vase
with square knops. Landing has C19 balustrade in similar style, and
panelled balcony containing bowed section with moulded cornice and blocking
course, flanked by attached twist columns. Moulded plaster cornice and
ribbed ceiling border to lower hall. Upper stairhall has boldly panelled
ceiling with plain and leaf-and-dart mouldings and paterae ornament,
elliptical arch to inner hall with scrolled consoles, archivolt and panelled
moulded soffit. Inner hall to south has round-headed opening with archivolt
and fielded-panelled soffit, moulded ceiling cornice and foliate centre-
piece. C19 south entrance hall has half-domed niche, elliptical arch with
moulded soffit, and moulded cornice to panelled ceiling with acanthus
centre-piece. Secondary staircase, in east canted bay, has moulded handrail
and column-on-vase balusters. North-west room has fielded panelling with
moulded dado rail, and an early C19 panelled marble chimney-piece inserted
beneath panelled overmantel in full-height Doric surround with fluted
pilasters and frieze with triglyphs and guttae, flanked by round-headed
half-domed cupboards with fielded-panel doors; moulded wooden cornice with
plasterwork guilloche border to ceiling. Moulded cornice to north-east
room. South-west room has fielded panelling with later C19 burr wood
graining, reeded dado rail, reeded pilasters flanking bow window with lions
head ornament, moulded wooden cornice with grapevine border to ceiling,
ribbed marble chimney-piece with roundel ornament. South-east room has
panelled pilasters with roundel ornament flanking the bow windows. First
floor: north-east room has fielded panelling with later C19 wood graining,
dado rail, moulded frieze with anthemion and paterae, leaf-and-dart ceiling
cornice, spine beam with panelled soffit and similar corniced wooden
pilastered chimney-piecewith marble slip and ribbed cast-iron fire surround;
C19 marble fire surround and moulded cornice to north-west room; reset early
C18 cyma-moulded stone chimney-piece to south-east room; moulded cornice,
pilastered chimney-piece with fluted frieze to south-west room. Pilastered
surrounds to bow windows similar to ground floor. 2 reset early C18 moulded
stone chimney-pieces in attic. Fielded-panel window shutters and window
seats, 6-fielded-panel door in architraves throughout. Original roof
timbers, incorporating tie beams with Y-shaped ends, one arm attached to the
wall, the other to the wall plate above. Interior of outside privy,
derelict at time of resurvey, has moulded skirting, moulded dado rail, and
moulded plaster cornice, comparable to some of the fittings in the main Hall
and stableyard ranges. John and Mary Stephenson owned the Hall in the early
C18, and Mary, described as of "Drypool (Hull) of Whitgift Hall" was still
alive in 1740. By 1777 the estate had been acquired by Cornelius Stovin,
succeeded in 1780 by James Stovin of Reedness. By 1801 it appears to have
passed into the ownership of John Gee of Haldenby Park, to be inherited in
1818 by his daughter Mary (1782-1868). In the late C19 their daughter, Mary
Armitage, sold the estate to Thomas Bladworth. The early C19 remodelling of
the Hall and grounds, including the new stableyard ranges (qv) and privy,
were probably undertaken when the Coulmans came into possession in 1818-19.
A stylish house with good details and a complex architectural history.
Renovations underway at time of resurvey (April 1987). N Pevsner, The
Buildings of England: Yorkshire, West Riding, 1959, p 543; W Richardson,
[Some Useful Consumers of Waste: History in Two Marshland Parishes,
Adlingfleet and Whitgift, 1981,
pp 146-7, 153.
Listing NGR: SE8166222808
