Horstone Farmhouse

Details

OTTERTON PINN LANE SY 18 NW 4/200 Horstone Farmhouse (formerly listed as Pinn Barton) 11.ll.52 - II House, former farmhouse. Late C15 - early C16 with major later C16 and C17 improvements, date plaque of 1587, enlarged in late C19, modernised circa 1960. The main house is plastered cob on stone rubble footings; extension of local conglomerate stone rubble with chamfered limestone plinth and its roadside gable end is of coursed blocks of dressed stone; stone rubble and brick stacks topped with C19 brick and hall has late C16 chimney shaft with Beerstone ashlar quoins; concrete tile roof (formerly thatch). L-shaped house. The main block faces south-east and has a 3-room-and-through- passage plan with the inner room at the right (north-eastern) end. The wide passage is now blocked by a partition across the middle. The inner room has a gable end stack, the hall a front projecting lateral stack and the service end room is unheated. It is small and was probably a dairy. The main stair is probably C19 and rises from the rear of the passage up the rear of the hall. The C19 crosswing projects forward from the left end. It has a 2-room plan with central stair and a gable end stack. C20 outshot on right end of main block. House is 2 storeys. Main block has an irregular 3-window front of C19 and C20 casements with glazing bars. The inner room window has been enlarged to a French window with a C20 aluminium-framed conservatory in front. The front passage doorway is at the left end and contains a C20 glazed door with a flat slate hood in the angle of the wings. The hall stack has been rebuilt in C19 brick with a fire window on the left side and slate offsets. Its tall double chimney shaft however is the original; built of small blocks of grey limestone with Beerstone ashlar quoins and soffit-moulded coping. It includes a Beerstone plaque inscribed ANO 1587 with initials of Roger and John Pinn and 3 small incised ornaments. The first floor windows to right of the stack rise a short distance into the eaves. The roofs of both wings are gable- ended. C19 and C20 casements with glazing bars to the wing and rear. Front left corner of C19 wing is propped by C20 buttresses. Stone mounting block on front end of this wing. Interior: the oldest feature in the house is the remains of a late C15 - early C16 roof truss over the lower side of the passage. The lower part is boxed into a partition but is assumed to be some form of cruck construction. The timbers are of large scantling. It has a cambered collar and although the apex is missing a section of a square set ridge survives. It and the truss are heavily smoke- blackened indicating a house open to the roof, heated by an open hearth fire and probably divided by low partitions. The rest of the roof structure, including the front wing, was replaced circa 1960. The partitions either side of the passage are plastered but the front section on the hall side has been demolished revealing the headbeam of a C16 or C17 oak plank-and- muntin screen. The service end room has a plain soffit-chamfered axial beam, probably C17. In the hall the fireplace is mostly C19 brick and has a C20 oak lintel. The 3-bay ceiling is carried on soffit-chamfered crossbeams with double bar-scroll stops. Such detail usually indicates a date well into the C17 for the flooring of the hall but the double chimney shaft suggests a first floor fireplace in 1587 unless the plaque was reset in a C17 shaft. No carpentry is exposed in the inner room and the fireplace here appears to be C19. The joinery detail throughout is C19 and C20. Horstone Farmhouse is marked "formerly Higher Pinn" on OS maps. The farmbuildings to the south-west mentioned in the previous listing have been demolished.

Listing NGR: SY1018086918

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:

86401

Legacy System:

LBS

End of official list entry

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