The Guildhall

Details

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TL 6832
7/24

FINCHINGFIELD
CHURCH HILL (south side)
The Guildhall

(Formerly listed as The Guildhall and Nos.1,2,3,4 The Almshouses)

21.12.67

GV
I

Guildhall, later a parish room, library and four flats. Circa 1500, altered in C18. Timber framed, plastered, roofed with handmade red clay tiles. Eight bays aligned North East-South West, jettied on both long sides. The bays are of various lengths, the shortest being at the South West end (originally forming a shop, later the stair to the parish room) and the second from the North East end, probably originally the entrance/stair bay.' The second bay from the South West end forms a covered footway to the churchyard, with the library bay to the North East, and the parish room over the two. The remaining five bays are converted to four flats, with two C18/C19 axial stacks. Two storeys.

North West elevation (to Church Hill), eight-window range of C18 casements of two or three lights, all restored in various degrees. Brick base wall rebuilt. The jetty has exposed beams (of which two are modern restorations) and joists with four original plain brackets. The left corner is cut back to reduce damage from vehicles. The jetty of the right bay is underbuilt. Full set of original sprockets.

South East elevation (to churchyard), on the ground floor six similar windows, and on the first floor seven similar windows and five smaller reproductions. Five plain boarded doors, of which two stand forward with a lean-to roof (entrances to the upper flats). The jetty of the left bay is underbuilt. Exposed beams and joists (including some modern restorations) and 10 plain brackets, of which some are reproductions. Some original sprockets. The footway through has original arched braces on the Church Hill side, some modern reinforcement timbers, and on the South West side an old (but not original) post with the head inscribed ET and 84 and carved with scrolls. Both sides of the footway have weatherboarded dados, one board being inscribed 1798. The South West end bay has a chamfered axial beam with plain stops, and plain joists of horizontal section jointed to it with unrefined soffit tenons, some wall framing indicating two former shop windows to the foot-way, and on the first floor square mortices for (missing) moulded mullions and grooves for sliding shutters, facing the churchyard.

The library has heavy studding with curved tension bracing trenched to the inside, indicating that there were no original apertures to the footway, a similar beam and joists, and a rebate for hinged shutters facing Church Hill. The parish room has jowled posts, cambered tiebeams with short solid hanging knees, square crownposts chamfered with plain stops, curved down braces, and thin axial braces. Original roof apparently complete. Edge-halved and bridled scarfs in wallplates. Some original rebated floorboards. The remaining five bays not examined internally, but reported to be fully plastered.

The Trinity Guild of Finchingfield is mentioned in the Chantry Certificates of 1548 (P.R.O. E.301/19/13 and 20/19). All its lands were granted by the Crown to William and John Myldemay, gentlemen, on 17 January 1549 (Calendar of Letters Patent, Edward VI, I, 295-6). In 1630 Robert Kempe of Spains Hall gave to the poor of the parish 'a messuage at thee church gate called Guildhall' (Report of Charity Commissioners, 546-7). The will of Sir Robert Kempe, 1658, endowed it as a school and almshouses, 'the upper room and a little chamber adjoining and one small room or shop under the small chamber' to form the school and a lodging for the schoolmaster, the remainder to form almshouses for five poor parishioners (Essex Record Office, D/DRS/Q1). This implies that the five North East bays formed the five dwellings (but not one to each bay, as the bay lengths differ greatly), and that the three South West bays formed the school and Lodging for the schoolmaster. The present use and arrangement of the building is little different, except that the five North East bays have been re-organised to form four flats, still occupied by aged parishioners. This building is of exceptional importance, both by its key position at the churchyard entrance, and by the historical continuity of use. RCHM 13.

Listing NGR: TL6857432816

Legacy

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

Legacy System number:

115167

Legacy System:

LBS

Sources

Other
An Inventory of the Historical Monuments in Essex North West, (1916)

End of official list entry

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