White Gates

Details

TL 71 SE HATFIELD PEVEREL SPORTSMAN'S LANE, NOUNSLEY (south-west side)

5/76 No. 41 (White Gates)

GV II

House. Early C15, altered in C17 and C20. Timber framed, plastered, with thatched roof. 2-bay hall facing N, with C20 axial stack in left bay, parlour/solar bay to right, and originally unstoreyed service bay to left. C17 one-bay extension to left, with external stack at end, and C20 single-storey flat-roofed extension beyond. C20 stair extension-to centre front, with hipped roof. One storey with attics. 4 C20 casements on ground floor, and one long C20 casement at half-height in stair extension. Roof hipped at right end. Jowled posts, heavy studding. The hall has a wide front doorway with 4-centred arched head (re-set on one side), blocked. The posts of the central open truss have chamfered attached shafts and chamfered arched braces; 2 tiebeams and the former crownposts are missing. Display V-bracing at 'high end', of which the front part is original, the rear part restored, trenched into the studs of the partition, now exposed. The former inserted stack at the 'low end' has been rebuilt in the C20, retaining the chamfered mantel beam with lamb's tongue stops. C17 inserted floor comprising a chamfered axial beam with lamb's tongue stops and plain joists of vertical section, with a few joists replaced in softwood. C20 softwood joists in service bay. The left extension has a chamfered axial beam and plain joists of vertical section jointed to it with soffit tenons with diminished haunches. The intermediate tiebeam has been severed for a doorway. Roof mainly original, with heavily smoke-blackened rafters and collars over hall and service end, and smoke-blackened laths and thatch also, proving that the lowest layer of the thatch has been undisturbed since the C16. This is a rare feature; at present only one other example of medieval thatch is known in Essex, at Reynolds, Lamarsh (where less of it survives), and deserves special care. The collar-purlin is missing. The structure of a gablet hip and smoke vent survive at the left end, obscured externally by the later extension. This house has been converted to cottages, and back to a house in the C20.

Listing NGR: TL7961810492

Legacy

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

Legacy System number:

115417

Legacy System:

LBS

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