Forke Farmhouse

Details

SS 81 SE CRUWYS MORCHARD 2/66 Forke Farmhouse - II Farmhouse. Circa late C16, possibly a remodelling of a late medieval house, some later C17 alterations, C19 fenestration. Colourwashed rendered cob and stone ; slate roof to front of ridge, corrugated asbestos to rear (formerly thatched), roof gabled at ends ; right end stone stack with stone and brick shaft, left end stack with brick shaft, large projecting front lateral stack with stone shaft. Plan: Complex evolution. The present plan is a 3 room and cross passage arrangement (lower end to the right) with a rear dairy. A front right wing at right angles to the lower end is a 2-storey farmbuilding. The house may have begun as a late medieval open hall but with only very limited access to the roofspace tis is not established as a fact. The left and right hand ends of the front elevation are slightly set back, indicating some rebuilding in the centre although the ground floor carpentry details throughout the range are consistent with a late C16 date. The quality of the carpentry is high and moulded beams in the inner room (to the left) indicate that it functioned as a parlour ; the lower end may have been a kitchen with the hall used as the principal living room. The lower end partition of the cross passage has been moved to the left and if the partition with the hall is in its original position the passage would have been unusually wide. A single storey outshut with a catslide roof incorporates an external stair leading off the hall and also a dairy. Parts of the rear wall at first floor level are only partition thickness between the jointed crucks, which is puzzling. 2 storeys. Asymmetrical 4 window front with an attractive set of C19 1, 2 and 3- light small pane timber casements and the centre of the range slightly broken forward. Front door to cross passage to right of centre. At right angles to the main range at the right end is a 2-storey farm building, gabled to the front with a corrugated iron and asbestos roof. The farmbuilding has external steps up to a loft entrance on the front end and the roof is brought down as a catslide over a lean-to adjoining the left return. The lean-to gives sheltered access to a door into the lower end room of the farmhouse. Interior High quality circa late C16 carpentry survives throughout the range. The hall has a C20 grate to the lateral stack, possibly concealing an earlier fireplace and a very fine set of deeply hollow-chamfered cross beams with keeled stops, a rare detail in the region. A chamfered step-stopped doorway on the rear wall leads to the stair. The inner room has elaborately moulded crossbeams and a modern grate, possibly concealing an earlier fireplace. The lower end room has fine, very deeply- chamfered cross beams with large roll stops. The left hand cross beam has mortises for a plank and muntin screen which no longer exists. The fireplace is partly blocked but an early lintel and jambs probably survive. The 2 right hand rooms on the first floor open into one another, the room over the hall has a blocked, probably C19 fireplace. Considerable change in floor level between the room over the hall and the room over the lower end, which has a higher floor level. The roof is of jointed cruck construction, side-pegged and the first floor rooms are plastered up close to the apex revealing 2 tiers of purlins. Straight, probably C19 collars have been added to the trusses below the level of the ceiling plaster. Access to the roofspace is very limited but what is visible of the old timbers appears to be clean (i.e. not sooted) above the lower end room and most of the hall ; the truss between hall and inner room is definitely darker than the others but without a closer inspection it is not possible to establish smoke-blackening positively. A new roof has been put over the old timbers over the hall and lower end and carried down as the outshut roof. Large sections of the first floor rear wall of the main range between the crucks are thin partitions, sections of which are daub and wattle. According to Margaret C.S. Cruwys, Forke Farm was first documented in the C15. In 1510 "Forkeshey" in the Manor Court Roll was held by Thomas Leigh of John Cruwys Esq. for the term of life. "Forkeshayes" was sold away form the Cruwys family between 1836 and 1837 to Andrew Elworthy. Forke farmhouse is a fine vernacular building with high quality carpentry details which have some similarity to Somerset carpentry. Cruwys, Margaret C.S., A Cruwys Morchard Notebook, 1066-1874 (1939).

Listing NGR: SS8535711063

Legacy

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

Legacy System number:

437533

Legacy System:

LBS

Sources

Books and journals
Cruwys, M C S, A Cruwys Morchard Notebook 1066-1874, (1939)

End of official list entry

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