Parsonage Farmhouse

Details

TL 51 SW MATCHING NEWMANS END Parsonage Farmhouse 3/32

GV II

Lobby-entrance house, early C17, extended in C18/19. Timber framed, plastered, roofed partly with handmade red clay tiles, partly with machine-made red clay tiles. 4 bays aligned NE-SW, with original chimney stack and lobby-entrance in second bay from the SW. Kitchen/bakehouse to rear of NE end with internal chimney stack at NW gable, C18/19. Lean-to porch to E in angle between main block and extension, and a rear lean-to porch to W in the other angle. 2 storeys. SE elevation pargetted with combed designs and concentric circles in panels. Door and 3 casement windows, 4 on the first floor, all C20. Roof half- hipped at both ends. Date 1595 in C20 pargetting at NE end. Jowled wallposts, straight tiebeams, primary straight bracing, heavy studding with much re-used timber, clasped purlin roof. Stop-chamfered axial beams over SW and middle lower rooms. Common Joists chamfered and stopped over SW lower room, unchamfered over middle lower rooms, all of vertical section. Over the NE lower room the joists are arranged longitudinally, unchamfered, of horizontal section, lodged at both ends, with original stair trap in NE corner. The Walker map of 1609 (Essex Record Office D/DU 25) shows 2 single-storey houses on this site, and (despite the pargetted date) the present house is not an adaptation of either of them, being built in 2 storeys from the outset, although it is likely that it incorporates re-used timber from the earlier buildings. The arrangement of floor joists is of particular historical interest, showing that even after 1609 plain joists of horizontal section were acceptable in a parsonage house at the service end, while elsewhere the more socially advanced vertical section was used, probably lathed and plastered to the soffits in the 'hall', exposed and stop-chamfered in the parlour. On the roof the mixture of old handmade tiles and C20 machine-made tiles, both kinds used on both pitches, is out of historical character. On the SE (front) pitch the lower half is of old tiles, the upper half of new tiles. on the NW (rear) pitch the NE third is of old tiles, the remainder of new tiles. There are old tiles on the kitchen/bakehouse extension. Re-arrangement of the tiles, and preferably roofing entirely with handmade red clay tiles, is recommended.

Listing NGR: TL5173812484

Legacy

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

Legacy System number:

118192

Legacy System:

LBS

End of official list entry

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