Town Head Barn

Summary

Large, multipurpose barn of probable C17 origins, extended in phases probably all before 1812, with the exception of the brick and concrete addition built in 1948.

Reasons for Designation

Town Head Barn, a large, mainly C18 multipurpose barn, at time of listing, is listed Grade II for the following principal reasons:

Architectural interest:

* probably of C17 origins, this unusually large barn retains evidence of its evolution through the C18 and early C19;
* for the retention of good quality features such as the roof structure, Tudor style lintels and other stonework.

Historic interest:

* for the barn’s likely links to the known history of Hebden and Town Head Farm;
* that the barn was extended with a degree of architectural embellishment during post-war austerity in 1948.

History

Whereas most of Hebden is thought to have developed as a planned manorial settlement, Town Hill, that area of the village to the north of the east-west main road, is believed to have evolved more independently. Town Head Farmhouse, which has C17 origins, appears to have been larger than most properties in the village and to have been the principal residence in Town Hill. It was bought by William Skelton, an in-comer from Leeds in 1760 who expanded its landholding through purchasing additional land until his death in 1803, by which time the farm had the second largest acreage in the township. Held by another Mr Skelton in 1808-1812, following a lawsuit, it passed to Charles Brown in 1813 who owned it at least until 1832, rented to a tenant farmer.

Town Head Farm Barn is also likely to be of C17 origins, but the earliest surviving fabric may perhaps date as late as the early C18, this being a five-bay dual purpose laithe (cow house with threshing floor and crop storage), probably originally with a steeper-pitched thatched roof. In the C18, the barn was re-roofed with stone slates supported by oak trusses on heightened side walls. Later in the C18 (based on the form of the south-western gable) the barn was extended south-westwards by two bays (perhaps in two stages) with the oak trusses being reset, the two additional trusses being constructed from Baltic pine, these being set at the north eastern end of the building. Red ruddle marking out lines on the trusses (recorded in 1998) provided evidence that the oak trusses were reset alongside the pine trusses. This extension provided space for a shippon (cow housing) at the south-west end. In the early C19, a lean-to addition of four bays was added to the south-east side of the barn to form a porch to the threshing floor, along with further cow housing, perhaps including stabling for a couple of horses. This included the resetting of the archway to the southern threshing entrance, this being set higher to accommodate C19 hay carts. The southern threshing door was recorded in 1998 as including graffiti 'T+W 1812' indicating that the doorway was enlarged, and the porch and the rest of the extension was added no later than 1812. The lower-set northern entrance was left unaltered, this being designed to accommodate loaded C18 style hay sleds, but would have been tall enough to allow the passage of empty C19 carts. The surviving shippon, at the north east end of the barn, is likely to have been created in the C19 after the introduction of machine threshing: traditional hand threshing is thought to have required storage space on both sides of the threshing floor, one side for unthreshed sheaves, the other for the threshed corn and straw. In 1948, despite post-war shortages of building materials (restrictions remained in place until 1954) a brick and concrete addition was built at the south-western end of the barn, this given a degree of architectural pretension by being finished externally in imitation of quarry-faced ashlar stonework. Sometime after the barn was surveyed in 1998 by the Yorkshire Vernacular Buildings Study Group, the stalls of the south-western shippon with its hayloft above were removed, the floor of most of the barn was re-laid in concrete and the threshing barn doors were renewed.

Although it is most likely that the barn has always been linked to Town Head Farm, probably with most of the alterations carried out alongside William Skelton’s expansion of the farm’s landholding, the Yorkshire Vernacular Buildings Study Group (1999) speculated that the unusually large size of the barn could have been the result of it being owned communally, linking it to title deeds dating between 1756 and 1769 that refer to a barn called the Town Barn.

Details

Barn, probable C17 origins, with C18 and early C19 alterations and extensions, with an 1948 addition.

MATERIALS: local gritstone rubble, roughly squared and coursed. Tooled gritstone dressings of varying styles giving an indication of dating. Stone slate roof laid to diminishing courses to a stone ridge. 1948 addition of brick and concrete, finished to imitate quarry-faced ashlar stonework.

PLAN: barn of seven bays: the first bay from the north-east end being a shippon with a hayloft above; the second bay forms a threshing floor; the sixth and seventh bays formerly being a further shippon with hayloft. Lean-to extension on the south side extends the first bay shippon, a porch to the threshing floor and a two bay shippon or stable accessed from the porch. The 1948 addition is at the south western end, interconnected via two doorways through the gable end.

EXTERIOR: neatly quoined gable ends, that to the south-west being raised and coped, the coping being moulded and supported by moulded kneelers. The north-east gable end is plain verged, possibly rebuilt with the lean-to southern extension. Slight indications of vertical straight joints between bays five-six and six-seven indicate early extensions. A horizontal discontinuity in walling style in bays one-five just above the north-west cart entrance suggests an early heightening of the eaves (the stonework above this level is more random and less well coursed than that below).

North-west: wide cart entrance to the second bay is neatly built with quoins and voussoirs, the opening being straight chamfered and segmentally arched. There is a small square window to bay one with a stone surround, and a similar sized, but differently formed window to bay seven. Four neatly built ventilation slits are evenly spaced along bays three-five. At eaves level there is a neatly built pitching opening to bay seven with a margin-dressed surround. Two further, irregularly placed, pitching openings are inserted slightly lower at bays three and five.

South-east: bays one-four of the barn are concealed within the lean-to extension with bay one opened up; bay two retaining the chamfered jambs of the original cart entrance, but this entrance being heightened, the arch replaced with a rough, substantial, round wood lintel with no walling above; bay three has inserted doorways at both ground and first floor levels; bay four has an inserted feeding hole between the barn and the added stable. The lower part of bay seven is also concealed, this by part of the 1948 addition. Bays five and six of the barn are still exposed: bay five has a ventilation slit similar to those on the north-west elevation and bay six has a doorway with a Tudor style monolithic lintel with sunk spandrels and quoined jambs, this likely to be C17, but reset. Bay one of the extension has a similar style doorway (also likely to be reset) to the north western shippon, this retaining a rough, broad planked door on blacksmith-made strap hinges. Bay two has the reset cart entrance arch, the heightened jambs being quoined but not chamfered. Bays three and four have a small square window and two ventilation slits with the south west facing return having windows to ground and first floor. Internally to the porch there is a pair of feeding holes into bay one and a doorway and niche into bay three.
North-east gable: this shows a straight joint between the original barn and the extension and indications of the raising of the eaves and rooflines. There are three small ground floor windows. A large niche (visible internally) may represent a further ground floor window that is blocked externally.

South-west gable: this has an attic window with evidence of being a former doorway. To the ground floor (internal to the 1948 addition) are two doorways and a feeding hole, the northern doorway having jambs formed from impost blocks set on tall plinth blocks, probably C18.

1948 addition: this is a large single storey shed with a large entrance to its gable end above which is set a date stone inscribed MDN/Aug28 1948. This shed extends as a lean-to against the southern side of the western-most bay of the barn.

INTERIOR: the main barn roof retains four C18 collared trusses with trenched purlins, carpenter marked one to four from the south-west end. These are of oak. The two north-eastern trusses are of Baltic pine, being queen-post trusses supporting tusked purlins. These are later, but possibly also C18. The floor of the barn is concreted except for the north-easternmost bay that retains its stone flagging complete with drainage gully, this floor treatment continuing into the extension. Bays two and three of the extension also retains a stone flagged floor and gully. A hayloft floor, with rough remains of cattle stalling below, also survives at the north-east end of the barn, this thought likely to be C19. Numerous socket holes within the walls of the barn imply further hay lofts, but may be former scaffolding holes.

This list entry was subject to a Minor Amendment on 22 December 2021 to update the name and address to reflect residential use

Sources

Books and journals
Yorkshire Vernacular Buildings Study Group, , Vernacular Buildings of Hebden, (1999), 32-33
Heather M Beaumont et al, , Pointers to the Past: The Historical Landscape of Hebden Township, Upper Wharfedale, (2006), 32-33, 38-40.

Other
Historic building survey by Yorkshire Vernacular Buildings Study Group (1998) (record number 1572)

End of official list entry

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