Summary
Former butchers shop with barn, stables and slaughterhouse. 1870s house with west range including commercial unit, barn, stables and slaughterhouse added around 1899.
Reasons for Designation
17 Waddesdon High Street, a former butcher’s shop with its related house and outbuildings including a combined stables and slaughterhouse, is listed at Grade II, for the following principal reasons:
Architectural interest:
* as a rare and particularly complete example of an early-C20 rural butcher’s shop with its private slaughterhouse, stables and barn which clearly illustrate the function and processes of the business;
* for its original shop front and an interior typical of a rural butchers of this period which retains characteristic features;
* the house, although plain and typical of its period, retains many original features and is integral to the understanding of the assemblage;
* the unusual combined stable and slaughterhouse block retains many original features relating to its function.
Historical interest:
* for its social history interest in providing evidence of the form and function of a rural butchers, prior to the eradication of private slaughterhouses during the course of the C20.
History
The plot at 17 High Street, Waddesdon was sold in 1877 and the First Edition Ordnance Survey map of 1880 shows a semi-detached building on this and the adjoining plot to the south-east. Trade directories indicate that the butcher’s shop was established by 1899 by George Hall Newman and the 1900 OS map shows the original house was extended at this time with a new range to the north-west added to create the shop. A stable block/slaughterhouse and a barn were also added to the rear at this time.
Butcher's shops in the late-C19s typically had open fronts or sash windows that could be opened wide to expose displays to passers-by. Grilles along the top of the window could allow ventilation in the shop. Canopies, sometimes fixed, could provide protection from sun and rain. They could also have rails and hooks attached with which to display carcasses. Historic photographs of 17 High Street from late C19 and early C20 indicate that the building’s new shop front has been little altered since construction. Only the name on the sign atop the canopy and the paint scheme have changed.
Slaughterhouses at the rear of the shop could be used to kill animals and were licenced by the local authority. After the Slaughterhouses Acts of 1954 and 1958, private slaughterhouses became less common places as facilities were provided by local authorities. Documentary evidence shows that the business of the butcher's shop at 17 High Street included a slaughterhouse from 1901 and was licenced by the Rural District Council of Aylesbury until at least 1925.
The original owner, George Newman, was born in Wilstone, Hertfordshire in 1849. Before moving to Waddesdon, he worked as a master wheelwright living at the Black Horse beer house, Tring and then as a carpenter in Aston Clinton, Aylesbury. The 1901 Census shows him at Waddesdon with his wife Emma and daughter Grace. By 1907, Buckinghamshire trade directories indicate that George Newman’s son, Ewart, had succeeded his father to the business.
In 1926, Stewart Adams purchased the business from the Newman family (The Bucks Herald, 9 October 1926). Stewart Adam’s father, William Adams had an extensive cattle and sheep business at Yeat Farm, Wotton (The Bucks Herald, 1 June 1951).
Adams Butcher Shop ceased trading in 1974 but the house continued to be occupied.
Details
Former butchers shop with barn, stables and slaughterhouse. 1870s house with west range including commercial unit, barn, stables and slaughterhouse added around 1899.
MATERIALS: original house of yellow stock brick with a pitched slate roof. The later western range is of red brick with a half-hipped slate roof. All brickwork is in Flemish bond. Timber shopfront with fascia signage of pigmented glass with gold lettering. Timber panelled interior with concrete floor, fittings of timber and ceramic tiles. The stable/slaughterhouse is of red brick (also in Flemish bond) with a weather-boarded upper storey and clay pan-tile roof.
PLAN: the buildings occupy a wide plot on the south side of the High Street. The original house occupies the eastern part of the plot facing the High Street (and originally formed the western half of a pair of semi-detached houses) with the later transverse range added to the west. Each range has two rooms to each floor (with an additional single-storey kitchen to the rear of the east range) with a ground-floor commercial unit at the front of the western range. A straight flight staircase runs from a small lobby at the rear of the eastern range. The stable/slaughterhouse at the rear of the plot has a loft, rear room behind the stables used for stunning or slaughtering the animals and a double-height slaughterhouse used for processing the carcasses.
EXTERIOR: on north elevation, the shopfront has a canopy with a dagger-board valance, supported by timber brackets. Atop the canopy is a framed timer sign reading ‘ADAMS’ in gold lettering. Underneath the canopy is a cast iron rail used to hang and display carcasses. Below is a large timber four-over-four sash window. The opened window could be used to sell goods externally. Above the window is a cast iron ventilation grille. The frames and surrounds and panelled stall-riser (which originally had painted lettering stating ‘FAMILY BUTCHER’) are of painted timber. The principal entrance to the shop and accommodation is to the right of the window and consists of a four-panel door with transom. The upper storey has a three-over-three, horned, sash window with a rubbed brick lintel and stone sill. The half-hipped roof has timber bargeboards. On the east range each floor has a similar window to that on the west range. The side elevation has a single ground floor two-over-two, horned, sash window, in a segmental arched opening, to the shop.
The rear elevation of the west range has a sash window to each floor (that on the ground floor in a segmental brick arch) and six-panel timber door with transom. The house extends further to the rear with a single-storey kitchen including a ledged and braced door and a three-over-six sash window.
Three red brick chimney stacks are prominent and to full original height, each with a projecting band and square-section pale terracotta chimney pots.
INTERIOR: the butcher's shop occupies the front room of the ground floor. The walls and ceiling are lined with painted matchboard panelling. To the left of the entrance is a white-tiled ceramic countertop which runs below the front window and along the east wall. At the end of the tiled countertop is a matchboard-clad space used for the cashier. Behind the counter, the northern wall has a matchboard inset with the moulded surround of a blocked doorway (on the other side of the wall, the four-panelled door remains). Above the sash window are five meat hooks and either side are cast iron brackets for a meat rail running across the window. Along the top of length of the east wall is suspended cast iron meat rail. The floor is of concrete. There is a white refrigeration cabinet along the southern wall with glazed double-doors and a metal plaque noting ‘THOMAS HALL & SON LTD. REFRIDGERATING ENGINEERS, INSULATING CONTRACTORS, ROTHERHAM.
At the back of the shop is a four-panelled door leading to the rear of the building. The two upper panels have etched glass with a circular floral design. The rear room includes a fireplace with marble surround, tiled register grate, decorative ceramic floor tiles and brass and cast-iron fender.
A red clay tiled corridor leads to the original rear room of the eastern range. This has a 1930s cast iron cooking range and grate set in a fireplace with a timber mantlepiece with consoles. Either side of the range are original fitted cupboards and the four-panelled door to the under-stair cupboard has a spring latch. A, now internal, sash window looks through to the single-storey kitchen suggesting this was a later addition. The front room of the eastern range includes a fireplace with marble surround and brass and cast-iron fender.
The straight flight staircase, with moulded treads, leads to the first floor. Doors are original and are all of four-panels. Timber fire surrounds, metal grates and most joinery survives.
SUBSIDIARY FEATURES: to the rear of the building stand three outhouses in a courtyard. Immediately to the south of the house is a small red brick privy with plank door. The interior has an earth closet and timber seat. Abutting the privy, is a timber-frame, weather-boarded barn or large shed. This has cart doors to the west, paired six-pane casement windows to the south and a corrugated iron roof. The interior contains a cool store of probably mid-C20 date.
The two-storey combined stables and slaughterhouse has red brick walls to the ground floor, weatherboarded timber-framing above and a pantile roof. The front (north) elevation has a stable door with a plank hayloft door above it. The slaughterhouse has double cart doors (one with a six-pane window) and a louvred window above. Internally the stable has two stalls separated by a timber partition, wooden troughs and tack brackets, an iron hayrack and brick floors. The east elevation has a three-over-six sash window. The rear room running behind the stables gives access to the rear of the slaughterhouse via a stable door and has a timber tethering post and a concrete floor with an L-shaped drain. The interior of the slaughterhouse is plastered above a brick plinth. In the south-west corner, below a four-pane window and next to an external plank door, is a brick tank lined with white ceramic tiles. The west elevation has a tripartite casement window. The roof beams of the double-height space have hooks and iron meat rails run along the eastern wall.
