Ashes Farmhouse

SD 54 SE GOOSNARGH CHURCH LANE Whitechapel

2/43 Ashes Farmhouse 11.11.1966 II

Farmhouse, C17 and early C18, altered. Whitewashed handmade brick and white concrete brick, with stone quoins, slate roof. Square plan formed by early C18 3-bay front range with rear wing to right half embracing a similar but earlier wing to the rear of the left half. Two storeys; symmetrical facade, recently rebuilt in white concrete brick, with a 3-course "moulded" band (the ends of which do not quite reach the corners of the wall), has a doorway with large long-and-short jambstones, moulded surround, and large stepped tympanum containing carving of a head, draped wings, and crude scroll-work, all within a triangle; 2 cross windows at ground floor and 3 above, all modern casements in stone surrounds. Right return wall, and both wings, have high stone plinth, blocked vertical rectangular windows with plain projecting architraves (one modern window on each floor of return wall, glazed porch and single-storey extension embracing the rear corner). Rear: gable wall of the old wing has at ground floor the remains of a high stepped label (like that over the front door) with double-returned ends (over a modern inserted window), at 1st floor over this a recessed 7-light wooden mullion window mostly rendered over but with geometrical leaded glazing visible in 2 lights (like that at Wood Fold Farmhouse, q.v.), a label over the window; and close to the junction of the wings a full-height segmental-headed stairlight with keystone, partly blocked. Chimneys at junction of wings with front range. Interior: unusually high ground floor rooms; said to have internal wall 1½ metres thick, with cavities large enough to hide several men (remains of stack?). History: from late C16 to mid C18 was home of recusant Threlfall family, Edmund Threlfall, active in Lancashire Plot of 1689, killed here 1690 (tympanum of door may be posthumous representation of him). Reference: Fishwick Goosnargh pp. 162-8. (Other similar houses in this parish, with comparable history, include Blake Hall, Bullsnape Hall, and White Hill and White Lee farmhouses, q.v.).

Listing NGR: SD5655240946