Ruins Of Former Snelston Hall And Attached Walls And Gates

The ruins of Snelston Hall, a large Neo-Gothic house, along with attached walls and gates, stand in the Parish of Snelston, Church Road. The hall was originally constructed around 1828 by L. N. Cottingham for the Harrison family, but was largely demolished in 1951. The building is constructed of sandstone and brick with stone dressings.

A substantial section of one wall of the former hall remains, enclosing a courtyard to the north. This wall is punctuated by towers at each end and features a continuous stringcourse near the top and embattled ridgeback coped parapets. The western tower contains a stone basin set within a basket-headed niche bearing a gargoyle head, from which water once spouted. Above this is an ovolo moulded lancet window in a recessed flat-headed surround with incised spandrels. Above the stringcourse is a recessed and chamfered three-light mullion window with ogee-headed lights and pierced spandrels, set within a flat-headed surround and hoodmould. The east tower has a double lancet window in a flat-headed surround, a two-light window above with ogee lights, and embattled parapets. Attached to the north side of the wall is a brick lean-to with a central stone coped gable bay and stone mullioned windows.

Stone walls enclose the courtyard, the west wall of which links to a gateway featuring a large four-centred arch with a corbelled barrel vault and a smaller, similar arch to the north, both protected by Gothic panelled gates. A thin circular tower with embattled parapets is attached to the south side of the gateway. A walkway runs over the gateway and along the west wall to the tower.

Garden walls, with ridgeback copings, run around the courtyard, connecting to a retaining wall in front of the former hall. A gate in the wall, approximately 4 metres south-west of the west tower, has a central four-centred arch, surmounted by corbelled ridgeback copings, and is flanked by columns with circular embattled tops and incised arrow slits. There are two pairs of gates along the wall to the east side of the former hall, each featuring circular columns topped by pyramidal copings and original timber gates with decorative ironwork panels.