Moot Hall

MOOT HALL AND NO. 39 HIGH STREET

A tower house built in the early to mid-15th century, now serving as town council premises. Constructed for Sir Robert D'Arcy (1358-1448) and acquired by Maldon Borough Council in 1576. The building underwent internal remodelling in the late 18th to early 19th century, with the parapet, top of the stair turret, and north-west angle of the rear range rebuilt around 1900.

Construction and Plan

Built of red brick in English bond with walls at least two feet thick, now under a lead roof. The building comprises two intersecting rectangles: the rear range attaches to the north-west corner of the front range and may be a later addition. An octagonal crenellated stair turret rises at the north-east angle of the front range, cylindrical internally.

Exterior

The building stands three storeys high, with a vaulted cellar beneath the rear range, partly below ground level.

High Street Elevation: The ground floor has been refaced in Gault brick. The entrance features a pair of doors set in round-arched reveals under gauged brick arches with patterned fanlights, flanked by a blind central recess. A boot scraper remains in place. A tetrastyle Doric portico carries a late 19th-century iron balustrade fitted with a pair of lamps. At first-floor level, a pair of full-height round-arched sashes with glazing bars and radial glazing in the heads provide light; one opens onto the balcony. A central plaque records the installation of a clock on an iron bracket in 1881. The second floor has a 20-pane sash window.

Rear Elevation of Main Range: The ground floor is partly concealed by later additions. A 12-by-4-pane pivoting window with chamfered jambs sits below a truncated single light. The first floor has a 16-pane sash under a gauged brick arch. A 12-pane sash lights the second floor. Sash windows appear on the east and west elevations at second-floor level. An added chimney stack stands against the west wall.

Rear Range Elevations: The ground floor of the rear elevation is cement rendered and lined out. A barred rectangular window lights the first floor, while a round-arched sash with glazing bars and radial glazing in the head serves the second floor. The north-east elevation has a first-floor two-light chamfered-brick-mullioned window, completely renewed. The west elevation shows two inserted rectangular lights at first-floor level and two arched lights at second-floor level, one of which is four-centred and chamfered. Rectangular slit windows pierce the stair turret walls. A timber bell cage sits beneath a shingled spirelet of 1881 on the rear range.

No. 39 High Street

This shop, dating from around 1440, was formerly part of the Moot Hall. Built partly of red English-bond brick and partly of rendered timber-frame with a gabled plain tile roof, it rises three storeys with a single-window range and a two-storey 19th-century rear extension. The front is rendered with a parapet. The second floor has a 19th-century nine-pane sash window. The first floor features a similar but wider window, now partly obscured and showing only eight panes. The late 19th-century shop front is of hardwood with a deep projecting fascia on brackets and a band of rectangular leaded lights above a plain shop front with brick stall-riser and recessed entrance.

As originally built in the early to mid-15th century, No. 39 had a brick west flank wall (shared with the Moot Hall proper), a recessed brick front elevation, and a brick angled rear wall contiguous to the Moot Hall stair tower. This rear wall contained narrow windows at ground- and original first-floor level with chamfered jambs. The west flank wall shows a brick straight joint near its south end at first-floor level only, marking the springing of the original brick front wall. The east flank consists of a two-storey timber-framed wall of around 1400 against which this property was constructed. This earlier wall has straight wall bracing and remnants of three originally elaborate windows. Near its centre stood a contemporary projecting chimney stack.

Interior of Moot Hall

On each floor, the front range contains a single large chamber. On the ground floor, a cross-wall has been inserted to form a front lobby containing a staircase to the first floor.

Ground Floor of Front Range: Moulded and crenellated wall plates support two transverse beams. A barred window sits in the inserted wall, which contains a diagonally boarded and studded door with a small grille. 20th-century dado panelling lines the walls. A Tudor arch, splayed only on the right, opens to the stair turret in the north-east wall. A tall chamfered Tudor-arched doorway, now blocked, originally gave access up steps to the small closet in the rear range.

Rear Range: Raised upon a barrel-vaulted semi-basement, the rear range's original cellar entrance from outside in the north wall is now blocked. In the early 19th century, the vault was truncated by the insertion of a cross wall to form a passage from the main range to the yard at the rear, now providing cellar access. A new entrance was cut through, perhaps at the same time, from the main range into the ground-floor chamber in the rear wing. This chamber has moulded and crenellated wall plates. A 20th-century brick fireplace stands in the original position at the west end of the rear wall. A Tudor-arched doorway leads to the closet. Another Tudor-arched doorway opens to a vaulted brick newel stair with moulded integral handrail and a stepped-headed lamp niche at the base.

At first-floor level, a timber floor was inserted across the staircase. In a second phase of alteration, most of this was removed when a short flight of timber stairs was inserted to improve access from the first-floor court room to the second floor. The brick steps, with a wider tread to the original first-floor entrance, remain intact although the entrance itself has been altered. A fragment of possible moulded door jamb survives.

First Floor: The front stair to the first-floor court room is of timber with ramped mahogany handrail and balustrade with stick balusters and column newels. The court room retains late 18th- to early 19th-century court fittings including raised-and-fielded-panelled benches, dock, witness box, and judge's bench. Dado panelling of the same date lines the walls. A fireplace with a 20th-century stone surround containing a Gothic iron grate stands against the west wall. A 19th-century gaslight fitting with ceiling rose in iron remains in place. A four-centred-arched door leads to the rear range chamber, which has 17th-century dado panelling and moulded and crenellated wall plates. A 20th-century brick fireplace sits under a perhaps original chamfered brick mantel. A gaslight fitting survives. A Tudor arch opens to the closet, which has a stepped-headed niche to the west wall.

Second Floor: Approached by the newel stair, with its lower wall encased and fitted with a mahogany handrail and stepped-headed slit window, an arched doorway chamfered on one side and built in the curve of the wall leads into the main room.

Council Chamber in Front Range: Features 18th- to early 19th-century dado panelling incorporating an arched niche cupboard with shaped shelves and panelled door. An ovolo-moulded cornice runs around the room. Iron ceiling roses for gas light fittings, now replaced, remain visible. A black marble fireplace on the west wall has fluted pilasters surmounted by roundels and contains a Gothic iron grate. A Tudor arch leads to the rear chamber with later 20th-century panelling. A four-centred chamfered brick fireplace sits against the wall, its flue contained within the wall thickness.

Interior of No. 39

Remnants of late 16th-century wall painting and 18th-century stencil painting survive on the ground floor. As first constructed, the building was of two storeys with a simple collar roof seated on moulded wall plates, built into the Moot Hall wall and planted on top of the around-1400 timber-framed wall. The around-1400 chimney breast was removed later (possibly around 1600), and a fireplace was inserted in the first floor with a timber mantel beam supported on large brick corbels. The ground floor of the west flank has a four-centred-arched brick doorway (now blocked) which gave access to the Moot Hall proper.

The brick front wall was removed probably in the early 17th century, and a new timber-framed wall was substituted, lining up with the Moot Hall frontage. At the same time, the simple collar-rafter roof was extended forward, and this new framing incorporated a large window opening to the former second-floor room. Shortly afterwards (around 1630), a floor was inserted, partly covering this window to form an attic.

History

The building, including No. 39 High Street, was built as a residence for Sir Robert D'Arcy. New evidence in the form of blocked doorways and straight joints in the brickwork suggests that a two-storey first-floor hall structure was first intended, squeezed into an already developed urban frontage. This probably had a hall at right angles to the frontage and the octagonal stair tower without its elaborate spiral stair. The latter appears to be part of a second phase, when walls were thickened up and the building raised to its present height. It seems probable that the stair was the work of foreign brickmakers, being identical to others at Someries Castle in Bedfordshire and Faulkbourne Hall in Essex.

In the 16th century, the house was sold to a Maldon merchant and was again sold to the Borough of Maldon in 1576 for fifty-five pounds. At some time, No. 39 had become a separate residence, probably during the period of merchant ownership. The Moot Hall has been used as a court since 1576. From 1836 to 1888, the ground floor was used as a police station and housed cells. After 1889, it housed the Essex Constabulary until the police station in West Square was built in the early 20th century.