Ruins Of Laughton Place

Ruins of Laughton Place

The tower, the only remaining part of a large house, now converted for holiday lets. It was built by Sir William Pelham in 1534 as part of improvements to an earlier house on a moated site, with alterations made circa 1753-60 in Gothick style for the Hon. Henry Pelham, probably by Fuller White, and refurbished after 1979.

The tower is built of red brick in English bond with some moulded terracotta dressings and stone cills. It is square in plan with an octagonal staircase turret to the north west. The building has four storeys with irregular fenestration, including some mullioned or mullioned and transomed casements, and some Gothick arched openings. It features a crenellated brick parapet and terracotta pseudo-machicolations with cinquefoil heads.

The south or entrance front displays a third floor 18th-century quatrefoil window with dripmould. The second floor window is an 18th-century arched window with dripmould and moulded terracotta buckle, which is the emblem of the Pelham family. The two lower floors have a mid-18th-century brick front in English bond, formerly the centrepiece to a now demolished large farmhouse. This section features a pediment with modillion cornice, three arched windows with leaded lights, a band of modillions raised up in the centre between floors, two arched windows to the ground floor, and a central arched doorcase with arched fanlight and a 20th-century door, all connected by an impost band, with a plinth below.

The east front has a triple mullioned casement with leaded lights to the top floor, and a gable outline is visible from the second to third floor. The second floor has the outline of a flat arched doorcase and a blocked doorway, with further blocked arches to the lower floors. The north front has the octagonal staircase turret with a series of arched windows with terracotta mouldings to the top windows, a buttress, an arch fragment attached to the centre, two small 20th-century additions in matching style to the left, and two almost full height stepped buttresses to the left.

The west elevation has a two-light two tier arched window with terracotta mouldings and on the ground floor one single and one triple window with terracotta mouldings. The plinth also has terracotta mouldings.

The interior contains a ground floor with a four-centred arched headed door with some moulded terracotta dressings leading to a full-height brick and terracotta spiral staircase. The first floor room has a blocked doorway arch with plain spandrels. The second floor room has a four-centred arched fireplace. The third floor room has a chamfered cambered headed fireplace.

The site excluding the tower is a scheduled ancient monument.

Historical Context

The Pelham family were instrumental in capturing the French king during the Battle of Poitiers. The original house was a symmetrical courtyard house. Excavations in 1984 showed that in the mid-16th century the moated site was encircled by a brick wall with eight interval turrets of octagonal or semi-octagonal form. The tower is thought to have combined the functions of a solar and an outlook tower, with the first floor reached by a door from the main part of the house, the second floor serving as the lord's apartment and possibly a strong room, and the top floor serving as a surveying point, either for security or to watch the progress of the hunt.

By 1595 the Pelham family had built another house at Halland, which became their principal residence and subsequently a farmhouse. An estate map of 1641 by Anthony Everenden shows a sketch of a four bay gabled building of two storeys and attics with a projecting two storey entrance porch and the four storey tower. In the 1662 Hearth Tax returns, Laughton Place was assessed at seven hearths.

Circa 1753-60 the Hon. Henry Pelham built a large farmhouse around the tower, possibly to the designs of the carpenter-cum-architect Fuller White, who had been a foreman at Esher Place. Drawings of 1760-2 and 1828 show this was a symmetrical building of two storeys and seven bays with steeply-pitched hipped roof with end chimneys, crenellated parapet, central pediment, and Gothick style windows. The 1534 tower was the building's central feature, with the top floor window converted into a quatrefoil opening, the second floor window into an arched opening, and the two lower floors refaced in 18th-century brickwork with a pediment and arched windows and doorcase.

The remainder of the farmhouse was pulled down in 1939, and the tower was used as an observation post during the Second World War. The tower fell into ruinous condition until 1979, when the Landmark Trust restored the building.