Ragstone Barn At Pevington Farm, Including Attached Cart Shed To South West And Farm Building To East

Ragstone Barn at Pevington Farm, Including Attached Cart Shed to South West and Farm Building to East

This is a group of farm buildings originally comprising a cattle shelter, later converted into a barn with attached former cattle shed and another farm building. The lower part of the barn dates to the 18th century, possibly incorporating earlier fabric, while the upper part was added in the mid-19th century. The cart shed and other farm building date to the early 19th century.

The buildings are constructed of Kentish ragstone rubble with brick quoins. The barn has a slate roof, while the other buildings have tiled roofs.

The group forms an L-shape within a formerly enclosed farmyard, consisting of a seven-bay barn aligned west to east to the north-west; an attached farm building to the north-east; and a five-bay former cart shed attached at the south-west corner of the barn.

The barn is built of Kentish ragstone with brick dressings and a gabled slate roof. Central full-height cart entrances open to both the south and north. The south side features coursed ragstone to the lower part with ragstone galleting and two wide openings for cattle with 18th-century brick quoins, later blocked in random ragstone rubble. Above these openings, the walling is uncoursed and without galleting, but includes four red brick ventilation slits. A triangular buttress is attached to the eastern side. The north side also has galleting to the lower part and some red brick quoins to the cart entrance, though the masonry of the upper part is more random and without galleting. The upper part of the quoins to the cart entrance and the ventilation slits are of yellow brick. The east and west gables have small openings inserted in the 1950s.

The cart store, aligned north to south, is also built of Kentish ragstone with red brick quoins and a hipped tiled roof. It is open-fronted to the east, supported on wooden piers, though the two southernmost bays have been enclosed with planks, slat windows, and a door with pintle hinges.

The farm building attached to the east of the barn is aligned west to east, single-storeyed, and built of Kentish ragstone rubble with a tiled roof hipped to the east end.

Internally, the barn has had two large 20th-century brick cold stores inserted, obscuring the interior walls. The roof structure is a 19th-century oak roof of scientific kingpost type with side struts connecting to the purlins. There is a ridgepiece and both rafters and purlins are of thin timber scantling. The former cart store has a roof of thin timber scantling with purlins and collar beams. The interior of the attached eastern farm building was not inspected.

Pevington Farm was an ancient manor and Pevington was formerly a distinct parish separate from Pluckley. The manor of Pevington was granted to Bishop Odo of Bayeux after the Norman Conquest and appears in the Domesday Book. The church at Pevington, dedicated to St Mary, was an appendage to the manor and in the patronage of the lords of the manor. In 1583 the ecclesiastical parish was united with Pluckley because the church had fallen into ruinous condition. Edward Hasted's "The History and Topographical Survey of the County of Kent" of 1798 reported that the church had been converted into a stable. In 1612 Pevington Farm became part of the Dering estate, and both the farmhouse and some farm buildings have the distinctive round-headed brick casement windows introduced into Dering estate buildings in the 19th century. These buildings and most of the other farm buildings at Pevington Farm are shown on the 1871 Ordnance Survey map.