Anderton And Barn Adjoining At West

Anderton and Barn Adjoining at West

Farmhouse and barn of 15th-century origins with 17th-century alterations. The building is constructed of dressed freestone and granite with some cob to the rear, covered with slate roofs and scantle slate to the left side. The left gable end projects a dressed freestone stack, with brick chimneys set in the ridge.

The original 15th-century plan consisted of a 4-bay solar to the left of a through passage. Evidence of 17th-century remodelling shows a 3-room and through-passage plan, with the roof of the higher end of the range raised in the late 17th century. A rear right cob outshut with catslide roof forms an L-shaped plan.

The north-facing 2-storey front features an off-centre porch formed from 2 slates over a slight recess at the junction between the higher and lower ends. The porch has a fine ovolo-moulded doorframe with urn stops and an elaborate front door decorated with geometric incised lines between studs. A datestone of 1636 marks the range to the left of the door.

The ground floor left side contains two 3-light granite mullioned windows with hoodmoulds and label stops; the window to the far left retains casements. The ground floor right of the higher range has a 2-light mullioned window with a high transom, each light below the transom containing 12 panes, with some glazing bars above the transom missing and a timber lintel. Three irregularly-spaced first floor windows, each 2-light with high transom and 3 panes per light below the transom, light the upper storey. A timber sash above the porch contains 6 panes to the upper sash and 9 panes to the lower sash. To the right of the porch the roofline is lower; the front is rendered above first floor sill level, indicating the roof has been raised. A 3-light timber casement window with 3 panes per light occupies the ground floor right, with a further blocked opening to the ground floor right. The first floor right has a 2-light timber casement with 8 panes per light. The slate roof of the lower end is painted with bitumen.

The through passage contains a slate floor, a heavily moulded cross beam to the right, and roll-moulded axial beams. A timber doorway with a 4-centred arch and foliage carved in the spandrels opens into the ground floor room to the right, which contains a massive blocked fireplace with 2 cloam ovens. Rooms to the left of the passage were subdivided in the 20th century. A 20th-century fireplace at the left gable end stack possibly conceals an earlier fireplace. Remains of a moulded plaster cornice survive to the rear of the ground floor rooms on the left. The roof to the right of the through passage was replaced and raised in the 20th century.

The roof to the left retains 4 arched brace trusses with mouldings. One truss, complete with collar mortised into principals, moulded braces, and 2 tiers of hollow chamfered purlins, remains at its original lower level. The truss to the left has lost one brace; the next truss to the left is intact with a hollow chamfered wind brace, and the fourth truss has its collar and braces missing. The roofspace at the higher end beyond the stack was inaccessible at the time of resurvey. The ground floor room to the left originally had an elaborate plaster ceiling with a wreath of fruit and flowers, which was removed in the 1940s. No evidence of smoke-blackening was observed on the timbers.

Anderton was owned by the Anderton family before being sold to Edmund Speccott. Speccott's daughter Elizabeth married into the Spoure family, and the house is illustrated in the Spoure Book, compiled in 1698. The illustration shows that the present range and barn projecting forward from the right gable end were part of an enclosed courtyard. The barn retains an opening in its east wall shown in the Spoure Book illustration, which also depicts cylindrical chimneys to the house and a formal walled garden to the east. A front lateral stack, now missing, is shown in the illustration with inserted mullioned windows indicating an altered plan. The present front wall of the left-hand end may have been moved forward since 1698. A copy of the Spoure Book is held in the Cornwall County Record Office, F.S.3/93.