Stocks Cottage

Stocks Cottage is a house dating from the early to mid 17th century. It’s constructed of stone rubble with a corrugated iron roof featuring gable ends. The roof ridge is lower on the range to the right. The house has large projecting stone chimney stacks on its gable ends. It likely originally had a two-room and through-passage plan with a kitchen in the lower range on the left and a parlour in a slightly smaller room at the higher end on the right. The original position of the staircase was probably at the higher end, in front of the gable-end fireplace to the right. The entrance has been altered, with a tiny, blocked door visible within the opening to the left of the present entrance, and its doorframe may be reset. A straight joint on the rear elevation indicates the former position of the rear door of the through passage.

The front of the house is asymmetrical, with two windows on each floor. The ground floor features a partly blocked opening on the left, a timber lintel over a blocked entrance to the left of centre, the current entrance to the right of centre, and a window overgrown with ivy to the right. On the first floor are two partly blocked window openings, one on the left and one to the right of the entrance. Two circa 17th century window openings are visible in the left-hand gable end, to the right of the projecting stack. The rear elevation has a three-light 17th century timber mullion window on the ground floor and remains of a 17th century two-light timber mullion window on the first floor.

A low stone rubble wall encloses a lean-to outshut on the right-hand gable end, with an entrance leading from the parlour to the rear of the right end stack. The interior has lime-plastered walls. A low doorframe to the blocked door on the left is visible from within; it is a rectangular timber frame with a circa 17th century chamfered inner timber frame, the jambs and lintel of which are chamfered on the inner side, possibly indicating it was moved and reoriented. The jambs are morticed into the lintel and shaped to form a rounded arch and the left-hand jamb has been partly removed. The kitchen, passage, and lower end of the parlour have slate paved floors, and chamfered ceiling beams. The parlour ceiling beams were replaced in the 19th century. The through passage has been altered and blocked at the rear. A staircase was inserted to the left of the passage, creating a small room between the stair and a screen. The parlour and kitchen fireplaces are partly blocked, with a step down into the kitchen. The first floor has two circa 17th century fireplaces in the gable ends.

The roof is of five bays. Truss one, at the lower end on the south, dates back to the 17th century and features cambered collars with dovetailed, notched, and lapped joints, and principals with slightly curved feet. Truss two was originally open and is probably 17th century, possibly closed in the 18th century below the cambered collar with a vertically studded lath and plaster screen. Truss three, circa 18th century, is missing a collar and shows slight blackening, possibly staining and was originally closed. Trusses one, two and three originally had trenched purlins. Truss four, circa late 18th century, has lapped and oak-pegged collars. Stocks Cottage is a good example, in both elevation and plan, of an unspoiled circa early 17th century two-room and through-passage plan house.