Woodsford Castle

Woodsford Castle is a surviving range of a fortified manor house dating from the 14th century, when a licence to crenellate was granted to William de Whitefield in 1335. The building is constructed of roughly coursed rough ashlar with thatched roofs, partly hipped and partly finished with coped gables. Stone chimneys stacks rise from the eaves—two at the front and two at the rear. The structure is partly two-storey and partly three-storey, though it may originally have formed a three or four-sided courtyard house.

The main range originally featured a first floor hall over a vaulted undercroft. An attic floor was inserted into the hall during the 17th century, floor levels were altered, and the roof was rebuilt at that time. A projecting three-storey wing of 17th-century date extends from the left end of the main range. A chamfered string course marks the original first floor level across the main range.

On the ground floor near the left end, a ledged door within a four-centred arched opening, approached by a flight of stone steps, provides access to the hall. Two further similar doors positioned nearer the right end give access to service rooms in the undercroft, above which are stone corbels, possibly for a former pentice. To the left of the hall door are two slit windows; to the right are one slit window and a 17th-century four-light stone mullioned window. One slit window sits to the right of the lower doors. Two 17th-century stone mullioned windows are cut into the original string course. To the right of these, above the string course, are two 14th-century mullioned and transomed windows—one two-light and one single-light, with trefoiled lights. On the present third floor, above the hall, are three 17th-century mullioned windows with lead lights.

At the right end of the main range stands a D-shaped stair turret providing access to rooms at that end, with external steps rising to a ledged door. To the right of the main range is a lower, two-storey range, probably for servants' rooms. At its right end are the remains of a former turret with a four-centred arched opening. This range contains a ledged door in a four-centred arched opening with a slightly projecting surround, two slit windows on the ground floor, and on the first floor two mullioned and transomed windows—one two-light and one single-light, with trefoiled lights.

In the left (north) end wall and rear wall is a 14th-century window, a two-light mullioned and transomed window with ogee-headed upper lights and shouldered-arched lower lights. Various 17th-century windows have been inserted throughout. Along the rear wall are stone corbels at eaves level, probably for a former parapet, and remains of turrets.

Internally, the ground floor is vaulted throughout, with the remains of a large kitchen fireplace opening topped by a stone arch. The hall at the north end has an inserted ceiling that obscures the heads of the original windows. A stone fireplace with a joggled lintel on moulded corbels is present. Off the hall at its north-east corner is a garderobe chamber complete with chute and wall basin. A spiral staircase to the roof is located at the north end of the hall.

A four-centred archway opens into the stair hall. This space, together with an adjoining bathroom, occupies what was originally the chapel, identifiable by an ogee-arched piscina. Stone stairs in the stair hall probably remain in their original position. The solar or Queen's room, situated beyond the chapel, has a squint into the chapel. Rooms at the south end have been largely unaltered apart from changes in floor level and several original door openings, though they have been unoccupied for an extended period.

This is a medieval house of considerable architectural and historical interest.