Charity Farmhouse And Attached Forge

This is a late 16th-century farmhouse, originally of longhouse form with a byre which remains in use. A north extension was added in the 17th century, with 19th and 20th-century window replacements and renewed stacks. The farmhouse is constructed of random rubble stone with dressed stone quoins. The roof is corrugated iron over thatch, with a hipped section to the left and a gable to the right. There are 20th-century brick stacks at the ridge and on the north end wall. It has two storeys and originally had three windows to the front of the house and two openings to the byre. The ground floor of the house features 19th and 20th-century wood casement windows, including a 3:2:3-light window to the right, and a 4:3-light window above. The entrances include a former common entry to the right of centre, a plank door within a wood frame and wood lintel, of 20th-century date. A 19th-century plank door with wood frame and weatherboard serves the 17th-century extension to the left. The present entrance to the byre is on the right of the common entry, without a door; there is blocking to the right of that.

The interior retains the original plan, with a byre at the south end, a common entry passage, and a subsequent wall blocking the original access to the byre. Originally the passage and byre were separated by a timber partition. A heated room has an open fireplace with an embrasure backing onto the entry passage. A stair was originally located on the rear wall within a projecting embrasure; access to the heated room between the stair and the fireplace jamb is now blocked. An inner room to the northwest is a 17th-century addition or rebuilding. The roof structure comprises raised cruck trusses with collars, pegged yokes, 2 sets of through-purlins, and a ridge, both in the byre and the house. The house features hollow and protruding straight-chamfered spine beams with run-out stops. The internal arrangement of rooms has been altered by moving the stair to the rear wall, between the heated room and the parlour, and by altering external access to a position between the two rooms.

Attached to the northeast, at a right angle to what was formerly a barn, is an 18th-century forge. It is constructed of coursed rubble stone with a plinth moulding and has a hipped Roman-tile roof. A pair of plank doors are set at centre. Charity Farm was purchased in 1665 by the Corporation of Weymouth and Melcombe Regis, funded by a bequest from Sir Samuel Mico, who intended the rents to be used for an annual sermon and to relieve the poor.