Old Sheldon Grange

Old Sheldon Grange is a farmhouse of exceptional architectural interest, begun in the late 15th to early 16th century and substantially remodelled in the late 16th and 17th centuries, with only superficial modernisation since. The building is constructed of local stone rubble, much of it now plastered, with some cob on the wall tops. The stone rubble chimneys are topped with 19th-century brick. The roof, now covered with corrugated iron, preserves remains of the original thatch beneath.

The house is built down a gentle hillslope facing south to south-south-west and follows a 3-room-and-through-passage plan. At the east end is a parlour with a gable-end stack and winder stair rising alongside, with a narrow unheated room partitioned off behind it. The parlour opens off the passage. On the other side of the passage is a smaller dining room with an axial stack backing onto the passage. At the west end is a small unheated room, latterly used as an animal pen. A kitchen block projects at right angles to the rear of and partly into the dining room, featuring a large gable-end stack with a curing chamber alongside.

The house has a complex structural history. The original roof, which survives, demonstrates that the building once extended further eastwards beyond the present parlour and began as an open hall house. The roof comprises 4 bays; the western 2 bays over the dining room and end room are heavily smoke-blackened from the original open hearth fire, while the eastern 2 bays over the passage and parlour are clean, with no surviving evidence of an original chimneystack. The layout of the main block, featuring a 3-room-and-through-passage plan with a substantially smaller hall than parlour, appears to result primarily from a major late 16th to early 17th-century refurbishment, though some features may be earlier. The kitchen block was added around the same time or slightly later. An axial division in what was once a full-width parlour was probably inserted during a late 17th to early 18th-century modernisation, as was the rebuilding of the parlour stair.

The house is 2 storeys throughout. The exterior presents an irregular 5-window front of 19th and 20th-century casements, the oldest example at the first-floor right end containing rectangular panes of leaded glass, with the remainder featuring glazing bars. A roughly central passage front doorway contains a late 19th-century door now off its hinges. The roof is gable-ended. Windows at the back and in the kitchen block are similar to those on the front. The passage rear doorway retains an old plank door, probably late 17th to early 18th-century, hung on strap hinges with fleur-de-lys finials, with a contemporary doorframe possibly boxing in an earlier oak frame. At the back end of the kitchen block an oven housing projects, alongside which stands a 19th-century gabled lavatory, apparently built over a stream.

The interior, although much clad with 19th-century plaster, preserves the 16th and 17th-century structure in excellent condition, albeit somewhat dilapidated. Stone rubble crosswalls stand either side of the passage. A fielded 4-panel door on H-L hinges connects the passage to the parlour; dated to the late 17th to early 18th century, similar doors occur at the top and bottom of the parlour stair. The axial partition is oak-studded, cob-hogged and was clad with lathe and plaster from the outset. The parlour crossbeam features plain chamfers. The fireplace is Beerstone with an oak lintel, low Tudor arch head and chamfered surround. Alongside to the right are late 17th to early 18th-century cupboards with fielded panel doors, the top tier featuring nowy-headed panels. The contemporary winder stair includes a short length of rail with turned balusters and a finial-topped newel post. Opposite the passage, a plain oak plank-and-muntin screen divides the 2 rooms. The hall/dining room contains a large stone rubble fireplace with an oak-framed front and chamfered surround, with a smaller version in the chamber above. Both the hall and small inner room have plain chamfered axial beams. On the first floor of the main block are 4 chambers of roughly equal size, 2 each side of the hall/dining room stack, each pair divided by a late 16th to early 17th-century close-studded oak-framed crosswall in which the lathes are slotted into individually drilled holes to provide a ladder backing for the cob infill.

The roof is of late 15th to early 16th-century date and is carried on side-pegged jointed cruck trusses with small triangular yokes at the apex and a diagonally set ridge (Alcock's type L1). The section over the hall/dining room and end room, including surviving common rafters and the underside of some original thatch, is smoke-blackened from the original open hearth fire. At the west end the ridge stops short of the end wall and contains a mortise for a missing hip cruck, proving this was the original end of the house. The section over the passage and parlour is clean or very lightly smoke-blackened. The ridge is cut off at the east end, proving the original house extended further in that direction. The kitchen has been enlarged at the expense of the hall/dining room, with the line of the original stone wall between the two visible in the ceiling. The crossbeam in the kitchen proper is boxed in. The large kitchen fireplace features a plain oak lintel and contains a large 19th-century oven. The left side of the fireplace is supported by an oak post, suggesting there was originally an opening through the left cheek to the large curing chamber. The roof of this wing is carried on a side-pegged jointed cruck truss.

Old Sheldon Grange is a most interesting multi-phase Devon farmhouse with unusually well-preserved early features, largely because it has not been modernised in the 20th century. It was built as a grange of Dunkeswell Abbey, which may account for its unconventional layout.