Shepherd'S Farmhouse

Shepherd’s Farmhouse is a house dating to the late 16th century, with later alterations. It is constructed of roughcast random rubble chert, with a gable-ended corrugated iron roof, which partially obscures a former thatched roof. Originally, the house comprised three rooms arranged in a through-passage plan, with a service wing to the left of the passage and a byre beyond, facing west. The internal division between the hall and inner room has been removed, as has the original roof structure. Some roof trusses appear to be of jointed cruck construction. The service wing retains an end stack with a bake oven; the hall has an axial stack backing onto the passage; and the originally unheated inner room now has an internal end stack. Brick shafts serve the chimneys. Two windowed staircases are present, one beside the service end stack and the other between the passage and hall. The exterior front (west-facing) features late 20th-century casement windows, some set within early embrasures, three large half dormers, and four ground-floor windows. The rear elevation also has late 20th-century windows. The rear door to the passage has an early design, though it has been much repaired and is fitted with fleur-de-lis strap hinges, set within a chamfered and pegged surround. The bake oven projects as a bulge between the end of the service room and the entrance to the byre. Inside, a plank and muntin screen separates the passage from the service room, displaying carpenter's mitres, though there appears to be no evidence of stops to the muntins, either now eroded or removed. Two blocked arched doorways lead into the service room, and no evidence of internal division remains within that room. The service room fireplace includes a large lintel with a shallow chamfer, lacking stops. The bake oven is an early example of good quality, constructed of small bricks, and is accompanied by a corn-drying kiln accessible from the byre at first-floor level. A solid timber winder staircase is also present. The hall was relatively small and contained two cross ceiling beams, deeply chamfered on the side facing into the hall, with scroll stops, and only shallowly chamfered on the opposite side. The fireplace lintel is also shallowly chamfered. An original newel post is visible on the winder stairs. Evidence for the former hall/inner room partition is unclear, but it was presumably attached to the unchamfered side of the higher end hall ceiling beam. A roughly chamfered ceiling cross beam is found in the inner room.