Leigh Barton Farmhouse

Leigh Barton Farmhouse

A Grade I farmhouse with monastic lodging, dating from the 15th century with 17th-century alterations and major renovation and reconstruction from around 1983. The building is constructed of green-grey schist with slate or asbestos-cement slate roofs.

The farmhouse comprises a U-plan courtyard group arranged around an open courtyard facing east. The north range, substantially reconstructed in the 17th century and re-windowed in the 19th century, contains a central hall with remains of a screen, cross passage, and an external stair turret to the north. Attached to this is an L-plan 15th-century range housing the kitchen, a former timber gallery to upper lodgings, and storage spaces.

The rear ranges are two storeys. The kitchen wing, aligned east-west, features a recently reconstructed timber gallery (1988) comprising six bays on a compartmental floor with moulded beams and a twelve-bay panelled balustrade with moulded muntins and handrail. This is approached by a steep flight of seven stone steps from a chamfered plinth. Below the gallery is a two-light timber casement opening directly into the kitchen. The left gable end, which terminates in a half-hip, retains remains of a vaulted bread oven and a doorway broken through a second similar area, with a square opening at upper level marking a former doorway.

A low wall extends from the south-east corner connecting to adjacent farm buildings and contains the lower parts of two former windows. The south front features at each side of a broad garderobe turret a small shouldered-arch opening and a two-light stone casement with mullion and transom, cusping and stopped hoodmould. A buttress with three offsets stands to the right.

The left gable rises to a coped verge with a small ridge stack above a shouldered door opening (probably a former window) and a two-light casement on the south face. The outer wall of the return arm has a stepped garderobe turret flanked on each side by small shouldered openings with iron armature, and at first-floor level a two-light stone cusped casement. On the east courtyard front, a broad opening with chamfered lintel sits partly below the gallery. At first-floor level is a single-light casement with recessed chamfer jambs beneath a granite moulded lintel with dropped ends (not corresponding with the jamb moulding) and a two-light basket-handle arched casement with transom and stopped hoodmould, all in granite.

Interior Features

The kitchen retains a large fire opening with vaulting on responds, four large chamfered beams supporting the renewed floor, and a timber breast wall to an upper chamber. The north wall has splayed openings to a door and casement, and two rectangular recesses. The roof, structurally reconstructed, comprises four bays plus two bays on cruck-like principals with high cambered collar. Between the two sections is a half-timbered partition rising to full height.

The west range contains an interior gallery in half-timbering, returned across the north end and carried on a square post to square base; part of this rises full height to the roof and was undergoing reconstruction at the time of inspection in December 1988. Between the west and south ranges a wide opening is spanned by a bressummer carried on corbel responds, with a long splay from the east-side entry.

The farmhouse and hall range front onto the inner courtyard. At the far left is a small single-light casement at mid-height, followed by a half-hipped porch with a chamfered round arch approached by steps from the cobbled courtyard. Above the porch is a two-light casement with some rendering on stonework. To the right extends a series of 19th-century casements: at ground floor two, three and four-light examples, and at first floor two, three and three-light casements. The right gable end has an external stack and a single-storey lean-to addition.

The north front, formerly the entry side facing the gatehouse across the courtyard, features at the left a gabled stair projection with a 19th-century margin-bar casement. To the right stands a large external stack serving the hall fireplace, then a six-panel 19th-century door in a wider blocked opening with a wood lintel, below a two-light casement, and a small casement at the far right. A single lean-to building abuts the wall linking the farmhouse to the gatehouse, containing a door beneath a moulded granite fragment serving as a link. The west gable wall displays a two-light over three-light reconstructed casement.

The partially inspected interior retains part of a 16th-century cross-passage screen and a stone spiral stair from the hall to the right of the main fireplace. The farmhouse was largely reconstructed in the 17th century.

The building is fully described and interpreted in a paper by Beric M Morley published in the Devon Archaeological Society Proceedings, No 41, 1983.