The Manor House

THE MANOR HOUSE

A house of late medieval origins, superficially remodelled and probably enlarged in the early or mid-19th century, situated on the south side of East Street in Bovey Tracey.

The building has roughcast stone walls, possibly with some cob, beneath slated roofs with blue glazed ridge-tiles. At the east end of the front range are two old handmade ridge-tiles with low crestings. The west gable of the same range has stone coping with a kneeler at the front. A 19th-century red brick chimneystack rises on the east gable, with a small rendered stack on the west gable. In the centre of the front wall is a projecting stack (heating the former hall) with a chamfered plinth and offsets; this has a later rendered shaft on top. A late 19th or early 20th-century brick stack stands on the west wall of the rear wing.

The plan is of three rooms and a through-passage with a long lower room, and a rear kitchen wing (probably a later addition) at the west end. The building rises to two storeys.

The front elevation to East Street now has few windows. To the left of the projecting stack stands a 6-panelled front door with a cast-iron knocker; the doorway has a moulded wood architrave and a flat hood on shaped brackets, with the soffit of the hood and the space above the door panelled with raised margin-mouldings. To the left of the door is a 2-light wood window with a straight wooden hood-mould, the lights with pointed heads and leaded panes. Above the door is a single-light window with hood-mould, containing a 4-pane wood casement with a 2-pane transom-light. To the right of the stack the wall has been brought forward. At the right-hand end of the ground storey is a corner window with a wooden hood-mould returned around the corner; at the front it has a sash with 8 panes in the lower section and 4 panes above, while at the side are 2 fixed panes with a transom-light over. The second storey has 2 wood casements of 3 lights, each light having 2 panes; the right-hand window has a hood-mould. To the right of this projection the front edge of the gable-wall is corbelled out in the second storey, almost exactly matching the corbels on the Little Front House at the west end of East Street. If this corbel is a pre-1700 feature (and not a 19th-century revival), then this end of the front wall was timber-framed and jettied, a remarkable thing to find in a rural type of house, even if it was on the outskirts of the medieval town. In front of the house is a pavement of old cobbles.

The east gable-wall has no windows, although there is evidence of a blocked doorway on the ground storey. The west gable-wall has in the second storey 2 wood mullioned-and-transomed windows, each of 2 lights with 2 panes in each of the lower parts; straight hood-moulds stand above. In the apex of the gable is a window with a pointed head and simple hood-mould, possibly a late 19th-century insertion, containing a 2-light wood casement with 2 panes per light and a 3-pane transom-light. The west wall of the rear wing has a second-storey window to the left with a pointed head and straight hood-mould; it contains leaded panes and some coloured glass.

The garden front appears to have been the most important in the 19th century, when it was embellished with Tudor detail. However, a sketch of circa 1853 shows a plain early 19th-century front, suggesting that the Tudor detail was added at a surprisingly late date. The rear of the main range is 3 windows wide; a 20th-century glazed door stands in the centre, having an ogee-headed glazed porch with late 19th-century windows. To the left in the ground storey is a 3-light wood casement window with 2 panes per light; to the right is an 8-pane sash, the glazing-bars of the upper sash forming pointed arches (not shown in the circa 1853 drawing). Second-storey windows all have 2-light wood casements with 2 panes per light. Every window, except that at the right-hand end of the second storey, has a hood-mould. The inward-facing front of the rear wing is 2 windows wide, all with 3-light wood casements having 2 panes per light; all have hood-moulds. A centre door has a flush panel nailed over the lower part, but 4 panels above; a cast-iron knocker is present. A gabled wood porch has patterned glazing in its side-windows (the circa 1853 drawing shows simply a flat hood on brackets). To the left is a slightly lower section of the wing, having a plank door in the ground storey and a 20th-century window in the second storey. In the garden is a pump (shown in the circa 1853 drawing) with a 20th-century wood casing, but an old lead outlet pipe into a granite trough.

Interior

The former hall has a large granite fireplace in the front wall, hollow-moulded and with a flat lintel made from a single piece of granite. A plank-and-muntin partition at the upper (west) end has studs chamfered on both sides with diagonal-cut stops towards the hall. Several studs and panels are missing; from the position of the pegs on the head-beam it is difficult to determine where the original doorway would have been. An internal jetty projects into the hall (which must formerly have been open to the roof); the joist-ends are rounded and chamfered, with step-stops where they abut the partition.

The lower (east) room has a gable fireplace with splayed sides, the jambs and back made of very large granite ashlar blocks. A wooden cranked lintel, chamfered and with scroll-stops, appears unusual but seems to be a genuine 17th-century feature. The fireplace seems too small to have served a former kitchen. To its left is a deep, rounded recess, probably designed for a newel stair. The front and back windows of this room have beneath them 19th-century panes with pointed heads.

The rear wing contains a large kitchen fireplace, its detail entirely concealed.

In the second storey, the upper (west) end room has in its gable-wall a corbelled granite chimneypiece with pyramid stops.

The roof contains a complete set of medieval trusses, although the common rafters have been replaced. The trusses have cambered collar-beams and threaded purlins; there is provision for a ridge, but probably not an original one. Over the hall are 2 arch-braced trusses with slots for 2 tiers of windbraces, a few of which survive. At the upper (west) end of the hall is a closed truss with a framed partition which is visible in the second storey and corresponds to the front of the jetty in the hall. There is no closed truss at the lower end of the hall, nor evidence that one existed. Since the arch-braces stop at this point, it seems likely there was only a low partition at this end of the hall. The lower end of the roof had only one tier of windbraces, of which a few survive. The roof-timbers over the hall and lower end appear to be blackened; at the upper end (beyond the closed truss) the roof has been converted to a garret and the evidence concealed. The feet of the trusses, visible in the second storey, appear to be curved; they may be raised crucks.

The rear wing has a 19th-century roof.