Higher Town Farmhouse

Higher Town Farmhouse is a house, formerly a farmhouse, in Sampford Courtenay. It dates to the early 16th century with 17th-century modifications and alterations.

The building is constructed of plastered cob walls with a concrete tile roof that is gabled to the left end and hipped to the right. A single axial brick stack is positioned at eaves level at the right-hand end. The building is two storeys tall with an asymmetrical front elevation featuring two windows; the ground floor has four windows. The right-hand side has 20th-century two-light casements with small panes. A 20th-century glazed door is positioned left of centre, with a stable-type door at the left-hand end. On the first floor to the left of centre is a loading hatch. A wing extends behind the right-hand end.

The house originally followed a three-room-and-through-passage plan with somewhat unusual subsequent development. The lower room initially served a non-domestic function and was divided from the main part of the house by a solid wall. The house itself was originally open to the roof with a central hearth in the hall. In a second phase of development, a rear wing was added behind the higher end, which also had an open hearth but with inferior roof carpentry suggesting a kitchen function; the roof shows only light smoke-blackening, indicating the open hearth did not function for long. The front range was ceiled in the early 17th century and a hall stack was inserted backing onto the passage. Subsequently in the 17th century, the room arrangement was altered: the inner room was considerably enlarged at the expense of the hall, and an awkwardly placed corner fireplace was inserted at its higher end. In the 20th century, the lower room was converted to domestic use, though the loft space above it was not utilised.

The hall contains a granite-framed hollow-chamfered fireplace with an oven in its left-hand side, and a heavy chamfered ceiling beam resting on a stone corbel at the front. The inner room has a chamfered cross beam with straight-cut stops and a corner fireplace with a chamfered wooden lintel featuring run-out stops. The large rear wing room has four chamfered ceiling beams with hollow step stops and a fireplace with granite jambs and a cambered chamfered wooden lintel.

The original roof timbers survive over both ranges, including common rafters heavily sooted over the front part and only darkened over the rear wing. Over the rear wing are two trusses morticed at the apex with diagonal ridge and threaded purlins. The inner truss has no collar, whilst the end truss has a simple lapped collar which may be later. Over the front range are four trusses. The lower end truss is clean and is a face-pegged jointed cruck. A light partition, constructed on top of a cob wall rising to eaves level, separates it from the rest of the roof; it is clean on the lower side and blackened on the higher side. This partition is set against an insubstantial truss. The two higher-end open trusses are very substantial: one has a cranked morticed collar chamfered on the underside, and the other has mortices for a collar with threaded purlins.

This is a relatively unusual example of a late medieval house apparently with two open halls, with its original roof structure virtually intact.