Matson House and attached wall

Matson House and attached wall

Former manor house, now residential home. Built circa 1575 for Richard Pates, a Recorder of Gloucester, Member of Parliament for Gloucester, and founder of Pates Grammar School, Cheltenham. The house was purchased by Jasper Selwyn around 1597. It underwent early 18th-century alterations, and further additions and alterations were made circa 1785 for George Augustus Selwyn, Member of Parliament for Gloucester. Early 19th-century alterations followed. From 1958 the house was occupied by Selwyn School, which restored and partly refitted it from 1970 onwards.

The building comprises a 16th-century house of stone under later roughcast with dressed stone details, with late 18th-century and 19th-century additions in brick. The roofs are gabled stone slate with brick stacks, some featuring suites of diagonal shafts.

The 16th-century house plan is a compact U-shape consisting of a lateral range that originally contained the great hall, with two wings flanking a narrow entrance court facing Matson Lane. A long lateral service range was added to the left side in the late 18th or early 19th century, replacing a shorter early 18th-century wing.

The exterior is two storeys with basement and attics. On all sides of the 16th-century house are moulded string courses at first and attic-floor levels, with dressed stone quoins at the corners and stone coped gables linked by parapets. Most gables have decorative apex finials.

On the front elevation, the two similar end-gabled flanking wings have crenellated parapets on the sides facing the entrance court. In the cross-gabled centre of the lateral range between the wings, the ground-floor entrance doorway was remodelled in the late 18th century as a plain opening with a cornice above supported on end brackets. The door has two fielded bottom panels and a large glazed upper panel with glazing bars featuring three-by-four panes with Gothick cinquefoiled foiled bars in the heads, though some have been recently damaged. On each side of the doorway are 18th-century sashes with glazing bars (originally three-by-four panes of similar Gothick pattern). On the first floor are two similar sashes with glazing bars. In the gable-end wall of the right-hand wing on the ground floor are two sashes with glazing bars (three-by-four panes, replacing sashes with Gothick panes), and on the first floor two sashes with glazing bars of similar pattern but retaining Gothick panes. In the gable-end wall of the left-hand wing on the ground floor are a central sash and a sash to the right, and on the first floor a central sash and a blocked former sash to the right. On the side of the wing facing the court and adjacent to the lateral range are sashes on each floor, all with details similar to those in the centre. In each of the gables to the wings and to the centre is a 16th-century two-light stone-framed and mullioned casement with eared hoodmould, one retaining original margin leaded lights.

On the east side, the cross-gabled side of the right-hand front wing projects beyond the end-gable wall of the lateral range on the right. In the latter, on the ground floor is a doorway with hood on shaped brackets, a sash on each side of the doorway, and a single-light casement to the right. On the first floor are two sashes and a narrow stone-framed sash to the right, all being inserted 18th-century sashes with glazing bars (three-by-four panes) and Gothick arched panes. In the gable is a 16th-century three-light stone-framed and mullioned casement with eared hoodmould. On the side wall of the wing to the left, on the ground floor is a tall single-light stone-framed two-light casement (top pane leaded) to the left. On the first floor is a small stone-framed casement to the left, a small stone-framed quatrefoil vent to the right, and in the centre a large painted sundial dated 1596. Above the apex of the gable is a tall brick stack.

The rear elevation has two cross gables linked by parapet. On the ground floor is a central doorway, approached by a flight of stone steps, with a doorhood on shaped brackets and a door with details similar to the entrance front door. To the left is an 18th-century sash with glazing bars (three-by-four panes) and Gothick panes, and to the far left a four-light stone-mullioned window with original leaded margin panes to the top. On the first floor are 16th-century windows on two levels: on the lower level three two-light stone-framed mullioned casements with eared hoodmoulds, and between them on the upper level under the string course two similar casements. At the left-hand end is a tall single-light casement and at the right-hand end a small stone-framed single-light casement with eared hoodmould. In the left-hand gable is a two-light and in the right-hand gable a four-light stone-framed mullioned casement, both with eared hoodmoulds.

The east front is partly masked to the right by the late 18th or early 19th-century wing addition. In the angle with the wing is a stair turret. To the ground-floor left is a small timber window in six leaded panes. To the left, in the end gable wall of the lateral range, on both ground and first floors is a large tripartite sash with glazing bars (both with stained-glass panels), and in the gable a three-light stone-framed mullioned casement with eared hoodmould.

The late 18th or early 19th-century wing added to the left side of the house is of two storeys with full basement at rear, with stone slate roof. It features two ridge stacks with chimney pots and a reduced gable-end stack. On the front is an offset plinth, and on front and rear a brick band at first-floor level and at parapet level. On the front, each floor has seven sashes with glazing bars (three-by-four panes). At the rear are four double casements with glazing bars in openings with segmental arched heads. A further undistinguished single-storey extension exists.

The interior includes an early 18th-century wood-panelled three-bay arcade with basket arches in the central entrance hall to front and rear, with an early 18th-century staircase to the right. Other rooms on both floors contain late 16th and 17th-century panelling, some reset. In the early 19th century, the former 16th-century gallery in the attic was divided into three rooms, and the two former drawing rooms on the south-east side were refitted and interconnected through wide doors. A room in the attic, constructed by George Selwyn as a Roman Catholic chapel for his adopted daughter, contains a 16th-century window with three panels of painted glass dating to circa 1785 by William Peckitt. These depict the figures of two friars and a nun, each within a Gothick foiled frame.

A wall runs east from the north-east corner of the house between the garden and the stable yard, with the Selwyn coat of arms carved on a stone panel on the south side.

Historical context: The house was built on the site of a medieval manor house held by Llanthony Priory. Richard Pates was a notable local figure who served as Recorder of Gloucester and Member of Parliament. George Augustus Selwyn, Member of Parliament for Gloucester, had sash frames fitted with Gothic-pattern glazing bars in the head of each pane, possibly at the suggestion of Horace Walpole, who visited Selwyn several times. In 1643, during the Siege of Gloucester, the house was requisitioned as lodging for King Charles I and his sons, Charles and James, and served as headquarters for the Royalist forces. Grooves cut into a stone sill in an attic bedroom are believed to have been made by the young Princes. A brass plaque in the hall records the visit by King George III and Queen Charlotte, accompanied by the Princess Royal and the Princesses Augusta and Elizabeth, on 29 July 1788, whilst staying at Cheltenham.