Church House Sexton'S Cottage

Church House and Sexton's Cottage

This Grade II* listed building in Widecombe-in-the-Moor is an early 16th-century structure, now functioning as a village hall and National Trust shop. It was originally a church house, with the left-hand section serving as the sexton's cottage.

The building is constructed of granite ashlar with a slated roof featuring gable-parapets and kneelers. Three granite ashlar chimneys rise from the ridge and gables (all apparently rebuilt in the 19th century), with a smaller example on the rear wall. It is two storeys high with a three-room ground plan, though the two right-hand rooms have been amalgamated. The upper storey mirrors this arrangement with two matching rooms.

The front elevation is striking: a five-window façade with hollow-moulded plinth and chamfered granite eaves-cornice, dominated by an open colonnade running the full width of the ground storey. This colonnade comprises seven octagonal granite columns with moulded octagonal capitals, standing on rough octagonal granite plinths without bases. The colonnade supports a slated pent roof, whose structure is mostly pre-19th century except for the common rafters; the four eastern trusses are heavier, with collars tenoned to the principal rafters rather than halved.

Ground-storey fenestration varies by section. The sexton's cottage on the left has a narrow hollow-moulded window with slightly curved top. To the right are two doorways with four-centred arches; the left has been converted to a window (simply chamfered), while the right features three-quarter-round moulding and carved spandrels. The village hall section begins with a small doorway (possibly a former window) with hollow-moulded left jamb and lintel, the latter bearing a mullion head at its centre. A 19th-century inserted window lies to the left, followed by a two-light mullioned window with rounded heads and carved spandrels. The right-hand end features a wide doorway (probably 19th-century insertion) with a two-light mullioned window to its right, this window having a flat head.

The upper storey retains mostly original windows, except for a central gabled dormer of 19th-century date. The original windows are hollow-moulded with round arches: the left-hand window is three-lights, the remainder two-lights. A granite stringcourse runs beneath the windows at sill-level, also serving as a drip for the colonnade pent roof. The rear wall contains three similar upper-storey windows of two lights. Its centre features a double external granite rubble staircase with an enclosed chamber of granite ashlar on top; this is possibly a 19th-century addition, as no original internal staircase is evident elsewhere. A 19th-century stair wing at the east end provides main access to the upper storey of the village hall.

Interior

The ground-storey Church House is now one large room, but mortices on the soffit of an upper-floor beam reveal it originally contained a very small east-end room, separated by a stud-and-panel screen. The upper-floor beams of the main room are finely moulded oak, with intersecting beams forming three compartments across the width; though some timbers have been renewed, the greater part of the 16th-century structure survives. The beams display hollow ogee and three-quarter-round mouldings, extending to half-beams along front and back walls. Joists are arranged in chequer pattern, running in opposite directions in adjacent compartments, with ogee mouldings on the sides and three-quarter-round moulding on the soffit, terminating in leaf-shaped bar-stops. The small east section has a chamfered beam with plain joists. The front door (west end) features an old wooden lintel with ogee and hollow moulding, possibly a re-used timber.

The east gable-wall contains a medium-sized fireplace with plain stone jambs and an ornately carved wood lintel, probably from elsewhere, bearing ogee, three-quarter-round and hollow mouldings interspersed with carved rose, thistle, fleur-de-lis, harp and two other floral motifs. The back wall holds an oven with round-arched stone opening and shallow stone shelf. The rear wall of the western section has a smaller fireplace, apparently original, with rectangular hollow-moulded granite surround. The west wall dividing Church House from Sexton's Cottage contains two plain wide fireplaces with flat, unmoulded granite lintels.

The upper storey has only a small plain granite fireplace (probably 19th century) in the rear wall. The roof structure, completely exposed to the room below, is original except for replacement timbers, comprising 11 side-pegged jointed-cruck trusses with three tiers of threaded purlins and no ridge. Collars (either cambered or slightly cranked) are tenoned to the principals, with undersides of collars and the principal rafter section below lightly chamfered. Some trusses carry gouged carpenter's marks. None appears to have supported a partition.

The Sexton's Cottage was altered in the 19th century but retains four jointed-cruck trusses matching those in the Church House. Its ground storey contains a medium-sized plain granite fireplace with canted sides in the west gable-wall.

History

The building was documented in use as a church house in 1608. By the mid-19th century, the poor house occupied the ground storey and the village school the upper floor. The National Trust acquired it in 1933. Historical accounts record the roof was thatched until the late 1880s, when it was converted to slate. Exterior restoration and minor additions date to the probably the late 19th century.