Dunstone Manor

Dunstone Manor, formerly known as Dunstone Court, is a house that originated as a longhouse. The building dates from the late medieval period with minor additions probably made in the 18th and 19th centuries.

The main structure is built of granite rubble, covered with roughcast on the south side, and has an asbestos-slated roof. The roof ridge carries a large rendered chimneystack, positioned off-centre to the east, with thatch weatherings indicating it heated the former hall; the shaft was rebuilt in the 20th century. A second rendered stack, also old with stone weatherings, stands on the upper east gable. Additional rendered stacks date from the 20th century, positioned on the west gable and in the centre of the south wall.

The plan is of the 3-room and through-passage type, with the hall stack backing onto the passage. The inner room is unusually large and retains an early fireplace. The former shippon, located to the west of the passage, has been converted into two rooms, with the passage enlarged on this side to accommodate a staircase. A wing was added at right-angles to the north side of the inner room. The building now stands at 2 storeys, though the entire main range was originally single-storeyed.

The south front facing the garden has 5 windows, all of 20th-century date. The front wall of the hall and inner room breaks forward slightly, with a further gabled projection (probably added in the 18th century) in front of the hall. The ground-storey window of this projection has a chamfered granite dripstone above it. To the right is a similar dripstone over the inner-room window, which may formerly have been a doorway, with another dripstone overlapping it to the right, probably relating to a blocked window. The north front has a complete set of 20th-century plastic windows. A lean-to stone porch covers the door to the through-passage. The west gable of the former shippon is recorded as having had a ventilation slit in the upper storey, now replaced by a window.

Interior features are substantial and historic. The through-passage is cobbled. The rear of the hall stack is of painted granite ashlar with a worn chamfered plinth and has an old plank door into the hall. The hall contains a large fireplace with a chamfered granite lintel and monolithic right jamb; on top of the right jamb is a rounded granite corbel with a very slight projection. The left jamb has been rebuilt but contains an old bread oven with a round-arched granite opening and a shallow granite shelf in front. At the back of the fireplace on the right-hand side is a smaller oven, known within living memory as the cake oven, with a stone opening of slightly curved top. The upper floor beams are chamfered, with one having an unusually deep and angled scroll-stop; the chamfered joists feature either step-stops or straight-cut stops.

At the upper end is a stud-and-panel screen, the only one known in Widecombe Parish. The studs are very lightly chamfered, the chamfer fading away without a stop at the bottom. At the left-hand end, apparently of different build, is a straight-headed, chamfered doorway with the left jamb featuring a diagonal-cut stop. At the right-hand end, where the wall has been cut away to insert the bay, is one end of an old wooden bench, which may originally have extended in front of the screen.

The inner room has no upper-floor beam but only plain joists running lengthways. Its gable-fireplace, now blocked, is large with a wood lintel and monolithic granite right jamb. The north wall adjacent to the wing has been removed and replaced with a straight flight of stairs, of which the 3 lowest steps are of granite. Old plank doors at top and bottom have wrought-iron strap-hinges with spade-terminals. A similar door stands between the rooms over the hall and inner room. The upper room over the inner room has a small gable-fireplace with rounded back and plain wood lintel.

The roof contains 3 smoke-blackened medieval trusses with through-purlins and ridge, and cambered collars; many common rafters survive. A tie-beam truss spans the hall with 2 open trusses to the west, one built into the hall stack and the other over the former shippon; the feet of the last 2 are concealed. The tie-beam truss presents a problem of interpretation. It is infilled with cob and stone above the collar, and appears always to have been so; the underside is sooted at the apex, though this may result from cob shrinkage allowing smoke penetration. The infill appears blackened on the hall side only, although the truss itself and the timbers over the inner room are plainly sooted. The truss over the shippon was examined in 1974 but not fully inspected. The old roof timbers are now protected by a secondary 20th-century roof.

The lower end of the house, which has no visible features, was formerly in non-domestic use and was known as the shippon within living memory.