The Chimes

This is a mid-19th century house, originally built as a police house before the construction of the police station opposite, circa 1863. It was likely built around 1845, shortly after a fire in Fore Street. The house is stuccoed, probably over a granite rubble core. It has a pyramidal slate roof coated with bitumen, with lead rolls to the hips, and deep eaves with boarded soffits, a moulded cornice, and a cast iron gutter. There are two chimney stacks, one rising from the rear of the left-hand roof slope and the other from the right-hand rear slope. Internally, the plan is of a double depth, with two principal front rooms, one on either side of a central lobby entrance, which contains the stairs in a central passage, and smaller rooms at the rear arranged in a square plan. The left-hand front room was likely used as the police station, with a small cell behind it; the right-hand room served as a living room with a kitchen to the rear. A further cell is located above the ground floor cell.

The house is two storeys high and has a symmetrical three-bay north front. Original 12-pane sashes are set in deep reveals, with a narrower first-floor window fitted with an 18th/19th century eight-pane casement. The central doorway has a round-headed opening with a plain, wide architrave and a semi-circular fanlight with spider's-web glazing bars. The round central pane of the fanlight contains stained glass; the original four-panel door has flush bottom panels. The east return side has an original 12-pane sash window on each floor, lighting the front rooms; the left-hand wall is without windows. The rear, south, elevation has an asymmetrical fenestration; the first floor has two original nine-pane sashes and a small two-pane pivot window (the former cell window) to the right. The ground floor has a top-opening light window (an enlarged former cell window) to the right, an original small 19-pane sash to the left of centre, and a plank door with a small two-pane pivot window above it to the left. The west side is unfenestrated and abuts No. 16.

The interior plan remains largely intact and retains many original features, including panelled doors and a straight staircase with a simple balustrade at the top, featuring stick balusters. The ground floor cell has a stone slab ceiling, and the first-floor cell retains its heavy door and barred opening. Fireplaces in the front rooms were opened up and 20th-century chimneypieces installed in 1985. The rear kitchen fireplace has also been opened. This building represents a near-complete mid-19th century police house.