Middle Ball

Middle Ball is a mid-19th century farmhouse, now a house, located in Twitchen. An outshut was likely added to the rear in the late 19th century. The house is constructed of uncoursed stone rubble with some red-brick dressings, and has a gable-ended roof covered in asbestos slate. Stone stacks are topped with brick. Originally planned with two rooms, a roughly central entrance, and external end stacks, the larger principal room is to the left, with a smaller room (now the kitchen) to the right. A staircase sits between the rooms, rising from an entrance lobby. An outshut was added to the rear, with evidence of straight joints marking its construction, and small, low outhouses flank the front of the house. The house is two storeys high, including the outshut, with one-storey outhouses. The asymmetrical three-bay front features 19th-century two-light wooden casements with brick segmental heads, though the left-hand ground-floor window is a late 20th-century replacement. A roughly central 20th-century half-glazed door is set within a brick segmental head. The outshut has 19th-century two-light wooden casements on both floors. The interior retains largely complete mid-19th century fixtures and fittings, including an open fireplace and an L-shaped wooden bench along the front and left-hand walls of the left-hand ground floor room. A blocked fireplace is present in the right-hand ground-floor room, with stone-flagged floors and old boarded doors throughout. The first-floor rooms have not been inspected. It is considered a good example of a mid-19th century farmhouse, and is notable for surviving in such an unaltered condition.