Duck Street Cottage

Duck Street Cottage comprises two cottages with an attached barn and outbuildings, dating to 1673, with additions and alterations from the mid to late 18th century. The building is constructed of coursed gritstone rubble, with graduated stone slate roofs. It is a long south-facing range composed of four elements. The first is a two-storey, one-bay cottage with a baffle entry and a lean-to addition at the west end. The second is a two-storey, two-bay cottage with a slightly lower ridge line. The third is a tall, two-bay barn; and the fourth is a two-storey, one-bay additional farm outbuilding.

The south front of the 17th-century cottage has a board door on the right, the jambs altered, with a lintel bearing a raised inscription, seemingly 'A D' over painted white, and a small rectangle with external 1673 triangles beneath. To its left is a four-light, now two-light, recessed-chamfered mullion window with a dripmould, with a similar three-light window above. The lean-to addition to the left has a board door with a small light above. Gable coping is present on the left end, and there are end stacks. The second cottage has a glazed door in a sawn stone surround on the right, and a four-pane window in a stone surround to the left and above. The barn has a cart entrance with jambs composed of quoins and tall narrow blocks, a segmental arch with voussoirs, a square opening above, and a byre door to the right, the jambs forming quoins to the former barn end. The additional outbuilding is entered from the east gable end, with a small window on the ground floor and a larger opening above; shaped kneelers and gable coping finish the right side.

Inside the 17th-century cottage, a door opens onto the side of a large fireplace with stone stairs against the rear wall; the spine beam in the front room has cyma stops. The barn’s byre has timber stalls with a hayloft above, and the roof features two queen-strut trusses with carved carpenters marks. The building’s history is complex; the 17th-century cottage may originally have been larger, but conversion to two cottages in the mid to late 18th century makes interpretation difficult. It may have been associated with the large Greenhow limestone quarry behind, possibly serving as workers’ cottages, and the large barn suggests extensive farming activities. The site is situated within the Cockhill and Sunside Head mining area, which was worked extensively from the 17th through the 19th centuries.