Mansion House Inn

BRIDGWATER

ST2937SE HIGH STREET 736-1/10/114 (North side) 23/01/74 Mansion House Inn

GV II

House, now public house. Mid C18. Painted brick facade; painted stone cornices to eaves and ground floor, rusticated quoins raised to form kneelers to C20 coping, cills and plinth; steep-pitched roof with late C19 crested ridge, pantile to the rear and double Roman tile to the front with brick stacks to gable ends. Painted rubblestone left return, rendered to the top. Double-depth plan with rear extension to the left making L-plan. 2 storeys; 4-window range. Windows to first floor are to sides, flanking a wide space for inn sign. 4 recessed panels below eaves over gauged brick flat arches with keyed lintels to C19 horned 2/2-pane sash windows in forward frames. The ground floor has flat arches to 6 early C20 windows of various widths; they and left-of-centre door have overlights, those over the 3 windows to left are coloured and leaded; narrow vertical windows flanking C19 double 2-panel doors have 3 square panes, those to sides have 3 rows of 2 panes. The left return is of painted rubblestone and brick rendered to the top; flat gauged brick arches to wide 2/2-pane sash windows to right; double 2-panel doors with bolection moulding below brick and timber lintel. The rear wing to left has two 2-light casement windows at eaves level; to ground-floor left a timber lintel to fixed window of 2 rows of 4 panes probably a former doorway; to right a late C19 tripartite horned 2/2-pane sash window. INTERIOR: room to rear has open fireplace with a segmental arch backing onto main block. The upper room has mid C18 fireplace to right end and an unusually high ceiling. The roof, unseen, is said to have 4 A-frame trusses and 2 rows of dowelled purlins. Built on the site of an earlier church house, for the rebuilding of which the corporation appointed a committee in 1765. It functioned in the later C18 as a school and then an inn, the upper floor being used as an assembly room. (VCH: Somerset: London: 1992-: 233).

Listing NGR: ST2972537027