Three Miletown Farm

Three Miletown Farm

A late 18th century farm steading with later 19th century additions, comprising a farmhouse and extensive range of agricultural buildings.

The farmhouse is a 2-storey, 3-bay rectangular-plan building with a 2-storey extension to the north-east corner. The 18th century structures employ random and coursed stream-worn and field rubble, while the later 19th century additions use squared and snecked rubble. The farmhouse itself has snecked bull-faced rubble to its south elevation and snecked stugged rubble to the north, west and east elevations (with stream-worn rubble to the lower half of the east side). Tabbed and stop-chamfered ashlar dressings and driven quoins with margins are featured throughout.

The principal (south) elevation displays a central timber-panelled door with a narrow plain fanlight, corniced lintel and tabbed stop-chamfered architrave. A 3-light canted window with moulded cornice sits to the left, and a bipartite window to the right, with three further 1st floor windows above. The east elevation has a central timber-boarded door beneath a lean-to corrugated metal canopy, with an adjoining lean-to brick outbuilding to the right and a 2-storey piended extension to the far right. Single ashlar gatepiers mark the right-hand corner. The rear (north) elevation is of 4 bays, featuring a 2-storey piened extension to the far left and windows to each floor of the right return. A projecting central single-storey outhouse is flanked by windows, with three unevenly spaced 1st floor windows above. The west elevation contains a single 1st floor window. The windows are 4-pane timber sash and case type (ground floor windows are boarded up), beneath a pitched roof of graded grey slates with stone skews. Coped bull-faced ashlar stacks and circular and octagonal clay cans complete the roofscape.

Internally, the original layout remains intact. A secondary door opens into a vestibule with etched glass side lights (now damaged). A spiral staircase to the rear of the plan retains dismembered decorative cast-iron balusters and a timber handrail. Plain cornices are present throughout, and a stone fireplace survives in the kitchen, though most original fireplaces have been removed.

The farm steading comprises two main blocks. The south block contains west, south and central late 18th century ranges housing a cattle court, stable, wintering shed and barn arranged around a rectangular central courtyard (formerly covered, before 1913). The courtyard has a central dividing wall and round gatepiers on the north-south axis, with a low coped stone barrier on the east-west axis forming a feeding passage.

The stable (west side) is a single-storey structure with an adjoining recessed 3-room block at its north end (gable end to road). Its east elevation has two windows with timber vents to the lower half, flanked by timber-boarded doors serving the stable, with two further timber-boarded doors to the recessed block. The north elevation contains a window to the left, a lean-to corrugated metal porch linking the farmhouse to the north block to the right, and a door to the right. The west elevation has three doors (that to the left blocked, two to the right converted to windows). The road-facing north elevation shows a single window to the left and a blocked loft window. The stable block retains timber-boarded stalls with later reinforced cast-iron columns, a timber hay loft to the south end, and a cobble floor to the front of the stalls. The north block has cobbles and flags. The west side preserves original 18th century wall construction; the east side (facing the courtyard) is later 19th century squared rubble. Graded grey slates cover the west pitch, corrugated metal covers the east pitch over the stable, and pantiles cover the east pitch of the north block, with two coped stacks to the north block.

The wintering shed (south, adjoining the stables at the south angle) is a single-storey structure featuring four segmental-arched openings with stugged ashlar voussoirs and quoins. Its north elevation has squared snecked rubble facing the courtyard, while the south (road) elevation is stream-worn rubble. A low stream-worn rubble dividing wall separates the compartments, with rubble ledges to either side and to the east and west ends of the sheds. The roof is corrugated metal.

The barn (north) is a late 18th century rectangular-plan structure forming the centre of the steading complex, linked to later 19th century additions to its north and west. It is built of stream-worn rubble with a pantiled roof. Remains of a later 19th century byre enclose the courtyard to the east.

The north block comprises a 2-storey barn and granary with three segmental-arched cart sheds to the east and three square timber-vented openings above. A lean-to engine house projects to the west, and a stugged ashlar chimney base with chamfered shoulders is present. A former piended single-storey boiler house stands to the right. An advanced and raised pitched extension to the south-west has stone stairs to its left return leading to the barn. Twentieth-century brick buildings stand to the south and east of the cart sheds. The barn and granary complex has a corrugated roof, with slates to the engine and boiler houses.

The byre is a single-storey rectangular-plan building on a north-south axis to the east of the barn and granary, containing stone feeding troughs and a later roof covering of corrugated metal and felt. Remains of stone walls perpendicular to the byre (formerly a covered court) survive, with feeding boles to the south-facing wall.

A curved coped rubble boundary wall to the south-east (at the highway junction) forms an additional open courtyard. Coped rubble walls to the south and west enclose the farmhouse kitchen garden. Square-plan pyramidal-capped gatepiers stand at the farmhouse entrance to the south.