Exploring Kent's Past

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Monument details

Summary

Grade II listed building. Main construction periods 1500 to 1991

Summary from record TQ 53 NW 45 :

Linkhorns Farmhouse : listed building

Monument Types

• SITE (Medieval to Modern - 1500 AD to 1991 AD)
• OPEN HALL HOUSE (Post Medieval to Modern - 1540 AD to 2050 AD) + Sci.Date

Full description

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The following text is from the original listed building designation:
TQ 53 NW SPELDHURST STATION ROAD, ASHURST
7/591 Linkhorns Farmhouse 19.8.82 II
Former farmhouse. Late medieval, probably early C16, with late C16/early C17 improvement, modernised and enlarged circa 1986. Timber-framed on coursed sandstone footings. Framing exposed on the ground floor and hung with peg- tile above. Brick stacks, parlour stack on coursed sandstone base, brick chimneyshafts. Peg-tile roof.
Plan: L-plan house. Main block faces south. To right (east) is a parlour with a large projecting gable-end stack. Left is a 3-room plan crosswing. Small front room is an unheated service room with the chamber above jettied forward. Behind it the hall and at the rear end a circa 1986 extension. Axial stack between the two.
The front 2-room section of the crosswing is the earliest part and was built as a late medieval 2-cell open hall house. Service room originally divided into 2 smaller rooms with end-jettied chamber (stair in the same position it is today) and one bay hall open to the roof and heated by an open hearth fire. There may have been a third medieval room but, if so, it had been demolished and the circa 1986 extension covers up any evidence of an earlier building there. Parlour added off the service end in the late C16/early C17. Hall was floored over about the same time. Hall stack of uncertain date.
2 storeys with attics in the roofspace and secondary lean-to outshots to rear of the parlour.
Exterior: irregular 4-window front of various C20 casements, some without glazing bars, others with leaded glass either rectangular or diamond pane. Roughly central doorway (direct entry into the prlour) contains C19 plank door with coverstrips behind a C20 gabled porch. Service end jetty to left on exposed joists. The left (west) end wall has an irregular 4-window front of C20 casements without glazing bars. The front (southern) 2-bay section has exposed original framing at ground floor level in the same style as the front end. Main roof on the front is gable-ended to right and hipped to left. Crosswing roof a little taller than the parlour roof.
Interior: Early framed structure is well-preserved. The late medieval 2-cell section has original framed walls including the crosswalls. Large scantling axial joists in the service room. Mortises along the soffit of the centre joists show that this room was originally divided into two. One-bay roof over the hall of plain crown post construction between closed trusses. The A-frame common rafter trusses (lap-jointed collars), the collar purlin and the plastered walls each end are heavily smoke-blackened from the original open hearth fire. The crown purlin over the service end has been cut off to accommodate a late C16/early C17 hip which was built with the parlour roof. Hall crossbeam is late C16/early C17; chamfered with canted step stops. The fireplace here has been rebuilt. Late C16/early C17 parlour has good intersecting beam 4-panel ceiling. Beams and joists are chamfered with step stops. Large brick fireplace has an oak-framed front with chamfered surround; unusual but probably late C16/early C17.
Linkhorns is an attractive and well-preserved farmhouse. Late medieval one- bay halls are not common and if it was only a 2-cell house then that is a very rare survival.
Listing NGR: TQ5083238627

Formerly TQ 53 NW 45

Dendrochronology dating gave a date of c.1540. (2)

English Heritage, List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest (Map). SKE16160.

<2> Vernacular Architecture Group, ADS Dendrochronology Database, Vol. 22, Pg. 44 (Website). SKE17391.

Sources and further reading