Stanton Old Hall (Netherwitton)
Stanton Old Hall. Photo by Peter Ryder.
Stanton Old Hall. Photo Northumberland County Council, 1956.
[NZ 13138958] Stanton Hall. (1)
Tower at Stanton. (2)
Stanton, the seat of John Fenwick Esq, is pleasantly situated on the east side of the river Font; the house is large and well-built. (3)
Listed in the 1415 Survey as 'Turris de Stranton'. [Not mentioned in the 1541 Survey pp29-49]. (4)
Modern alterations have so defaced the tower, that few traces of it are now observable. Sashed and stone mullioned windows have been inserted at different periods by the Fenwicks. A part of the tower is still tenanted. (5)
The old manor-house of the Fenwicks which appears to have been a pele-tower in the reign of Henry VI, is now partly occupied by a blacksmith. It was used for some time under the old poor-law system as a parish workhouse. Veitch, the Covenanter moved in May 1677 from Harnham to Stanton Hall. (6)
Apparently a late 15th or early 16th century pele, it is fast going to decay. The south and west fronts have been eased with ashlar about the end of the 17th century or beginning of the 18th century. (7)
The remains of Stanton Hall stand upon a steep south-west slope, overlooking the Font valley to the west, south and east, and commanding the slopes to the north.
The structure consists of a tall rectangular block, with a stair turret against the east side. The north end is still inhabited as a private dwelling. The south end is roofless and ruinous.
Few original features remain. There are several small square-headed windows, blocked with bricks.
All the large windows are of 16c date, except those in the south wall which was rebuilt in early 18c style. The walls of the main block are 1m thick.
There are modern additions adjoining the inhabited part on the north and east sides. The tenant Mrs Dentice can offer no additional information about the structure. (8)
Condition unchanged. (9)
Stanton Tower. Remains partly in ruins, comprise an oblong tower house with south projection. On south side remains of garderobe. Rest looks early 17th century or Tudor. West front early 18th century. (10)
Stanton Old Hall, Grade II. Late 16th century incorporating medieval fabric. South end remodelled c.1700. Remains of 16th century openings on ground floor. Interior: several old fireplaces, one probably 16th century and hall fireplace c.1700. Thicker walls and change in masonry suggest north part of main block was a two-storey gabled structure, heightened in 16th century. (11)
Stanton Old Hall. Three-storey 'strong house'. Probably later 16th century. (12)
The house consists of a rectangular north-south block c.20m by 9.2m with a stair turret or projection 2m deep by 4.5m wide close to the north end of the east side. There are later outshuts along the whole length of the east and north walls.
The building is of considerable complexity. The architectural and structural features are best described elevation by elevation.
WEST FRONT: The west front is of four bays and three storeys. There is a change in fabric type, from roughly-coursed and roughly-squared stone, to smaller and rather better-squared stonework, at or a little above the level of the lintels of the first floor windows. The windows of the lower floors have been mullioned and of four lights, although most of the mullions (including all the intermediate ones) are now missing. Two of the ground floor windows have been knocked through into doorways; the southern (in the fourth bay) has been altered back to a window again, although one only half the width of the original. Below the northern jamb of this window are two large blocks looking at first sight like the jamb of an earlier doorway, but in fact probably
the base of the south west quoin of an earlier phase of the building. At second floor level are large upright windows of mullion-and-transom cross type, one still bricked up. There are also remains of an earlier scheme of fenestration. Between the northern two ground floor windows is a blocked window, almost square, with a chamfered surround; its jambs are 'long' blocks of gritstone extending back into the wall, in contrast to those of the jambs of the mullioned windows which are mostly 'upright' blocks, suggesting that they are insertions. To the north of the ground floor window in the third bay from the north is the chamfered jamb of a taller square-headed window, with jamb stones of similar type. At first floor level, between the windows of the third and fourth bays, is a slit window with roughly-cut dressings, quite different in character to anything else in the building.
NORTH WALL: The north end of the house shows very clear evidence of having been raised from two storeys to three. The lines of the earlier gable coping and of the sides of a central stack, are both clear. The lower part of the wall is partly obscured by a pent-roofed addition (probably of 17th century date, to judge from a two-light mullioned window in its west wall). At the present first floor level (just below the eaves line of the two-storeyed house) is a small window close to each end, the eastern with a chamfered surround and the western a plain rectangular opening.
SOUTH FRONT: The south front of the house is of sandstone ashlar with a chamfered plinth and rusticated quoins. It is two bays wide and two storeys high, in contrast to the west front. The large windows have been of mullion-and-transom cross type (their mullions and transoms having gone) with moulded architraves and swan-neck pediments - the pediment ornament differing in detail from window to window. The roof is hipped at this end so there is no gable.
EAST FRONT: The east elevation of the house is in some ways the most complicated of all. The stair turret rises a stage above the present eaves line and is lit by a series of windows. The present gable looks to have been heightened a little (an older steeper eaves line seems to be visible just below the present one) yet a bricked-up window, now virtually hidden by the gutter on the south, appears to imply that at least the side walls of the turret were originally carried up higher.
South of the turret are a number of puzzling features, here described from south to north. After the metre or so ashlar facing coeval with the south front, is a vertical line of projecting blocks,
apparently intended to key in a wall that was never built. Beyond this toothing the heightening seen in the west wall is visible, although the change here is between large squared blocks - laid in irregular courses, suggesting that they are re-used from an earlier building - and the coursed rubble of the top floor. The lower masonry includes one near vertical line of large blocks (now almost hidden by the outshut roof) which may be angle quoins and might correspond with the apparent earlier angle quoin seen on the west.
Beyond this is a blocked three-light mullioned window (now almost hidden by the outshut roof) and then the wall fabric below second floor level abruptly changes to rubble. At the commencement of this section there is a ragged area that may indicate the eastward return of an earlier wall. This rubble section contains a recess flanked by two projecting corbels, referred to in some sources as a garderobe, but more likely to be the remains of a hooded fireplace. Above this, the rubble masonry extends as far as a series of marked horizontal grooves or channellings in the wall face, presumably related to the eaves line of a removed part of the building. The coursed rubble of the upper part of the wall contains a two-light mullioned window and a single-light window closer to the stair turret.
The interior of the building has not been examined in detail and its original internal arrangements cannot be reconstructed. The only old doorway is in the east wall immediately south of the stair turret and now opening within the outshut. It is a square-headed opening with a hollow-chamfered surround, opening into a lobby alongside a fireplace in a cross-wall that divides the main block somewhat north of centre. Several fireplaces of late 16th or early 17th century character survive. The stair, entered from the northern part of the main block, is of stone winder type to second floor level and timber above. The remaining section of the old roof, above the northern part of the house, has two very unusual trusses with their eastern principal (that set against the stair turret) curved like a cruck and the western straight.
SUGGESTED DEVELOPMENT: A tentative suggestion follows:
i) a medieval house or tower, of which the west wall (with the remains of the hooded fireplace) remains incorporated in the east wall of the present house.
ii) in the early 16th century a two-storeyed wing is constructed running north-south against the west side of the earlier building. This probably incorporates an earlier building, either coeval with, or possibly earlier than the tower.
iii) around 1600 the wing was heightened from two or three storeys and possibly extended slightly to the south, the earlier house or tower demolished and the present stair turret built. The end result was to produce a strong house of similar form to the nearby Witton Shields Tower (dated 1608) and to late towers in the Scottish tradition (eg. Doddington).
iv) in the late 17th century the house was aggrandised by the construction of a new south front. The influence of local houses can be seen in the slightly quirky detail of the swan-neck pediments over the new windows. The upper tier of windows of the west front were also remodelled at this time. Further remodelling was probably intended, including an eastward extension of the main block, but was never carried out.
v) in the 18th century the house fell into decline. To this phase can be dated the accretion of the various outshuts, except perhaps that at the north end, which may be a little earlier.
vi) restoration, with partial rebuilding of the eastern outshut, in the late 20th century. (13)
Listed by Cathcart King and by Dodds. (14a-b)
Tower at Stanton. (2)
Stanton, the seat of John Fenwick Esq, is pleasantly situated on the east side of the river Font; the house is large and well-built. (3)
Listed in the 1415 Survey as 'Turris de Stranton'. [Not mentioned in the 1541 Survey pp29-49]. (4)
Modern alterations have so defaced the tower, that few traces of it are now observable. Sashed and stone mullioned windows have been inserted at different periods by the Fenwicks. A part of the tower is still tenanted. (5)
The old manor-house of the Fenwicks which appears to have been a pele-tower in the reign of Henry VI, is now partly occupied by a blacksmith. It was used for some time under the old poor-law system as a parish workhouse. Veitch, the Covenanter moved in May 1677 from Harnham to Stanton Hall. (6)
Apparently a late 15th or early 16th century pele, it is fast going to decay. The south and west fronts have been eased with ashlar about the end of the 17th century or beginning of the 18th century. (7)
The remains of Stanton Hall stand upon a steep south-west slope, overlooking the Font valley to the west, south and east, and commanding the slopes to the north.
The structure consists of a tall rectangular block, with a stair turret against the east side. The north end is still inhabited as a private dwelling. The south end is roofless and ruinous.
Few original features remain. There are several small square-headed windows, blocked with bricks.
All the large windows are of 16c date, except those in the south wall which was rebuilt in early 18c style. The walls of the main block are 1m thick.
There are modern additions adjoining the inhabited part on the north and east sides. The tenant Mrs Dentice can offer no additional information about the structure. (8)
Condition unchanged. (9)
Stanton Tower. Remains partly in ruins, comprise an oblong tower house with south projection. On south side remains of garderobe. Rest looks early 17th century or Tudor. West front early 18th century. (10)
Stanton Old Hall, Grade II. Late 16th century incorporating medieval fabric. South end remodelled c.1700. Remains of 16th century openings on ground floor. Interior: several old fireplaces, one probably 16th century and hall fireplace c.1700. Thicker walls and change in masonry suggest north part of main block was a two-storey gabled structure, heightened in 16th century. (11)
Stanton Old Hall. Three-storey 'strong house'. Probably later 16th century. (12)
The house consists of a rectangular north-south block c.20m by 9.2m with a stair turret or projection 2m deep by 4.5m wide close to the north end of the east side. There are later outshuts along the whole length of the east and north walls.
The building is of considerable complexity. The architectural and structural features are best described elevation by elevation.
WEST FRONT: The west front is of four bays and three storeys. There is a change in fabric type, from roughly-coursed and roughly-squared stone, to smaller and rather better-squared stonework, at or a little above the level of the lintels of the first floor windows. The windows of the lower floors have been mullioned and of four lights, although most of the mullions (including all the intermediate ones) are now missing. Two of the ground floor windows have been knocked through into doorways; the southern (in the fourth bay) has been altered back to a window again, although one only half the width of the original. Below the northern jamb of this window are two large blocks looking at first sight like the jamb of an earlier doorway, but in fact probably
the base of the south west quoin of an earlier phase of the building. At second floor level are large upright windows of mullion-and-transom cross type, one still bricked up. There are also remains of an earlier scheme of fenestration. Between the northern two ground floor windows is a blocked window, almost square, with a chamfered surround; its jambs are 'long' blocks of gritstone extending back into the wall, in contrast to those of the jambs of the mullioned windows which are mostly 'upright' blocks, suggesting that they are insertions. To the north of the ground floor window in the third bay from the north is the chamfered jamb of a taller square-headed window, with jamb stones of similar type. At first floor level, between the windows of the third and fourth bays, is a slit window with roughly-cut dressings, quite different in character to anything else in the building.
NORTH WALL: The north end of the house shows very clear evidence of having been raised from two storeys to three. The lines of the earlier gable coping and of the sides of a central stack, are both clear. The lower part of the wall is partly obscured by a pent-roofed addition (probably of 17th century date, to judge from a two-light mullioned window in its west wall). At the present first floor level (just below the eaves line of the two-storeyed house) is a small window close to each end, the eastern with a chamfered surround and the western a plain rectangular opening.
SOUTH FRONT: The south front of the house is of sandstone ashlar with a chamfered plinth and rusticated quoins. It is two bays wide and two storeys high, in contrast to the west front. The large windows have been of mullion-and-transom cross type (their mullions and transoms having gone) with moulded architraves and swan-neck pediments - the pediment ornament differing in detail from window to window. The roof is hipped at this end so there is no gable.
EAST FRONT: The east elevation of the house is in some ways the most complicated of all. The stair turret rises a stage above the present eaves line and is lit by a series of windows. The present gable looks to have been heightened a little (an older steeper eaves line seems to be visible just below the present one) yet a bricked-up window, now virtually hidden by the gutter on the south, appears to imply that at least the side walls of the turret were originally carried up higher.
South of the turret are a number of puzzling features, here described from south to north. After the metre or so ashlar facing coeval with the south front, is a vertical line of projecting blocks,
apparently intended to key in a wall that was never built. Beyond this toothing the heightening seen in the west wall is visible, although the change here is between large squared blocks - laid in irregular courses, suggesting that they are re-used from an earlier building - and the coursed rubble of the top floor. The lower masonry includes one near vertical line of large blocks (now almost hidden by the outshut roof) which may be angle quoins and might correspond with the apparent earlier angle quoin seen on the west.
Beyond this is a blocked three-light mullioned window (now almost hidden by the outshut roof) and then the wall fabric below second floor level abruptly changes to rubble. At the commencement of this section there is a ragged area that may indicate the eastward return of an earlier wall. This rubble section contains a recess flanked by two projecting corbels, referred to in some sources as a garderobe, but more likely to be the remains of a hooded fireplace. Above this, the rubble masonry extends as far as a series of marked horizontal grooves or channellings in the wall face, presumably related to the eaves line of a removed part of the building. The coursed rubble of the upper part of the wall contains a two-light mullioned window and a single-light window closer to the stair turret.
The interior of the building has not been examined in detail and its original internal arrangements cannot be reconstructed. The only old doorway is in the east wall immediately south of the stair turret and now opening within the outshut. It is a square-headed opening with a hollow-chamfered surround, opening into a lobby alongside a fireplace in a cross-wall that divides the main block somewhat north of centre. Several fireplaces of late 16th or early 17th century character survive. The stair, entered from the northern part of the main block, is of stone winder type to second floor level and timber above. The remaining section of the old roof, above the northern part of the house, has two very unusual trusses with their eastern principal (that set against the stair turret) curved like a cruck and the western straight.
SUGGESTED DEVELOPMENT: A tentative suggestion follows:
i) a medieval house or tower, of which the west wall (with the remains of the hooded fireplace) remains incorporated in the east wall of the present house.
ii) in the early 16th century a two-storeyed wing is constructed running north-south against the west side of the earlier building. This probably incorporates an earlier building, either coeval with, or possibly earlier than the tower.
iii) around 1600 the wing was heightened from two or three storeys and possibly extended slightly to the south, the earlier house or tower demolished and the present stair turret built. The end result was to produce a strong house of similar form to the nearby Witton Shields Tower (dated 1608) and to late towers in the Scottish tradition (eg. Doddington).
iv) in the late 17th century the house was aggrandised by the construction of a new south front. The influence of local houses can be seen in the slightly quirky detail of the swan-neck pediments over the new windows. The upper tier of windows of the west front were also remodelled at this time. Further remodelling was probably intended, including an eastward extension of the main block, but was never carried out.
v) in the 18th century the house fell into decline. To this phase can be dated the accretion of the various outshuts, except perhaps that at the north end, which may be a little earlier.
vi) restoration, with partial rebuilding of the eastern outshut, in the late 20th century. (13)
Listed by Cathcart King and by Dodds. (14a-b)
N11040
FIELD OBSERVATION, Ordnance Survey Archaeology Division Field Investigation 1957; A S Phillips
FIELD OBSERVATION, Ordnance Survey Archaeology Division Field Investigation 1971; B H Pritchard
THEMATIC SURVEY, Towers and Bastles in Northumberland 1995; P RYDER
FIELD OBSERVATION, Ordnance Survey Archaeology Division Field Investigation 1971; B H Pritchard
THEMATIC SURVEY, Towers and Bastles in Northumberland 1995; P RYDER
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