Description

MIDDLETON MIDDLETON PARK
SP19NE
2/83 Middleton Hall
GV II*
Country house. The main early C18 house incorporates buildings of C14 and C16
date and has extensive early C19 additions. The existing buildings are grouped
around an open courtyard with its entrance to the north. An early C14 west
facing building in the east range incorporates some C12 material. It is built of
finely jointed dressed sandstone partly covered in cement render. 2 storeys with
chamfered offset at first floor level. Roughly central doorway with a 3-centred
arch and chamfered surround. To the right of the doorway is a round-headed loop
partly concealed by the render, and to the left, an inserted doorway. Blocked
inserted openings to first floor left and right. The doorway gives access to a
chamber 28 feet long from north to south, and 13 feet wide. There was a room of
similar size above, the floor of which was carried on a continuous offset. The
round-headed loop noted above has splayed jambs. In the south wall is a cupboard
with Caernarvon arched lintel, a groove for a shelf and a rebate for a door. In
the south wall of the first floor chamber is a doorway with segmental head and
roll-moulded surround. There is a similar doorway in the north wall, though this
is heavily weathered. An early C14 arch-braced collar rafter roof survives. The
2 doorways at first floor level suggest that there were further medieval
buildings adjoining to the north and south and this suggestion is confirmed by
surviving continuations of the east wall. To the north and separated by a short
gap is a much altered timber-framed building, possibly the remnant of a chapel
for which licence was granted to Sir Baldwin Freville circa 1390. At the
north-east corner of the quadrangle is a building aligned east-west facing
north. It is probably Cl6. Timber-framed, plastered in the C17 and partly
rebuilt in brick in the C18/C19. 2 storeys with jettied first floor on scrolled
plaster brackets. 3 window front with moulded plaster architraves. The entrance
is at the rear. Exposed framing in the north and east walls: close studding with
middle rail, long curved tension braces to ground storey and short curved braces
to first floor. Inside there are 2 ground floor rooms of unequal size. The
smaller eastern room has a spine beam with wide chamfers and the main western
room has boxed and plastered spine and cross beams and wide joists. In the south
wall is an early C19 cast iron kitchen fire grate with fluted grieze. Main
house: early C18. Rendered brick; plain-tile roof; brick ridge stacks. L-shaped
plan: the house encloses the west side of the courtyard and part of the north
side. West elevation: 2 storeys with moulded eaves cornice. 2:4:2 window front
articulated by giant fluted pilasters which reflect the internal proportions:
12-pane glazing bar sashes with moulded architraves. Early C19 three-bay
extension wing to the right. The left hand (north) return of the range has 3
more bays with pilasters, and then a 2-bay entrance block set back to the left.
It has a central 6-panel door with bracketed hood approached by a flight of
concrete steps. The south range contained the services. Interior: the entrance
block contains a single room or hall. Access is from the north doorway which
opens to the landing of the great staircase. From here, flights ascend to the
first floor of the west range and to a blocked doorway in the east wall, and 2
short-flights descend to the floor of the entrance hall. The staircase has an
open string with shaped tread ends, ramped handrails, a square panelled foot
newel and a panelled dado. Most of the balusters have been removed but the few
that survive alternate between column on vase and barley sugar twist type. To
each side of the landing is a giant fluted column of square section. Large
raised and fielded wall panels to the lower part of the hall and plastered walls
above crowned by a coved and moulded cornice. In the south wall is a large stone
fireplace with bolection moulded surround and in the east wall 2 doors, now
blocked. These together with the blocked door at first floor level indicate that
C18 house extended further to the east. A first floor gallery extends along the
west side of the hall. It is carried on an arcade of 3 round arches with raised
keys; there are fluted pilasters between the arches. Behind the arcade and
directly beneath the gallery is a passage which gives access to the principal
rooms of the west range. Each of the 4 ground floor rooms of the west range has
a polished marble fireplace with bolection moulded surround. The large central
room is flanked by a pair of smaller rooms each of which has an C19 plaster
cornice with modillions alternating with rosettes, and a lower band of egg and
dart. The southern of these flanking rooms also has a pair of round-headed
arches in the east wall, each with a plaster shell-vault. Middleton Hall was
formerly contained by a moat, parts of which survive to the east and north-west.
(Buildings of England: Warwickshire: p355; VCH: Warwickshire: Vol.IV, 1965,
p156)

Listing NGR: SP1925498097

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Middleton Hall, Tamworth at Wikipedia
• Middleton Hall, Tamworth official website
• Wikidata Q6842011

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

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