Fowlers Wells Grade 2 listed barn

I am grateful to Roger Wolfe, owner of Fowlers Wells who contributed the following research. 

Built more than 300 years ago, this lovely old barn was still in use as a horse shelter, and for storing and threshing corn, in the early decades of the 20^th century. Original carpenters’ marks are still visible on some of the main oak frames.

 Age and Grade 2 listing

This is a three-bay, single-aisle barn – a layout typical of lowland (east and south east) England. It’s hard to be sure about the date of the barn, because the roof has been replaced and the original main frame timbers pre-date the barn’s construction. But the internal brick work suggests that construction probably dates from the second half of the 17^th century. That makes it around 100 years younger than the house, but still old enough to justify a Grade 2 listing.

 Usage

Though compact (with a length of 40 ft from end to end, and a depth of 21 ft from front to back) the barn was large enough for its original purpose: storing and threshing corn, and providing shelter for farm equipment and animals.

The centre ‘wagon’ bay is 11 ft wide; the left-end bay (viewed from the front) 12 ft wide; and the right-end bay, 14 ft wide. The roof at the front is extended downwards to form an aisle just nine feet wide that runs across the front of the barn.

The main part of the left bay was used for storing corn sheaves to the roof; the slightly larger right bay for storing somewhat bulkier threshed corn. The central wagon bay provided a threshing floor accessible via the two main doors. A couple of feet taller than now, the doors were of sufficient height to allow a loaded wagon to pass through. There is some evidence of a further large access doorway which may have existed at some time at the back of the wagon bay opposite the main doors.

Farm equipment was kept in the left end of the aisle, with room for livestock, including horses, in the right end.

Fred Benham, who lived in Fowlers Wells as a lad, has recounted his memories of the barn when it was still used by a local farmer in the 1920s. The wagon bay was separated from the end bays by two low walls, each a couple of feet high. The threshing floor between the walls was sufficiently large to take a threshing machine. It had four wheels, and featured a large cylinder that rotated to separate the grain by centrifugal action.

Fred remembers the threshing machine being driven via a long flat belt by a steam engine standing in the driveway. That was in 1924. It wasn’t until later that the farmer who used the barn acquired a trussing machine for binding the straw, and replaced the steam engine by a tractor.

Threshing took place in the winter. After threshing, the straw was stacked where the corn had been stored, and the grain was sold off. At that time the aisle was used as a workshop, and for storing garden tools and horse harnesses.

 Construction

The barn’s rough-and-ready oak-framed construction is typical of the period for Surrey Heath, with its poor quality farming land.

 Four cross-frames separate the barn into three main bays, each open to the roof.

The four oak cross frames are conventional post and truss. Each frame comprises two vertical posts (called wall posts, or arcade posts if internal) joined by a cross-wise horizontal tie beam at eaves height, supported by diagonal pegged, tenon-jointed braces. The tie beam forms the base of a roof truss comprising two sloping, braced rafters.

 Horizontal wall plates, also at eaves height, link the cross frames to form the bays. The rafters in each bay are supported by horizontal purlins, clasp-jointed at each roof truss. Some of the wall plates are linked using pegged scarfe joints.  Original carpenters’ marks can be seen on several of the braces, and a tie beam. They identified components for assembly, and may also have continued a ritualistic tradition from earlier centuries.

 Originally the external walls would have been undaubed wattle, to allow for plenty of ventilation. The partial brick infilling of panels at the front and right end of the barn probably took place in the 18^th century. Windows, and the weatherboard cladding of the remaining walls, were added later. The roof might well have been thatched in the past.  Recently (probably in the 1940s) it was tiled with the Dutch Romans that remain in place today.

 The future

By the end of the 20^th century, the barn had become somewhat dilapidated. In 2001 the roof was weatherproofed, the timbers cleaned and treated, the walls air-gapped, insulated and plastered, and the floor screeded and painted. The barn was also re-wired to meet current regulations, and provided with a water point.