East Ealingham Bastle

Description

Ruined bastle house. Late C16 or early C17. Massive random rubble. 36 ft by 24 ft. Formerly 2 storeys but now roofless. Front wall and right return stand to c 7 ft, rear wall to c 12 ft, left gable almost to full height. Walls 4 to 4 ft thick. Later opening on front wall. Original ground-floor doorway on left return has rounded jambs and massive lintel. Old wood lintel inside, also rebates for harr-hung door and drawbars. 3 square recesses on 1st floor in left gable. (Listed Building Report)

NY 846808 East of West Ealingham Farm are two walls of a bastle 16ft by 24ft, with walls 4-1/2 feet thick. There is a doorway in the west gable end, and the wall above suggests a roof pitch of 45-50 degrees (Ramm et al 1970).
Solitary standing bastle, 11m x 7.3m, with side walls 1.3m thick. Byre entrance in gable wall (Ryder 1990).
The ruins of the former farm of East Ealingham stand just below the summit of a ridge at about 180m OD and c.250m east of West Ealingham Farm. The name East Ealingham is given on the 1st Edition OS 6 inch map. The bastle is 11.2m by 7.4m externally, with walls of roughly coursed rubble with large quoins; the walls are c.1.4m thick except for the east end which is only 0.7m; an aberration which may perhaps be explained by its having been built against an earlier structure, now removed. The west end and north wall are more or less intact, except for the upper part of the west gable. The byre doorway is set centrally in the east end; it is square headed with a chamfered surround; directly above the lintel is a square quenching hole. The doorway was a harr socket cut in an internal timber lintel against the south jamb, a rebate for a single door and a drawbar tunnel in each jamb, the upper on the north, the lower on the south. Internally there is a wall cupboard on each side of the doorway with a smaller rectangular recess directly above (compare White Lea, Knaresdale with Kirkhaugh). At first floor level the southern third of the wall is slightly recessed; there is a wall cupboard at each end of the wall and a recess directly above the doorway, rather irregular in plan, which is presumably related to the quenching hole. In the centre of the north wall is an inserted window, now blocked, at basement level, with to the east of it an original slit vent, also now blocked; at the east end of the wall is a patch of smaller stonework, presumably indicating a repair. At first floor level is an internal set back and a ragged row of holes for the ends of transverse beams. There is a broad gap in the centre of the south wall, the remains of which have obviously been repaired; one jamb of a slit vent survives west of the gap. Internally there appears to be a blocked opening, low in the wall, near the west end. Little survives of the east wall apart from footings and a stub at each end. There are remains of a later structure, 7.6m long and 6.3m wide, attached to this end of the bastle; the walls are of smaller coursed stone and are only c.0.6m thick. No features survive and the south wall is reduced to overgrown footings. About 40m west of the bastle are the footings of another rectangular building (its south wall gone), clearly of some age; there are further grassed over footings, apparently of several buildings, a similar distance away to the north east. East Ealingham is a bastle of some merit; the well preserved west end with its quenching hole and cupboards, is of considerable interest. A ragged hole has been broken through the wall at the rear of the basement cupboard north of the doorway and perhaps should be patched to prevent further deterioration (Ryder 1994-5). (Northumberland HER)