Hipswell Hall (The Gatehouse Record)

In the civil parish of Hipswell.
In the historic county of Yorkshire.
Modern Authority of North Yorkshire.
1974 county of North Yorkshire.
Medieval County of Yorkshire North Riding.

OS Map Grid Reference: SE18819842
Latitude 54.38093° Longitude -1.71189°

Hipswell Hall has been described as a probable Fortified Manor House.

There are major building remains.

This is a Grade 1 listed building protected by law*.

Description

Western range of fortified manor house, now farmhouse. C15 with alterations dated 1596. Manor house of the Fulthorpe family, altered for George Wandesford. Coursed stone, part roughcast, with ashlar dressings, stone slate roof. 2 storeys with near-central 3-storey tower porch, 2 first-floor windows. Quoins. Embattled parapet. Porch: part-glazed door in chamfered ashlar surround with triangular soffit to lintel. Above, plaque with raised lettering "GW 1596". First floor: 2-light double-chamfered mullion window with vertical iron bars and hoodmould. Second floor: 2-light double- chamfered mullion window with vertical iron bars. Plain parapet. Left return of porch: double-chamfered light vent between ground and first floors; waterspout from parapet. Right return of porch: waterspout from parapet. House, to left of porch: 4-light double-chamfered mullion window with vertical iron bars and hoodmould on ground floor; 4-light double- chamfered mullion and transom window with vertical iron bars and hoodmould on first floor. To right of porch: 2-storey 5-sided bay window with ogee lights in square heads with recessed spandrels and vertical iron bars. First-floor windows cinquefoil-cusped, those on ground floor have had the cusping cut away. Between windows, a traceried panel with a cross moline, the arms of the Fulthorpes. Crenellated parapet. To right of window, waterspout from parapet. Rear: most original openings blocked, including a doorway and windows. On first floor, a window of 2 pointed lights. Two- storey flat-roofed extension, said to be of c.1917, re-using old materials, and with re-set chamfered doorway with triangular soffit to lintel and board door on left return. Right return: 5-light chamfered mullion window with hoodmould on ground floor; 5-light chamfered mullion and transom window with hoodmould on first floor. Interior: armorial shield in plaster ceiling of ground floor bay window. The extensive manor house is shown in Samuel Buck's Yorkshire Sketchbook (1979), p. 384. VCH i, p. 302. H. Speight, Romantic Richmondshire (1897), p. 118. (Listed Building Report)

Hipswell Hall, on the fringe of Catterick garrison town, was a lightly fortified, two-storeyed block-like house similar to South Cawton Castle and of comparable date. It was more elegant than South Cowton and was substantially extended in the late sixteenth century as Buck's sketch of c. 1718 illustrates. Reduced to its original volume in c. 1840 this battlemented farmhouse stands within a rectangular moated site now partly enclosed by a nineteenth-century crenellated wall. (Emery 1996)

Sources of information, references and further reading

National Heritage List for England Listed Building number(s) 1179639
Historic England (PastScape) Defra or Monument number(s) 50944.
County Historic Environment Record (or Sites and Monuments Record) number(s) MNY14370.

Books
- Ingham, Bernard, 2001, Bernard Ingham's Yorkshire Castles (Dalesman) p. 25
  Emery, Anthony, 1996, Greater Medieval Houses of England and Wales Vol. 1 Northern England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press) p. 349
  Hatcher, J., 1990, Richmondshire Architecture p. 119-20
  Ryder, P.F., 1982 (paperback edn 1992), The Medieval Buildings of Yorkshire (Ash Grove Book) p. 132
  Samuel Buck, 1979, Samuel Buck's Yorkshire Sketchbook: Reproduced in Facsimile from Lansdowne MS.914 in the British Library (The King's England Press)
  Page, Wm (ed), 1914, VCH Yorkshire: North Riding Vol. 1 p. 302 online transcription
  Ambler, L., 1913, The old halls and manor houses of Yorkshire, with some examples of other houses built before the year 1700 (London: Batsford) p. 46-7 online copy
  Speight, Harry, 1897, Romantic Richmondshire (London: Elliot Stock) p. 118 online copy

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The bibliography owes much to various bibliographies produced by John Kenyon for the Council for British Archaeology, the Castle Studies Group and others.

Suggestions for finding online and/or hard copies of bibliographical sources can be seen at this link.
Minor archaeological investigations, such as watching brief reports, and some other 'grey' literature is most likely to be held by H.E.R.s but is often poorly referenced and is unlikely to be recorded here, or elsewhere, but some suggestions can be found here.

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*The listed building may not be the actual medieval building, but a building on the site of, or incorporating fragments of, the described site.

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