Building record 4538/0/42 - The former White Lion Inn

A former inn, now converted to two houses, dating from the mid to late 19th century. Originally an inn and attached farm building. The buildings were combined in the second half of the 20th century to extend the inn.

{1} Level II building survey undertaken prior to conversion into two domestic dwellings.

The eastern portion of the former inn has large ironstone quoins at each corner and was first constructed as a two storey cart or carriage shed. When first built it does not appear to have had any doors onto High Street but instead faced into a roughly rectangular open yard surrounded by buildings on the south, west and north sides. The cart or carriage shed had two wide brick-built arches leading into the main part of the ground floor of the building. A side room, to the west, had a set of stairs leading up to the first floor which may have served as a hayloft with a possible tack-room or living accommodation. The roof structure of this building is typical of a mid to late 19th century agricultural or at least rural roof. The use of the large ironstone quoins at each corner does however represent a degree of care and expenditure in the construction of the building. The use of steel beams dating to the pre-World War One period suggest some internal modifications or strengthening to the cart shed. The steel beams stop where the dividing wall within the cart shed was positioned. The modification may have taken place at the time when Mr William Brawn took over from the pub’s previous landlord Mrs Clark. The size of the cart or carriage shed seems to be too large to be associated with a small village pub and so is more likely to be part of a farm.

To the west of the cart shed the adjacent building appears to have been built as two rooms although it is possible that internal divisions of the larger room may have been removed in the past. This building has doorways from each room which exit onto High Street. The smaller of the two rooms has slightly oddly angled walls and may represent a combining of the existing buildings to create a new room to the south of the range of (recently demolished) outbuildings which extend northwards along the western site boundary. The thickness of the dividing wall between the two rooms of the west portion fronting onto High Street may also indicate that the room at the far western end of the range is in fact an earlier building associated with the northern outbuildings and that the room to the east of it was added later to infill the gap between it and the cart shed. If the cart shed and the far western building were separate structures this may represent the original entrance into the yard to the north. The demolished rear buildings are likely to have formed the western boundary of the farm yard.

The first floor rear, north, wall of the western building has been rebuilt in brick which appears to date to the early 20th century. It is not clear why this rebuilding took place but may be to strengthen the existing ironstone wall which appears to remain in place, at least in part, on the inside skin of the wall. This remedial work may be as a result of the modification of the ground floor extension built against the rear of the western portion. This ground floor extension sits on stone foundations but is built of a mix of brick and stone which may be of a similar rebuilding date to the first floor brick wall.

The entire frontage of the White Lion Inn appears to have been rebuilt in a matching style to create a uniform façade with matching windows and door details. The modification has obscured any earlier arrangement of windows and doors. It is not clear when this happened but it is likely to have happened when the entire range was converted into a larger pub. Map evidence suggests that this was after 1938. Any rebuilding during the wartime period is improbable so the remodelling must date to the immediate post war years. In addition to the façade being remodelled the internal layout was altered to remove the staircase and create a new bar in Room G3. The roof covering may have been renewed and modified at or around this time too.

Later alterations include the construction of the brick-built extension to the rear of the building. This housed a new entrance from the extended car park and contained a new modern toilet block.

<1> Hyam, A., 2016, An Historic Building Recording at The White Lion Inn, 1 High Street, Moulton, Northamptonshire, 2016 (Report). SNN110989.

<2> Crank, N. (Editor), 2017, South Midlands Archaeology (47), p. 52 (Journal). SNN111362.

Record last edited

Feb 6 2019 11:44AM