:''not to be confused with

Chirton Hall Chirton Hall or Chirton House, occasionally spelled Churton and originally Cheuton, was a country house in Chirton, Northumberland, Chirton, in what is now a western suburb of North Shields, Tyne and Wear, North East England. Historically, the h ...

, Northumberland'' Churton Hall is a

country house image:Blenheim - Blenheim Palace - 20210417125239.jpg, 300px, Blenheim Palace - Oxfordshire An English country house is a large house or mansion in the English countryside. Such houses were often owned by individuals who also owned a Townhou ...

in the

parish A parish is a territorial entity in many Christianity, Christian denominations, constituting a division within a diocese. A parish is under the pastoral care and clerical jurisdiction of a priest#Christianity, priest, often termed a parish pries ...

of Churton,

Cheshire Cheshire ( ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in North West England. It is bordered by Merseyside to the north-west, Greater Manchester to the north-east, Derbyshire to the east, Staffordshire to the south-east, and Shrop ...

, England. The date of building is uncertain. There is a loose board carrying the date 1569 that, according to the authors of the ''

Buildings of England The ''Pevsner Architectural Guides'' are four series of guide books to the architecture of the British Isles. ''The Buildings of England'' series was begun in 1945 by the art historian Sir Nikolaus Pevsner, with its forty-six original volumes pub ...

'' series, may or may not date the house. Dendrochronological analysis suggests that the timbers within the

cruck A cruck or crook frame is a curved timber, one of a pair, which support the roof of a building, historically used in England and Wales. This type of timber framing consists of long, generally naturally curved, timber members that lean inwards and ...

structure of the house were felled in or around 1461, suggesting a 15th-century construction, and the 1569 date is thought to refer to the hall's gifting as a wedding present to William Barnston and his wife Elizabeth. It is a

half-timbered Timber framing () and "post-and-beam" construction are traditional methods of building with heavy Beam (structure), timbers, creating structures using squared-off and carefully fitted and Woodworking joints, joined timbers with joints secure ...

house built for the Barnston family, and was "heavily restored" in 1978–80. Much of the timber framing has been replaced by brick at the rear of the house. The house is roofed in

slate Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous, metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade, regional metamorphism. It is the finest-grained foliated metamorphic ro ...

. It has two storeys, and its plan is E-shaped. At each end of the building are

gable A gable is the generally triangular portion of a wall between the edges of intersecting roof pitches. The shape of the gable and how it is detailed depends on the structural system used, which reflects climate, material availability, and aesth ...

s with different designs. The house is recorded in the

National Heritage List for England The National Heritage List for England (NHLE) is England's official database of protected heritage assets. It includes details of all English listed buildings, scheduled monuments, register of historic parks and gardens, protected shipwrecks, ...

as a designated Grade II

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Hi ...

. The buildings were leased for three generations to a dairy-farming family following the Second World War, but the lease reverted to the Barnston Estate in February 2023. The estate has restored the original house and a 19th-century extension with the intention of leasing them as two homes.

References

Country houses in Cheshire Timber framed buildings in Cheshire Grade II listed houses in Cheshire {{UK-listed-building-stub

See also

References