A visit to a rescued and restored mediaeval cottage in Lichfield

Cruck House … a rescued and restored mediaeval house in Stowe Street, Lichfield (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2015)

Patrick Comerford

After visiting Dr Milley’s Hospital on Beacon Street, Lichfield, on Saturday, I also visited another surviving mediaeval house in Lichfield that has been restored carefully in the past few decades.

Cruck House is a restored Grade II* timber-framed mediaeval cottage at 71 Stowe Street, which is a continuation of Lombard Street, and close to south side of Stowe Pool.

Cruck House is an impressive sight on Stowe Street in the midst of modern residential and commercial buildings. Yet, despite first impressions, this is a surprisingly small building.

This jointed cruck and part-box-framed house fell into disrepair before it was rescued from demolition in 1971. It was discovered during the redevelopment of Stowe Street and was restored to its original state.

In the mid-1950s, many of the old buildings in Stowe Street pulled down. During the demolition work, the Cruck House was revealed within the outer cladding of a building whose outer walls had obscured the framework supporting it.

Whoever spotted the house during the demolition process and called a halt had saved a rare building dating back to the late 14th or early 15th century.

Cruck House, Lichfield … a unique example of its type in Lichfield (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2015)

In the past, there were two main types of timber buildings in England – the box frame construction, and cruck.

Box frame was a construction of mainly pre-fabricated sections that were made up, and then erected on the site to form the shell of the building, with the roof supported on beams carried on to the top plates – or wall plates on the upper frames, thus transmitting the roof load down to the ground via the framework below.

Cruck buildings were mainly made up in-situ. The roof load was carried directly from the apex to the ground via pairs of arching beams such as those at the exposed end of the Cruck House. This building is what is known as jointed cruck, since the main beams are jointed instead of being in one piece.

Although it looks bigger this is a single-storey, two-bay building with a half loft. There are two windows of two lights with an upper three-light window between, all with leaded glazing. The left return has a cruck truss with a tie beam, cruck spurs, collar and yoke with short king post.

The right return is similar, with braces to a king post, and two two-light ground floor windows. At the back of the house, the entrance is connected through a 20th century glazed porch connecting with the terrace behind Cruck House.

Some of the timber has been renewed in the restoration work in recent decades, especially the sill plates and the rear framing.

There were other examples of cruck-style buildings in Lichfield in the past. For example, when an old pub was being demolished on the corner of Frog Lane and Saint John Street, cruck beams were visible in the party wall between the old pub and the building immediately to the north of it. It was swiftly demolished and removed, although not before the pieces were photographed before they were removed.



Cruck House was open to the public last year as part of the Lichfield Heritage Weekend. Dave Moore, who was involved in Saturday’s visit to Dr Milley’s Hospital and who has interviewed me about my Lichfield links, recently gave an interesting talk to Friends 2 Friends, explaining how Cruck House was built.

Cruck House is now a day care centre and is used by a variety of community groups, including Friends 2 Friends (F2F), which supports adults with learning difficulties. In recent years it was also used for Sunday meetings for worship by the Society of Friends (Quakers), although they have since moved to the Martin Heath Hall in Christchurch Lane.

Cruck House is close to Stowe Pool, to the east of Lichfield Cathedral (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2015)

Notes on a visit to Dr Milley’s Hospital in Lichfield

The ground floor of Dr Milley’s Hospital is now well below the street level on Beacon Street (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2015)

Patrick Comerford

I visited Dr Milley’s Hospital at No 7 Beacon Street, Lichfield, yesterday [30 May 2015] as part of a small tour organised by Kate Gomez and the local history group, Lichfield Discovered.

We were welcomed at the front door by the chair of the trustees, Mrs Sheelagh James, who is also Deputy Mayor of Lichfield, and were shown around the house in small groups by two other trustees, Mr Peter Parsons and Mr Ronald Monk.

Alongside the Cathedral and Saint John’s Hospital, Dr Milley’s Hospital is one of the oldest surviving buildings in Lichfield. The original almshouse was founded almost 600 years ago by the Bishop of Lichfield, William Heyworth, in 1424, and it was refounded and endowed by Canon Thomas Milley over 500 years ago in 1505.

Remembering the founder of Dr Milley’s Hospital (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2015)

The pedimented tablet above the entrance says:

This hospital for fifteen women was founded by Thomas Milley, DD, Canon Residentiary of the Cathedral Church of Lichfield AD 1504.

A view of the front of the hospital, drawn in 1841, suggests a number of alterations were made in the 18th century. These included the facing of the exterior with plaster, the insertion of wood casement windows, and the addition of gabled dormers to the roof.

Stepping into the hospital was like stepping down in a bygone age, and I mean stepping down, for the ground floor of Dr Milley’s Hospital is now well below the street level on Beacon Street, due both to its original location in the town ditch, and to the raising of the street levels over the years, catering for the heavy traffic along the A51 which was once the main road from Chester to London, running through the heart of Lichfield.

The front range, facing onto Beacon Street, contains a central stone porch giving access to a wide entrance hall flanked by rooms for the matron and almswomen. It is possible the large beam in the entrance hall below the chapel dates back to the building of 1504, and I had to stoop my head several times to avoid a nasty bump.

The hospital building is a two-storey, red-brick building, with a stone plinth and stone dressings. Originally the building was L-shaped in plan: from the southern end of the front range, a long rear wing extended back along the southern boundary of the property.

Dendrochronology or tree-ring dating tests suggest that parts of the hospital were rebuilt around 1652 (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2015)

It is generally believed in Lichfield that parts of Dr Milley’s Hospital date back to the 16th century and that the building survived the English Civil War in the mid 17th century.

However, a scientific report by MJ Worthington and DWH Miles of the English Heritage Centre for Archaeology in 2002 used dendrochronology or tree-ring dating techniques and they suggest that much of the hospital did not survive the civil war and that it was rebuilt just after 1652.

An examination of glass-making techniques has shown that some of the glass in windows in the upper storey survive from the late 17th and early 18th century.

The chapel is the oldest part of Dr Milley’s Hospital (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2015)

The chapel is in the oldest part of the building, and is in a separate space on the first floor, above the porch and hallway and facing east.

The rear wing has a corridor on each floor, and these corridors originally gave access to residents’ rooms on the south side of the building. On the north side of the corridors is the staircase and also a two-storey addition, probably dating from the late 18th century, containing two rooms. At the bottom of the staircase, we were pointed to the covering over a well that provided fresh, clean water in the hospital until the first half of the 20th century.

The original well beside the stairs is now covered over (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2015)

The internal partitions are of heavy close-studded timbering and incorporate many of the original early 16th century doorways.

By the early 20th century, the hospital was in need of modernisation and repair, and a complete rebuilding was proposed, with plans to demolish the old building. However, the Charity Commissioners wanted a careful restoration instead, and their recommendations were carried out in 1906-1907. The alterations allowed for only eight resident women, but their accommodation was now more comfortable. New stone-mullioned windows were inserted at the front, and the external plaster was stripped away to reveal the earlier brickwork.

Each woman had one room for all her needs, but water had to be carried from the well at the end of the passage.

Looking out from Dr Milley’s Hospital onto Beacon Street (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2015)

The building was designated a Grade II* Listed building in 1952, and it was not until 1967 that the hospital was provided with one bathroom and a communal laundry room.

Dr Milley’s Hospital was extensively refurbished in 1985-1987, with a major extension and the provision of a communal lounge. New kitchens were provided in 2013, the communal lounge and heating were renovated in 2014, and this year sees the updating of bathrooms in in the apartments.

Dr Milley’s Hospital now has 10 residents. Six of the women live in self-contained flats and the other four live in studio apartments. Each resident has her own kitchen and bathroom, and some women live in studio apartments.

After our tour of the hospital and gardens we were entertained to morning tea and coffee in the Dennis Birch Room, which serves as a community or common room, and in the gardens.

Sunshine in the gardens at the rear of Dr Milley’s Hospital (Photograph: Patrick Comerford, 2015)

Updated 2 June 2015 (Correcting names of trustees)