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Summary

Description

1769 (dated) and late 19th century; with late 20th century rebuilding and restoration. U-plan courtyard with 2 crowstepped dwellings and flanking former barn, byre and stables; large rear walled garden.

North front, to cobbled courtyard: small, 2-storey 3-bay nepus-gabled house; door to L with simple roll-moulded reveals, marriage lintel above inscribed 'WC JS'; 2 triangular doocots to nepus with 3 triangular ledges; apex stack; rubble built with droved ashlar dressings; moulded string course between ground and 1st floor, moulded eaves cornice. To west, late 19th century tall, 2-storey house raised over earlier single storey range; irregular openings. 2 ranges flanking courtyard (that to L now without gables and original roof); irregular openings including cart arch, mounting block adjacent; crowstepped skews to R range and triangular doocots in end gables (both formerly with apex ball finials); rubble built with droved dressings and moulded eaves cornice.

SW (REAR) ELEVATION: 2-storey 4-bay later house to L with bipartite and single windows; timber panelled door to centre R with stop-chamfered surround, cornice and frieze above. Earlier house to R with single window and door to ground. Reconstructed adjoining 6-bay wing to outer R (circa 2000).

Timber sash and case plate glass windows; uPVC windows to converted stables. Grey slate roofs; stone ridges; coped ashlar stacks.

INTERIOR: mostly modernised. Original 18th century stone chimneybreast in earlier house. Timber panelled doors, cornices, chimneypieces and turned timber stair balustrade to later house.

WALLED GARDEN: to south of house; rubble built with dressed coping and ashlar flat arch to fields. In ruins at present (2003).

Statement of Special Interest

William Caldwell is recorded as the landowner of Middleton in the Heritors' Records of 1820-22, at the time the tenth most profitable lands in the parish. When first built, the property would have consisted of the single 2-storey dwelling in the centre of the long range of the U-plan courtyard. The byre and stables projecting at right angles but not adjoining this range both had crowstepped gables with doocots in the north ends and rather grand ball finials to the apices. This formal arrangement indicates an early steading of the improvement era and illustrates the prosperity of the landowner. The doocots incorporated in the gables provided the inhabitants with a valuable source of food in the wintertime and were a common feature in 18th century Scotland.

The late 19th century house built over the earlier single storey range is far larger in scale than any of the other buildings in the complex. The wing to the east of the earlier house is a late 20th century reconstruction. The former byre to the east has lost its pitched roof but is otherwise well preserved with some good voussoired arches over the doorways. Originally the buildings would have been harled with exposed margins and the roofs thatched.

References

Bibliography

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