The Building Stones of Clifton - Part 2

 

Moulds of brachiopod shells in an oolitic variety of the Cadeby Formation

Continuing down Common Lane, having seen that the building stones of Clifton are essentially dolomitic limestone from the Cadeby Formation, with a significant amount of dark red Coal Measures sandstone, I was interested to see that the quoins and window dressings to Manor House are made of another Coal Measures sandstone.

Manor House

 

The house is set back from the road and I couldn’t get a close look at it but, when enlarging my photos, I can see that it is grey/brown in colour with some Liesegang rings and doesn’t appear to have been very durable. It also looks quite similar to the sandstone used for the entrance to the Manor House, but I don’t know where it might have come from.

The Building Stones of England Database map explorer

 

The Building Stones of England Database map explorer shows clusters of quarries at Wickersley and Thrybergh, which worked the Wickersley Rock and others located on the Mexborough Rock in Mexborough, with the nearest working the Ravenfield Rock near Ravenfield.

 

Pisolitic limestone

 

Walking down Common Lane towards Chapel Lane, I stopped a couple of times to look at the variety of textures seen in the limestone used for the boundary walls. These includes coarse grained pisolitic limestone, similar to the one that is formed near to the base of this formation in Hooton Pagnell, a finer grained limestone that has cavernous decay and a very fine grained variety that I normally associate with the Brotherton Formation.

 

Fine grained limestone and cavernous decay

 

On the corner of Common Lane and Church Lane, Church House is another example of a building appears on the 1854 Ordnance Survey (OS) map, which contributes to the character of Clifton Conservation Area and in other locations would have probably have merited Grade II listing at least for its group value.

 

Church House

 

Further down Common Lane, I was intrigued by Holly House, which has walling composed of approximately equal proportions of dolomitic limestone and red sandstone and unusual brickwork to the window heads and between the ground floor and first floor windows.

Views of Holly House

Except for Manor House, the houses along Common Lane all have limestone lintels above the doors and windows and I can’t imagine that the brickwork, if original, was designed to be seen. On the upper storey, the red sandstone appears to be covered in fragments of what appears to be the remains of a lime render that may have been stripped off, with very crude and inappropriate Portland cement ribbon pointing applied to the roughly squared stonework.

 

 A detail of the masonry of Holly House

Walking further down the hill, I took a few general record photos of the various buildings and boundary walls on its east side, where both limestone and red sandstone are used in varying proportions, before stopping at the entrance to Hall Farm.

 

Buildings and boundary walls on the east side of Common Lane

 

Looking at the side by side version of the 1854 OS map, Hall Farm appears to be a modern building and the boundary walls to either side of its entrance look like they may have been rebuilt using material from demolished buildings.

 

 

Retracing my steps, I stopped briefly to have a closer look at the various sections of walling that I had just passed. The red sandstone varies from a deep oxblood to bright red and the limestone from cream to yellow, with the development of a grey patina. The limestone also shows a considerable variation in texture, with both pisolite and oolite and moulds of brachiopod shells where the calcium carbonate has dissolved.

 

Details of boundary walls on Common Lane