Buildings of Interest
Despite their great antiquity, the villages of Thringstone and Whitwick retain relatively few old buildings. The Department of the Environment has to date listed six buildings (and one monument) in Thringstone and four in Whitwick as being of special architectural interest. The four buildings in Whitwick are the Church of Saint John the Baptist; The Old Vicarage, Silver Street; The Old School, Market Place and The Old Convent, Parsonwood Hill.
In 2002, the grave of Charles Booth in Saint Andrew's Churchyard also became a listed monument.
The listed buildings in Thringstone are summarised below, complete with brief descriptions given by the Department of the Environment, and further notes provided by TOL Editorial where possible:
Church of St Andrew, Main Street (East Side)Grade Two Listed, SK 4267 1744
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Church. 1862. By James Piers St Aubyn. Leicestershire granite rubble with sandstone dressings and plain tile roof. Early English style with butresses with set-offs. Nave and Chancel in one with east end apse, apse to north-east vestry, transepts and south-west porch. East apse has three lancets, and the vestry apse a single lancet. North vestry door. Transept windows are triple lancets with simple rose above. Lancets to nave sides. West end has two lancets with rose window in gable. Porch (of 1911) has moulded doorway with hood mould and coped gable with finial. Small bellcote on nave roof.
INTERIOR. East lancets have stained glass of 1881 by F A Oldaker of Epsom. Choir Stalls. Three further stained glass windows in the nave of 1917 and 1920 by Kempe and Co. Roof of scissor trusses supported on braces rising from stone corbels and two tiers of purlins with windbraces. Set of benches in nave and simple drum font at west end.
HISTORY. The church was built to serve Thringstone in the parish of Whitwick through the zeal of Rev. Francis Merewether, partly to counteract what he perceived as a Roman Catholic revival in the parish begun by the foundation of Mount Saint Bernard's Abbey (qv), designed by Pugin. St. Andrew's, a well-designed though much smaller building, is in an equally austere style, and also carefully utilises the local granite.
Tomb of Charles Booth
Approx. 12m north of nave of the Church of St.Andrew
Main Street (East Side)
Grade Two Listed, SK 4267 1744
Monument. Aslar. Dated 1916. Low rectangular slab tomb with slightly curving top is set on stepped base. Inlaid inscriptions to Charles Booth, 1840 - 1916, and his wife, Mary Catherine, 1847 - 1939.
Charles Booth was the notable researcher and writer, whose important statistical analysis of the state of the London poor provided the base for the Welfare State. He was made a Privy Councillor in 1904. His wife was a granddaughter of Zachary Macaulay, who worked for the abolition of the slave trade, and a neice of Lord Macaulay, the historian.
The Monument forms a group with the nearby Church of St.Andrew
(qv).
The Old Manor House, Brook Lane (South Side)
Grade Two Listed
Cottage, C17, stone ground floor and brick 1st floor (replacing timber frame, all rough-cast). Plain tile roof (originally thatched), brick end stacks. Two storeys, 2 window range. 2-light casement windows with glazing bars. Door to right-hand side. Reed and plaster floors.
Forest View House, Number 25, The Green (West Side)
Grade Two Listed
House, mid C18, of brick, rendered, with plain tile roof and massive central rendered chimney stack. 3 storeys, 3 window range, 1-1-1, centre projects slightly. Keystones to most windows. C19 sash windows with glazing bars. Blind windows in central part. C20 door.
The Gables, Main Street (East Side)
Grade Two Listed
House, mid C17, extended to W 1682 (dated on plaque). Of Charnwood granite rubble with some brick dressings and plain tile roofs. 2 timber framed gables to S, with brick infill panels. End wall stacks. 2.5 storeys. Extension of 2 storeys, has half-hipped roof. Main range, perpendicular to street, 2 windows wide, extension one window wide but with two windows to street. C20 horizontally-sliding sash windows. Central doorway, blocked. Rear has timber-framed gable with queen post, collar and tie-beam truss.
Lily Bank Farmhouse, Main Street (East Side)
Grade Two Listed
Farmhouse, C17/C18 origin, built in stone with later brick alterations and a gabled bick wing at the rear. Tiled roof. 2 storeys, 3 window range, C20 casements and door. At the rear, the ground storey has some stone work, but part and the upper sorey, is of brick. The gabled wing is entirely of brick and has dentilled brick courses between the soreys and in the gable end, below the ground floor window and above the upper storey window.
Lily Bank Farm Dovecote, Main Street (East Side)
Stable and granary with dovecote, to the rear of Lily Bank Farmhouse
Grade Two Listed
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Small detached building, probably of C18 origin, of brick with plain tiled roof. 2 stalls and a loose box in lower part, some small wood-mullioned windows. The upper part has 3 rows of pigeon holes on two sides and is approached by an external brick stairway.
Other Buildings of Note
Thringstone House and Hall
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Thringstone House is marked on Smith's Inclosure Map of 1807 and is thought to be of mid-eighteenth century origin.
The buiding was formerly a farm dwelling in the occupation of the Hurst family, until it was purchased in March 1901 by Charles Booth of Gracedieu Manor and opened up as a resource for the local community.
Ten years later, in 1911, he engaged his cousin, the architecht Harry Fletcher of London, to add the splendid two storeyed hall to the rear of the premises.
An interesting feature of the hall is 'the tower', a white, louvered ventilation structure saddled at the west end of the roof. Directly below and exposed to this structure is a small room which was purpose-built to house a cinematograph (often referred to as a magic lantern). This device was used to project pictures on to a screen in the main hall through an aperture high up in the wall and would have required a powerful light source (probably a gas burner). At that time the film was made of a highly flammable and noxious nitrate base and good ventilation was essential - hence the tower above.
During recent years the north and south exterior walls of the hall have been reinforced with handsome brick buttresses which, coupled with the effect of the western tower, has from some angles given the building a distinctly ecclesiastical appearance.
(SNB)
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