Buildings of Interest

Description

Estate villa and attached outbuilding. c. 1840, with minor C20 alterations. Attributed to the Earl of Crawford and Balcarres, for one of the land agents for his Haigh Estate.

Grade II listed in 1999

A little-altered early C19 villa, with much surviving contemporary interior fabric, which formed a component of the Haigh Estate owned by the Earl of Crawford and Balcarres and which stands upon the island of a former moated site, now a Scheduled Ancient Monument.

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At present the island is occupied by an 19th century house, which is a Listed Building Grade II, with a small cellar and outbuildings to the north. Although there is no documentary evidence of the original occupation, the island was the site of a medieval hall 

The moat is now dry and preserved as a garden feature. It is square with each side measuring 50m on the outside. The sides are stone lined to a depth of 0.75m and on average the moat is 1.5m deep and 8m wide. Material thrown up by the excavation of the moat appears to have been placed to the south to build up the side of the watercourse into a shallow dam.
On the southern corner of the east side there is a causewayed entrance to take service traffic. This is not original. On the north side, almost in the centre, there are the remains of a stone bridge beneath the outbuilding which lies over the moat. This may represent the original approach to the island.The house and its outbuildings are excluded from the scheduling, although the ground beneath them is included.

Source Ancientmonumentsuk

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Comment by Alison Margaret:

My family lived at Moat House Haigh from1948 until the late 1970s. I always understand that it was the dower house to Haigh Hall and that Haighlands was the land agents house.

Comment by Vicky Postill

I know of is that originally part of the Haigh estate, the house was home in the 1800’s to James Wood a land agent for The Earl of Crawford, I’m not sure if it is one of his children Annie Wood or a sibling who etched her name in the window and the date that can be seen, she married Maskell Peace and they eventually I believe lived at Ashfield House.

There have been others but one other occupant in the late 1800’s was John Edmond who was the chief librarian for the Earl involved in the famous collection the Bibliotheca Lindesiana.

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Black & White images provided by Vicky Postill