EDO5372 - Castle Hill House, Bimport, Shaftesbury; desk-based assessment 1998

A desk-based assessment carried out by ASI for architects Howard, Shreeve and Turnbull on behalf of the Signpost Housing Association, in connection with development proposals likely to include demolition of the former clinic buildings and the erection of two blocks of dwellings and a Leonard Cheshire home on traditional strip foundations and terraced formation levels. An engraving reproduced in Hutchins (1803) of a manuscript map of 1615 shows three principal plots on the northern side of Bimport, interpreted as possible medieval burgage plots, sub-divided. The author, having compared the plots with early Ordnance Survey maps, concludes that the present site is located within the south-east street frontage corner of a subdivision of the large plot occupied by the house of a Mr Grove. The map is not particularly detailed but indicates the presence of cottage tenements along the whole street frontage and in rows - presumed to be alongside passages - leading back from Bimport. Upjohn's 1799 survey of the borough (DCRO D1/KL34) shows the same principal plot boundaries as the 1615 map, but Mr Grove's house has been demolished and Castle Hill House established within gardens and yards. The adjacent street frontage has been cleared of tenements, leaving only a short row. The adjoining N-S row along the boundary immediately to the west of the house corresponds to that shown on the 1615 survey. Most of this row seems to have gone by 1817 when a map (DCRO Photocopy 485) shows a single rectangular building towards the rear of the yard. The short row on the street frontage remains, and another small building appears immediately north of the house. The plot boundaries, though somewhat distorted, appear to correspond to present boundaries. The tithe map (DCRO T/SY Shaftesbury composite parishes tithe map, 1845 and apportionment 1846) suggests that the N-S row has been cleared from the site, but the short row on the street frontage remains. The author notes that the earliest evidence suggest that the site backed on to a substantial late medieval building, raising the possibility of an intensification of stratigraphy towards the rear of the site. There is little evidence for subsequent landscaping, and he feels that the present modern buildings constitute the only later disturbances in an otherwise undisturbed plot. Although it is not clear whether the present site represents a complete medieval burgage, he feels that it clearly encompasses the entirety of a late medieval tenement. He concludes that there is potential for survival of deposits pertaining to the middle and later Saxon development of the town, and that the considerable archaeological significance of the site is enhanced by its relatively undisturbed state.