This chapter looks at:

Pevsner

The Buildings of England series by Nikolaus Pevsner is the classic architectural guide to buildings in each county. There is a rolling programme of updates – the information does change between editions, so it’s worth checking the previous edition as well as the latest one. The building you’re looking at may be listed in some detail if it’s architecturally significant.

There’s a descriptive gazetteer arranged alphabetically by town/village name. For a major city the buildings are listed within street order and the significant buildings are listed along with:

• A note of when it was built.
• A description of the building.
• Points of interest, such as which architect worked on restoration or alterations.
• A brief historical note (for example, the North-West and South Norfolk edition refers to Nos 1–2 Prospect Terrace in Attleborough; it mentions that the clasped purlin roof was one of the last built in Norfolk).

 

For towns and villages only the significant buildings are listed. Only the larger towns have ‘perambulations’ (i.e. a street-by-street look at the architecture); smaller villages may have references only to a church and one or two buildings that Pevsner and his associates considered worthy of note.

In the case of Mill House in Attleborough, the Pevsner volume on Norfolk containing the town (Norfolk North-West and South) doesn’t mention the building at all.

Victoria County History

The Victoria History of the Counties of England (VCH for short) covers most counties. The series was originally started in 1899 and was dedicated to Queen Victoria, hence the name. The volumes are usually found in the ‘outsize volume’ section of the reference library and have a red cover. The most important section for looking at the history of a building is the topographical section, which deals with the cities, towns and villages within the county in turn and looks at buildings such as almshouses, manor houses and other important buildings. Some of the VCH are available online at British History Online www.british-history.ac.uk/ .

In the case of Mill House in Attleborough, the VCH doesn’t mention the building at all.

Department Of Environment List

Department of Environment lists (i.e. ‘listed buildings’) are published for each local authority area and contain short historical and architectural descriptions of the buildings of historical interest. These lists should be available at your local council planning department, county council offices and most local reference libraries, as well as at the National Monuments Record in Swindon. There are three categories in the list:

• Grade I – buildings of national importance or of exceptional interest.
• Grade II* – particularly important buildings of more than special interest.
• Grade II – buildings of special interest that need preservation – roughly 93% of listed buildings fall into this category.

 

Mill House in Attleborough is not listed as a building of historical interest, despite its age.

Standard Local History

Your local library should be able to advise you where to see a copy of the standard local history for your county. This may contain references to your building, but it depends on how much detail the history contains – you may find that your village, for example, isn’t even mentioned.

The standard local history for Norfolk is the 11-volume work of Francis Blomefield. However, the volume covering the history of Attleborough doesn’t mention Mill House or the mill.

Monographs

Eighteenth- and nineteenth-century gentlemen often wrote monographs – scholarly research on one particular subject, such as a building or a family or bridges within a town. It’s worth checking with your local library to see if there’s a parish history or monograph which might cover the geographical area around your house. Or there may be a short biography of someone who once lived in your property.