A
pole was stretched between the two apexes
of the gable ends, & covered with thatch.
One such construction on the Banks survived
into the early 20th century, affection ally
called the “ mud hut"
Later a new type of construction came into
vogue, for the gable ends, this was called
a cruck, consisting of a curved tree trunk,
split down the middle, and opened up to
form an inverted letter "V", with
the tops
Crossing each other like a Red Indian Tepee,
to form a saddle for the ridgepole, and
the walls were made at first in the same
way as before until they were superseded
with an infill of stones and/or early thin
bricks.
The roof was again thatched, and had a steep
pitch so that rain and snow ran off the
roof quickly. A steep pitched roof is a
guide to determining whether a building
is old or not. (Cossington cruck).
As
the yeoman farmers became more prosperous
they began to construct their houses using
timber frames, with an infill of stonework
or brickwork, and by the 17thc Swithland
slates were available, these were used to
replace the thatch, these too required a
steeply pitched roof, as they were heavy,
so a method was devised whereby large thick
slates were used at the eaves, graduated
in size and thickness upward towards the
ridge where they became small and thin,
thus distributing the weight to suit the
roof timbers better.
( Such roofing is still around today, and
is sought after)In the beginning of the
19thc various Fire Insurance companies set
up business, among them the Sun, the County,
and Norwich Union, each issued a plaque
to fix on the front of the property insured,
there is only one such plaque left in Sileby
today, in Barrow Rd, a second one that used
to be fixed above Morris's shop in Brook
St was removed in recent times.
If, as was common with a thatched roof,
a fire did occur, the insurance co was called
out, they collected a horse from the field
or stable or wherever, first having caught
it, they hitched it to their "Heath
Robinson" pump and proceeded to the
fire, if the property bore their company's
plaque and had not finished burning, they
would proceed,if however the property bore
another company's plaque they returned the
horse and appliance from whence they had
fetched them, leaving the fire to burn itself
out.
When the canal system was established two
centuries ago, it was possible to get Welsh
slates, which were much thinner and lighter
than Swithland slates brought cheaply by
barge up the Soar, they were popular because
they were cheaper, and because they allowed
a lower pitch of roof to be used, with less
area to cover.
In 1759 a great change took place in Sileby,
the Patron of the Parish Church Mr William
Pochin, and other yeoman farmers, who had
acquired many strips of land in the open
fields, found it difficult to farm these
strips whilst they were scattered, and not
adjoining, they therefore applied for an
Act of Parliament, for an exchange and redistribution
of the strips, so that they could have the
strips adjoining so that they could enclose
their land with fences and hedges.
The Act was passed by Parliament in 1760,
which allowed this to take place it also
required quick thorn hedges to be planted
round the new "fields", and access
"roads" to them, these "roads"
occasionally became public footpaths. A
sad result of this Act was that many of
the previous small landowners
lost their strips in the open fields and
became destitute, some left Sileby to try
to find work in Leicester.
