NHER 6561 (Monument record) - Remains of Baconsthorpe Castle and Baconsthorpe Hall

Site of Wood Hall Manor. Fortified house ('castle') 1480-6 in three stages. Outer gatehouse, known as The Hall, about 1560. Used as wool factory. Alterations 17th-19th centuries. 16th century barn. Earthworks of formal garden, moat.
Demolished 1654 and material used for Felbrigg Hall.

Licence to crenellate granted 24 November 1561.
Information from (S2).

Pre-1960.
Roman intaglio found.

1953-1954. Excavation of site.
16th century pottery.
The results of this work are summarised in (S7) and (S8).

1972. Further excavation.
Venetian glass vessel.
Medieval metal objects.
See full details in file and (S1).
E. Rose (NLA) 19 October 1995.

2006.
Human bone found in molehill.
E. Rose (NLA), 4 September 2006.

July 2007. Watching Brief.
Several fragments of building material were recovered from shallow holes excavated prior to erection of information panels.
See report (S3) for further details. See also (S4).
The associated archive has been deposited with the Norwich Castle Museum (NWHCM : 2016.45).
A. Cattermole (NLA), 31 October 2007. Amended by P. Watkins (HES), 17 May 2019.

October 2008.
There is now a downloadable audio tour of the site by English Heritage (S5).
See http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/baconsthorpe-castle/audio/
D. Gurney (NLA), 13 October 2008.

Historic building report.
The castle was founded by John Heydon I in c. AD 1450 and was completed by his son Sir Henry in AD 1486. It has only recently been described as a 'castle' rather than 'hall'. The site is an important example of a late medieval quadrangular moated site. The reduced walls which follow the line of the moat have arrow loops, gun ports and turrets. Only the gatehouse survives of the original buildings that existed within the enclosure. The inner gatehouse was used for residential purposes and retains some of its original facing of knapped white flints with the core work of a mixture of flint and brick. The façade has a slight two-storey central advancement which presumably housed a mechanism for the drawbridge and portcullis. It had a tierceron-vaulted gateway of which one bay survives and spacious first and second floor rooms with large fireplaces and two and three light stone mullion windows with arched lights. Sir Christopher Heydon added the outer gatehouse in AD 1551 and part of this survives having been converted into a house in the 17th century. The four-centred carriageway arch survives to the rear elevation and an octagonal turret stands against the east gable-end topped with an ogee dome with little Renaissance blind lunettes. A relatively accurate drawing of the castle exists on one of the two Norfolk Armada maps prepared by Yorke in the 1580s in anticipation of the Spanish Armada is kept at Hatfield House in Hertfordshire.
See (S6) for further information.
S. Howard (NLA), 15 June 2010.