Friends of the Croxley Great Barn
We, the founding sponsors and members (listed below)
seek public support to:
- PROMOTE A SECURE FUTURE FOR THIS FINE 14TH Century STRUCTURE
FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE COMMUNITY.
- SEEK FUNDING SUPPORT FROM STATUTORY/CHARITABLE BODIES.
- ENSURE CONTINUED ACCESS TO AND GIVE CONSIDERATION TO
POSSIBLE PUBLIC USES OF THE BUILDING.
And accordingly invite the people of Croxley Green and all who care for the
survival of this Grade 2* Building.
The Barn: five bay, timber-framed (100x40ft) aisled with crown-post roof (35ft high) was
built during the abbacy of John Moote at St Albans (1396-1401) with some timbers felled
in the winter of 1397/8, at a cost of 100 marks. (Geoffrey Chaucer died in 1400).
Purchased from Gonville and Caius College and then restored in 1975 by Herts County Council
after a long local campaign, it now languishes (some 28 years later) obscurely within the grounds
of a local school.
Dr Martin Bridge of The Institute of Archaeology at UCL spoke of his work in dendrochronology
and also his tree-ring analysis which dated this barn (for English Heritage. Report No 25/2000)
at Croxley Library recently and thereby sparked the revived interest and concern about its present
condition, preservation and future.
SPONSORS: David Brockwell (mbr Croxley Camera Club).Chris Beney (Chair,Bushey &District Footpaths Assoc) Mary Forsyth (mbr HBPT).
Jack Goldenfeld (lecturer West Herts Coll) .David Harding. John Hedges ARIBA (exChair, Parish Council). John Houston BSc,MSc (B.R.E.).
John Kirkham (local artist). Len Leach (aged 90, original campaigner 1963). Ged Mealor (Sec Croxley Gardening Club). Robert Mitchell.
Brian Norman (Chair, Friends of the Green) Barbara Owen (Chair, 3 Rivers Museum Trust).Martin Pinder. Margaret Pomfret (local historian
&former P Councillor). Tony Rawlins (Chair, SWest Herts Archaeol Soc). Ron Prizeman MSc. CEng. Rickmansworth Historical Society
and Sec Ann Vernau. Dr D Wynne-Jones MA (Chair, Friends of Common Moor & P Councillor).
promoting a secure future for this fine fourteenth century structure for the benefit of the community;