Warehouse

ND34SW 100.01 30343 41095.

The remains of this farmstead are situated on a prominent terrace immediately E of the Burn of Warehouse. The steading comprises a farmhouse (YARROWS04 144), which was built in the late 19th century, a long range (YARROWS04 126), and a pile of rubble that represents all that is now visible of the original farmhouse (YARROWS04 295).

The present farmhouse, at the SW end of the steading, is a two-storey building measuring 12.4m from ENE to WSW by 5.8m transversely overall; in its SSE side there is a central doorway and flanking windows at ground-level, and the first floor is lit by two dormers in the stone flag roof. The ground floor contains a kitchen at the ENE end, a parlour at the WSW end, and behind the central stair a small bedroom, lit by a small window on the NNW. In the kitchen there are the remains of a cast-iron range at the centre of the gable wall, and this is flanked on the S by a shelved alcove and on the N by a window. A door in the NW corner of the kitchen leads out into a narrow outshot, which has an external door at its ENE end. In the parlour, which is lined with strip-pine panelling, there is a fireplace containing an iron grate in the centre of the gable. The fireplace is flanked by a window on the N and an alcove on the S, mirroring the pattern seen in the kitchen. The floor-boards in the S part of the kitchen have been removed, revealing that the joists are supported at their ends by low stone-built dwarf walls and at regular intervals along their length by small boulders.

The first floor contains bedrooms at either end, but only that at the WSW end appears to have a fireplace. Between them, on the N side of the landing, there is another small room lit by a skylight. On the S side of the landing there is a large closed void between the roof and the ground-floor vestibule, access to which is gained by way of a door close to the top of the stairs.

The earlier farmhouse (YARROWS04 295), stood 10m to the NE and its site is now marked by a roughly rectangular grass-, nettle- and bracken-grown stony mound measuring 13m from NE to SW by 5.5m transversely and 0.3m in height.

The range (YARROWS04 126), which stands immediately NW of and parallel to the earlier farmhouse, was previously noted as a longhouse (Mercer and Hill 1985, 237, No.100; figs 75 and 88). It measures 35.8m from NE to SW by 5.2m transversely over clay-bonded, roughly coursed rubble walls 0.75m in thickness and 1.95m in height at wall-head level. It contains six compartments, the westernmost of which has been reduced to little more than a stony platform 0.2m in height. The other compartments retain both their gables and mid-gables, and also traces of a turf roof. The second compartment from the SW was a dwelling, with two doorways in its SE wall, which appear to have replaced an earlier, blocked, central entrance. Another doorway in the NW wall is accompanied by a blocked window, and there is a blocked fireplace at each end. The fireplace at the SW end was flanked by cupboards and there are two ambries in the NW wall, one of which has been inserted into the space occupied by the blocked window. In addition, the NW wall contains two blocked cruck-slots, while a doorway at the SE end of the mid-gable provides access to the adjacent compartment on the NE.

This compartment was evidently a byre, as there are two flagstone stalls jutting out from the NW wall, with room for a third to the SW. There is also a window and a door in the SE wall, and another, blocked, door in the centre of the NE mid-gable, which led into the next compartment. The next compartment to the NE can now be entered only by a wide door at the NE end of the SE wall. A pair of opposed cruck-slots survive in the NW and SE walls, and a small drain breaks through the foot of the NW wall, adjacent to the NE corner. Access to the neighbouring compartment on the NE was through a doorway very close to the NE end of the SE wall. In its interior there are two pairs of opposing, blocked cruck-slots measuring 0.8m and 1.1m in length respectively; and the top of the gable at the NE end is raised in turf to a height of 0.8m. The lower part of this gable contains a central ambry. A thin flagstone originating from the wall-head and cut away to take a cruck, now leans against the inner face of the SE wall. An angled slot retaining a timber support for the final phase of the turf roof survives just below the wall-head close to the SW end of the NW wall.

The NE compartment has a doorway at the SW end of its SE side and two windows, one immediately NE of the doorway and the other offset to the SE in the NE gable. In the interior there are single, opposed cruck-slots on the NW and SE.

Both the range and the earlier farmhouse are depicted roofed on the 1st edition of the OS 6-inch map (Caithness 1877, sheet xxix). The Ordnance Survey Name Book (Caithness, No. 6, p.53) describes Warehouse as 'A small farm steading occupied by Mr McKiver, the property of A Sharp Esq. of Clyth'. On the 2nd edition of the map (1907, sheet xxix) the earlier farmhouse is omitted in favour of what was then the recently built, new farmhouse, and the second compartment from the NE end of the range is shown unroofed. A garden, enclosed by a drystone wall, lies on a steep, SW-facing slope 20m SW of the later farmhouse.

(YARROWS04 126, 144, 295)

Visited by RCAHMS (JRS, ATW, PM) 12 May 2004