'Riverside', 15 Bridge End Dorchester, Oxfordshire

The Oxford Archaeological Unit carried out an archaeological investigation and recording programme at ‘Riverside’, 15 Bridge End, Dorchester in advance and during renovation works. Although an unlisted building ‘Riverside’ is within Dorchester Conservation Area and is of social and historic interest.
The building is thought to be a squatters cottage, erected on Bridge End Common shortly after 1815 when the bridge crossing the River Thame, immediately to the east of the site, was relocated along with the route of the main road. The building was constructed on land belonging to the Earl of Abingdon and is first shown on the tithe map of 1845 with a circular garden enclosure.
This low-status road side cottage originally had a ‘two-up – two-down’ plan which while tiny by modern standards housed a family of five at the 1841 census. The historic core has been little changed, instead a series of extensions have been added to the east and west. The primary building is of poor quality red brick with some rubble stone and a roof covering of red clay tile on small scantling softwood and reused elm timbers. The plan is the same on the ground and first floors with one front room and one rear room divided by a narrow staircase. In this original building only the ground floor front room was heated, served by an external stack of a typical Dorchester style with staggered brick work from a wide base to a narrow stack. The stack serving the fireplace in the back ground floor room was seen to be a later 20th-century addition.
Evidence was seen during the investigation that suggests the south wall and the southern half of the east wall have been rebuilt, reusing the original materials. The remaining original northern half of the east wall is not keyed into the north wall at first floor level and is visibly spreading eastwards. It is likely the walls were rebuilt following a similar structural failure