Whitewalls Restaurant, 39 Hatlex Lane, Hest Bank, Lancashire: Archaeological Desk-Based Assessment

Following the submission of planning applications for the conversion of the former Whitewalls Restaurant into two dwellings and the construction of a new dwelling on land to the east, the local planning authority requested the submission of a Heritage Statement. The building is Listed Grade II and as such statutorily protected and the Heritage Statement assesses the impact of the proposed development on it. Whitewalls Restaurant was formerly Hatlex House and had an associated farm. Hatlex is recorded as early as the 13th century as part of land initially granted to Furness Abbey, and in the late 17th century it became the home of the Stout family, a notable local family whose life is well recorded in the autobiography of William Stout. It subsequently passed through their family before being sold at auction to the Hall family in 1828 but was sold again in 1894. The site was evidently well developed by the early 19th century and comprised at least three dwellings plus farm buildings by 1828. The map evidence shows that it continued to increase in size during the later 19th century although it lost one barn to a fire in 1906 and another in a second fire in the late 1960s. By the later 20th century the area around it had become heavily developed. The desk-based assessment revealed that the site has some potential for below-ground archaeological remains, and also that the standing building has the potential to contain earlier elements of historic fabric.

The full report is available on the Archaeology Data Service website: https://archaeologydataservice.ac.uk/archiveDS/archiveDownload?t=arch-700-1/dissemination/pdf/greenlan1-102484_1.pdf