Chapter 11: From 1992 to the Present Day

2011 saw a development resulting from the arrival of Morgan Aitken, who had bought Exmouth Cottage from the Cheevers in 2009, and who did extensive work on the roof of that house. This at last provided me with the opportunity to reinstate the chimneys on that side of Exmouth House, something that I had been planning since 1991 (see chapter 10, above). For this a proper planning application had to be submitted, which was done by Adams John Kennard (no amateurish hand-drawn plans and elevations this time around, in contrast to 1991!) The actual building up of the chimney stacks was done by Morgan’s builder, Dave Tuppenney, who I remember seemed pretty cheap but did a perfectly good job.

View over house from rear

Then, the chimneys were installed, with terracotta caps and a special topping for the one flue which works: this serves the fireplace in the front study and made it possible at last to use that on a regular basis (for the previous few years, I had retreated to the sitting room each winter, where the chimney was more reliable and not subject to down draughts when the wind was in a northerly or easterly direction). The only complication was that the flue turned out to be in very poor condition, as was revealed by a company who became involved called Chimney Care: they put a kind of camera up the chimney, which revealed how the sulphur from coal burnt in the past had eroded mortar from the internal brickwork, and the flue had to be lined with a fibreglass lining, an elaborate and expensive operation.