FARMINGTON — The cause of a fast-moving fire that destroyed a large 1840 brick home, barn, car and separate garage at 423 Knowlton Corner Road on Monday afternoon is undetermined due to the extensive damage, State Fire Marshal investigator Edward Hastings said.

The owner of the home, Joy Warren, and an upstairs tenant, Sharon Rodriguez, were home at the time the fire began. Both received minor injuries as they left the burning structure, he said. Warren hurt the back of her leg and Rodriguez injured a thumb and had singed hair on her arms, he said.

A third resident, Warren’s daughter, Crystal, was at work. A mobile home behind the house where Warren’s son, Mike, lived was also damaged heavily by the fire. The heat was intense, he said.

The fire started in the kitchen/entryway and spread through to the barn and across the driveway to a small detached garage, he said.

Warren who sat and watched the fire from a firefighter’s truck said two bikers passing by stopped and helped her get out of the house. She didn’t know where they came from. She said she had recently had knee surgery and it would have been difficult if they hadn’t helped her, she said.

Three dogs and multiple cats lived at the residence. A few cats have been found, Hastings said, but Warren believed her dogs headed for the kitchen.

Warren said she heard a noise from upstairs and thought it was the tenant but when she went into the kitchen, she found flames and called for the Fire Department shortly after 1:30 p.m.

“Everything’s gone,” she cried. She said she was hoping that the garage, where she was storing items to take to Farmington Fair next week, could at least be saved. Her son then came up to the truck to tell her that it had also caught on fire.

Hastings estimated the damage to be around $200,000 although it would cost more to replace it, he said.

Warren had no insurance on any of the property because she couldn’t afford it any longer with taxes going up, she said.

The Red Cross was at the scene helping the family find lodging for the night, Hastings said.

Crews were still on the scene shortly after 7 p.m., he said. Thirteen fire departments were called to fight the intense fire and haul water. A town backhoe was brought in to help cover and put out hot spots, he said.

A strong, southerly breeze sent embers and heavy, dark, thick smoke throughout the neighborhood as the fire swiftly brought the large barn down.

A Forest Ranger was called to the scene but Hastings was unsure whether there was a problem with a fire developing in the wooded area or just a fear that it would.

The house, known as the Grounder homestead, appears to have been built in 1840 by a Benjamin Lowell who built carriages in the shop, said local historian Paul Mills. Mills checked on the property in a history written in 1973 by Ben and Natalie Butler, “The Red Schoolhouse Neighborhood.”

Lowell sold the property to Napoleon and Peter Grounder and there appears to have been four generations of Grounders who owned the property prior to the sale of the large brick home to Warren about 25 years ago.

The Red Schoolhouse formerly on Route 2 was at the Farmington end of the Knowlton Corner Road.

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With firefighters in the foreground, a farmhouse and barn burn in Farmington on Monday afternoon.