Brook Farm, Reculver

( 137 ) BROOK FARM, RECULVER. BROOK FARM is in the parish of Reculver, and wiU be found marked on the 1 inch Ordnance Survey Map about threequarters of a mUe south-west of the ruined church of St. Mary. It is approached from the Canterbury-Reculver road, and in the opposite direction from the new coastal road, by a lane remarkable for its primitive surface. The house was anciently of considerable local importance, was caUed Helborough (the modern HUlborough), and belonged at the beghxning of the fourteenth century to Nicholas Tingewike, the last Rector of Reculver, who consented to the conversion of the hving to a vicarage in 1310. He died in 1321, and the house passed to the Pine famUy, one of whom, James de la Pine, was Sheriff of Kent in the twenty-sixth and twenty-seventh years of Edward III. At the beginning of the fifteenth century it was sold to the famUy of Cheyney, who held it untU it was again sold, in the foUowing century, to George Maycot, Esq., son of Anthony Maycot (d. 1532) whose brass remains in Hoath church. George Maycot's son was Sh CavaUiero Maycote, a courtier of some celebrity in the reigns of EUzabeth and James I, who married Mary, daughter of Thomas Monyns of Swanton in Lydden, and died on Christmas Day, 1606. His elaborate monument, of which descriptions exist, was in Reculver church, and perished when the buUding was destroyed in 1809. From Sh CavaUiero the house came into the possession of Sh Christopher CUve, of Copton, near Faversham, who Uved for a time at Zutphen in the Netherlands, where his daughter Zutphania was born. She married John Wood of Faversham, and, dying in 1635, was buried in Faversham church, where a brass commemorating her existed untU the eighteenth century.1 I cannot now find it, but a shield bearing the CUve arms remains at the west end of the nave. 1 Lewis, History and Antiquities of Paversham, 1727, Funeral Monuments, p. 20. 138 BROOK FARM, RECULVER. Sh Christopher CUve conveyed away Helborough to the Contry famUy of Bekesbourne, one of whom, EUzabeth, was his wUe ; and it eventuaUy came into the possession of the famUy of Masters, from whose former house of Brooke, near Ash, it is said to have assumed its present name.1 FinaUy it passed in the eighteenth century to Sh George Oxenden, from whose son, Sh Henry, Mr. CoUard, grandfather of the present owner, acquired the property. The most interesting architectural feature now remaining at Brook is the fine Tudor gateway of moulded brick, the arch in the debased Perpendicular style of the sixteenth century, flanked formerly by two curiously shaped piUars (one is now gone), and surmounted by a pediment and three urn-shaped pinnacles. It is a grand and unusual monument to find in a remote country lane, and its warm dark red colour gives it an added charm.2 The house itseU was furnished by Mr. CoUard with an enthely new front, and he also demohshed the upper storey, so that the only remains of the old buUding are on the ground floor at the rear. An ancient ceUar, now quite outside the house and approached by a stone stahway, appears to be at least in part a reUc of the earUest buUding, but the old brickwork of the house itseU is, Uke the gateway, of the sixteenth century, and is probably to be attributed to the Maycote famUy. A room at the south end has its great hooded brick fireplace stiU intact, and adjoining this on the north remains the haU, with several massive beams in the ceiling, though here the windows are modern, and the fireplace is fiUed with a modern range. Over the fireplace are the arms, in plaster, of King James II. (See Note at foot.) The haU was formerly paneUed, and at another house in the parish are preserved four of the panels, measuring about 12 by 22 inches, each one having painted upon it a shield of arms represented as hanging by a strap from a naU. These 1 Duncombe, Antiquities of Reculver and Heme, 1784, p . 78. 2 The present aspect of the gateway is not in accordance with its builder's intention, since the brickwork seems originally to have been covered with stucco. Photo : Mrs. John Archibald. BROOK FARM, RECULVER. FINITE I. '^ IN BROOK FARM, RF.CITLVER. PLATK II. BROOK FARM, RECULVER. 139 arms, which seem to indicate that the panelling was erected during the period of Sh Christopher CUve's ownership of the house, are : 1.—The Royal arms of England (France modern quartering England). 2.—Argent on a fesse between 3 wolves' heads erased sable 3 molets or (OLIVE). 3.—Argent a fesse and in chief 3 roundels gules (perhaps CONTRY of Bekesbourne). 4.—A shield of six quarterings, viz. : (i) and (vi).—CUve, as above. (U).—Ermine on a bend between 2 cotises gules 3 crescents or (HTJXLEY). (Ui).-—Sable 3 garbs or (STYOHE). (iv).—Gules a Uon rampant or between 3 crosses formy fitchy argent (LONGSLOW). (v).—Quarterly, argent and sable, 4 cocks counterchanged (BROTJGHTON). This elaborate shield displays the arms of the CUve f amUy with theh connexions, and is or was also to be seen on a tomb-slab in GiUingham church commemorating AUee (d. 1610), sister of Sh Christopher CUve, and her husband WiUiam Haward, lord of the manor of Grange in GiUingham.1 The north-country arms take us back to the original home of the CUve famUy in Shropshire, where was born at a later date the great Lord CUve of India. Note.—I gratefuUy acknowledge my indebtedness to Mr. Ralph Griffin, F.S.A., for his interpretation of the shields, which on the original panels are greatly discoloured by age. [This panel, unknown to Mr. Torr, has since been photographed by Mr. T. A. Bennett, of Heme Bay, whose attention had been drawn to the house by Dr. T. A. Bowes. Mr. Sydney Wilson, Local Secretary for Faversham, has been kind enough to send us the photograph with the suggestion that the panel might have originaUy come from Reculver church.—ED. Arch. Cant.] C. R. CoTxsrcER. 1 Arch. Cant., VI, 301.