BADSELL MANOR

In July of the following year Mr Goatley wrote again to the Earl of Westmorland, ‘I had your Lordships letter as to the stone – they will not make limestone but however they are a good help in underpinning the house and barns which would have cost your Honour 10 shillings per loade.’ He goes on to tell of the violent rains over the previous three weeks and the problems getting the harvest in as the hay is under water. Finally he concludes by complaining about the tenant at Tatlingbury who is not paying his rent. 

A year later Thomas Goatley wrote to Mr Browning, a lawyer at Lincolns Inn giving him a breakdown of the land holdings at the Badsell estate. The meadow land was tenanted but the woods, amounting to 157 acres were retained by the Earl. 

By 1771 the bailiff was Rob Brenchley. His record of the rents for that year covering the Badsell estate still exists . The whole estate, which included Ploggs Hall, Mote Farm and Tatlingbury Farm generated an annual rental of £674-19-00. The manor itself was let to a Jonathon Larking for an annual rent of £80-03-00. At the time of the record Larking was a year in arrears with his rent. There is a note showing that the lease was due to expire at Michaelmas 1782. 
Sadly we know nothing more of the occupants of the Manor during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and it is not until 1810 that we have more information. At that time Lord Falmouth’s tenants’ register shows that the property was rented to a Miss Elizabeth Larkin for £152 per annum. 

At some time between 1810 and 1841 an S Southon was shown as a tenant of the manor. A tithe map of the time shows that he rented 168 acres, a mixture of meadow and arable land with a small part being used to grow hops. 

During the mid part of the nineteenth century the house was occupied by the Playfoot family. In 1841 Jeffrey, a 45 year old farmer, was the head of the house and lived there with his wife Ann and seven children. The younger children were all attending school, but the twenty year old eldest boy helped on the farm. Living in with them was a male servant. At this time the land that Jeffrey was farming was mainly arable with 7 acres of hops. Mead was being made and in that year it produced revenue of thirteen pounds twelve shillings. 

Ten years later the whole family were still living at the manor, with all of Jeffrey’s sons working on the farm. Seemingly his offspring had an aversion to marriage. Jeffrey was the local census enumerator for the whole period that he occupied the Manor and proudly made an extra entry in the 1851 census describing himself as ‘Farmer 200 acres employing 13 labourers.’ At this time, as well as two servants living in the manor, there were some lodgers in the outbuildings including a broom merchant living with his wife and baby daughter. Another lodger was a thread and lace merchant who also had a wife and baby daughter living with him. The other occupant was a seventy nine year old traveller called Daniel Norris. Perhaps Jeffrey was kind enough to allow the old man to spend a few nights in a barn while he was passing through the area. 

By 1871 Mr Playfoot had died but his widow Ann continued to farm the land. Living in the house with her were her two unmarried daughters, Mavis and Sarah and three male employees, a W Crayford, a G Wills and a W Hayton. These were all described as ‘Farm, Servant, Indoor’ but being men aged 16 to 28 it is likely that they were simply farm workers. 

Sir Francis Dashwood 

Painting of Badsell Manor around 1907 showing a conservatory at the front