History of Madeley / including Ironbridge, Coalbrookdale, and Coalport

by John Randall

“Robert Brooke Miles married three wives; one, Anne, d. and heir of Michael Warringe de Salop. He died 1558.

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John B. died 1598, aged 60. + Anne, d. of Francis Shirley, of Staniton, co. Leicester.

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Sir Basil Brooke Miles, 1623, died 1646. + Etheldreda, d. and sole heir of Edmund Boudendil.”

Sir Basil was one of the sporting friends whom Giffard of Chillington drew around him at his housewarming on the border of Brewood Forest, a house which subsequently gave shelter to the Earl of Derby and King Charles the First. It was built nominally as a hunting-seat, but really for purposes of concealment; and the site on the bolder of two counties, deep in the recesses of woods, traversed by no public roads, was exceedingly suitable. It is said that on the completion of the building the owner invited a few friends to dinner, to celebrate the occasion, and amongst them Sir Basil Brooke, of the Court House, Madeley, who had recently returned from Italy, and who on being requested by his host to supply a name for the place, suggested Boscobel, or Bos co Bello; and this was considered so appropriate, from the prospect it commanded of the beautiful woods around, that it is said to have been at once adopted.

It will be seen from what we have previously stated that the family of Brooke continued to reside at Madeley till 1706, when, according to the benefaction-table in the church, Basil Brooke by will bequeathed the sum of £40, and for a further sum of £30, paid him by Audley Bowdler and eight other parties, sold three several cottages or tenements, with gardens and yards, at Madeley Wood, for the use of the poor. [40]

The next tenant of the Court appears to have been the first Abraham Darby, for we find that he died there, after which time we find no tenants of more importance than the Purtons and the Triggers, who were farmers, and held the land around.

Thus early, even in Madeley, did the great owners of the soil—who merely tilled the surface, and scarcely that—give place to miners and ironmakers who knew how to win wealth from beneath.

With regard to this fine old mansion itself, having about it the symbols of ancient and distinguished Shropshire families, and associated at still earlier periods with the history of the wealthy monastery of St. Milburgh, it is fast going to decay. The last of the long and distinguished line of Wenlock priors lived and died here, as did the first great Shropshire ironmaster, the first Abraham Darby, afterwards, and one almost regrets that the wish of the late James Foster, who purchased the property, to repair and restore it, was not carried out. The temptation to get the mines underneath it, however, proved too strong: the whole has been undermined, and from attacks below and above, with all the usual elements of decay at work, must ere long disappear, rich as it is in associations of the past.

It is one of that class of buildings the country can ill afford to spare, for it speaks not to the antiquarian or the historian merely, but to all who take an interest in the manners, customs, and domestic arrangements of the past. It is difficult to say which are the original portions, but the vaults and cellaring, and some other parts appear to have belonged to a building which has undergone many changes. The windows, walls, and doorways of that portion of the building occupied by Mr. Round, and the substantial foundations that gentleman found beneath the surface in cutting a drain in the same direction, with a well 15 yards deep, indicate pretty clearly an extension of the buildings formerly on that side.

On going inside, and descending a spiral stone staircase to the basement story of the building, visitors will have opportunities of seeing how substantially the walls are built. They are a yard and a half in thickness, and have narrow openings, each growing narrower towards the outside, every two converging towards a point similar to what the reader has witnessed in many a fortress of byegone times, and designed no doubt for the same purpose, for defence. This staircase did not then as now terminate in what was the large hall, but in the adjoining apartment, now used as a brewhouse. The partition, too, which shuts off the entrance to another pair of stairs near the coat of arms on the north did not exist, nor the stairs either. The room is now 38½ feet long; then it would be 40, by 22 feet wide, and 14 feet high. Beneath these arms, on a daias, probably, the head of the house would sit dispensing hospitality. The chief staircase was near the other end of the hall, and composed of immense blocks of solid oak. The spiral stone staircase from the base of the building to the chapel at the top of the house was for the use, it is supposed, either of the dependents or the officiating priest. A further examination of the arms on the ceiling and a comparison with those in other parts of the building show them to be those of the Brooke family. An oak screen divides the chapel, which is wainscoted to the ceiling with oak. On the eastern side of this screen is a piscina, which has been cut out of the solid brickwork, and which at a subsequent period must have been concealed by the wainscoating. In the western division, behind the wainscoating, is a secret chamber, a yard square; probably for concealment in times of danger. It is communicated with by a panel in the wainscoat just large enough to admit a man, who, once inside, had the means of bolting and barring himself in behind the oak panel, which would look in no respect different to the others. This is called king Charles’s hole, but there is no evidence or well-founded tradition that he occupied it. There are a number of other curious nooks and small chambers which might have served purposes of concealment in troubled times, and probably did so, when the votaries of the two dominant religions, fired with a zeal inspired by their positions, alternately persecuted each other, as in the times of James, Mary, and Elizabeth. It is an error however, and one which Harrison Ainsworth among others appears to have fallen into, to suppose that the unfortunate king Charles either came to the Court House or was secreted in it. It is probable enough that, from the well known loyalty of the owner, the house would be searched by the Parliamentarians for the king, and the fact that they were likely to do so would lead to more discretion in selecting a place of concealment. The fine old wainscoating is falling from the rooms, and the whole place presents a scene of utter desolation.

From the upper portion of the building a pit, said to be without a bottom, and leading to a subterranean passage to Buildwas Abbey, may be seen. There is of course no ground for either tradition: a house which belonged to the priors of Wenlock would want no communication with a rival monastery, which was looked upon with jealousy, and the more abstemious habits of the inmates of which were in some measure a reflection upon their own. The pit or well has no bottom, inasmuch as it slants when it gets below the building in the direction of the pool in which it terminates.

Outside the building are some of the grotesque, nondescript stone figures which builders of the Gothic age indulged in. On this side, too, is a handsome stone porch, which, like some other portions of the same building is more modern than others. The gate-house, like the porch, is both more modern, and more Elizabethan than the other. It is a well-proportioned and beautiful building, exciting the admiration of all who see it. It possesses several heraldic embellishments, relating to the Brooke family.