The Skirts of the Great City

by N. D'Anvers

On Keston Common, in a spring known as Cæsar's Well, rises the Ravensbourne, which widens close by into a series of ponds overshadowed by venerable trees, and near to them, within the grounds of Holwood House, are the remains of a Roman camp in which, according to some authorities, Aulus Plautius awaited the coming of the Emperor Claudius to receive the homage of the conquered Britons. Whether there be any foundation for this belief or not, there appears at one time to have been an important Roman settlement on Holwood Hill, a complete villa, the foundations of a temple, and many bricks and tiles having been unearthed at different times. Keston is, however, now chiefly celebrated for its connection with William Pitt, who lived for many years in a house that occupied the site of the present mansion in Holwood Park. Even when still a child living on his father's estate at Hayes, Pitt longed, as he often told his friends, 'to call the wood of Holwood his own,' and great was his delight when, in 1785, two years after he became Prime Minister, he was able to purchase it. The table at which he used to write is still preserved in Holwood House, and the park was laid out by him. Many of its trees were planted by his own hand, and others, already venerable when he became their owner, are associated with interesting incidents of his career. One noble wide-spreading oak near the chief entrance to the park is specially revered, because of the tradition that Pitt and William Wilberforce were seated beneath it when they arranged the opening of the campaign against slavery, a fact commemorated by a quotation from one of the latter's letters that is cut in the back of a stone seat marking their resting-place, placed in position by Lord Stanhope in 1862. 'I well remember,' said the philanthropist, 'after a conversation with Mr. Pitt, in the open air, on the root of an old tree at Holwood, just above the steep descent into the vale of Keston, I resolved to give notice, on a fit occasion, to bring forward the abolition of the slave-trade.' The important meeting probably took place in 1787, and Wilberforce was often at Holwood House during the first few of the nineteen years' struggle thus inaugurated, finding distraction from his ever accumulating worries in aiding his host in his amateur woodcraft. In his diary for April 7, 1790, for instance, he records how he sallied forth with Pitt and Grenville, then Speaker of the House of Commons, 'armed with bill-hooks, cutting new walks from one large tree to another through the thickets,' neither of them dreaming how soon the beautiful estate would cease to belong to their host who, a little later, was compelled to part with it. It was sold for £15,000, a very large sum for those days, and, after changing hands more than once, was bought by a Mr. John Ward, who, with little respect for its memories, pulled down the old house to make room for an ornate villa in the Italian style, and cleared away much of the woods that had been the Prime Minister's especial pride.

West Wickham

Though not quite so picturesquely situated as Keston, the neighbouring villages of Farnborough and Downe—the former associated with the name of Sir John Lubbock, who lived for some years at High Elms, the latter with that of Charles Darwin, who long resided at Downe House—have something of its quiet charm. West Wickham, too, though it has unfortunately recently been discovered by the jerry-builder, is still a pretty place, the older cottages and farms clustering about Wickham Court, erected on the site of the original manor-house in the reign of Edward III. by Sir Henry Heydon, but almost entirely rebuilt in the time of Henry VIII. The Heydons were near relations of Anne Boleyn, who is said to have passed some of her happiest days at Wickham Court when her royal suitor was courting her, a tradition confirmed by the true-lovers' knot in which her initials and Henry's are intertwined, engraved on one of the windows in the dining-hall. Very often, probably, the enamoured pair paced to and fro on the smooth bowling-green or on the long grass walk, still known as Anne Boleyn's, between the dense yew hedges, that remain unchanged to this day. Sometimes, too, it is related, the fair Anne would await the coming of her lover in a little Gothic tower, to which a subterranean corridor gave access, and the two may possibly have explored together the secret passages that led beneath the grounds of the mansion to Hayes Common and elsewhere. A new entrance was made to Wickham Court by Sir Charles Farnaby, the ancestor of the present owner, but the rest of the house is much what it was when completed in the sixteenth century, and is a fine example of Tudor domestic architecture. The massive oaken door, with its huge iron bolt, may be the very one that was so often flung open to admit the guests of the Heydons, including Henry VIII. and Anne Boleyn, to pass through to the banquets held in the great hall. It bears the marks of many a siege, and must have received very rough usage in the troublous times of the Stuarts, when the gloomy dungeon beneath the north-west turret served sometimes as a prison to the enemies, sometimes as a hiding-place to the friends of the owner of the property.

The church of West Wickham, which, with the creeper-clad turrets and chimneys of the court form a charming group when seen from a distance, was rebuilt at the same time as the latter by Sir Henry Heydon, and owns some fine sixteenth-century windows, including one representing scenes from the legend of St. Catherine. There are also some well-preserved monuments and brasses in the nave and chancel, and in the churchyard, entered by an ancient lych gate, with a tiled roof, are some interesting old tombs.

In a wood not far from West Wickham is the grand old hollow oak painted by Millais as the hiding-place of his 'Proscribed Royalist,' and the village itself is associated with the memory of many other famous men. Before Lord Chatham bought the mansion at Hayes in which his celebrated son was born, he lived for some years at South Lodge, and in a smaller house dwelt the Latin chronicler Gilbert West, who was often visited in his retreat by William Pitt the younger, Lord Lyttelton, and the eccentric merchant poet Richard Glover.

Addington

Another ancient and still picturesque village of Surrey is the beautifully situated Addington, the name of which is supposed to signify the town of the Edings, though who these Edings were history does not say. The manor is referred to in Doomsday Book as being held under the king by Tezelm, a cook in the royal service, and from that time to the accession of George III. the owners of the property were bound to observe the quaint custom of preparing a dish, or providing a substitute to do so, for the monarch's consumption on the day of his coronation. The last time the strange ceremony was performed was in 1760, when Mr. Spencer, then lord of the manor, presented to the newly crowned monarch a dish of pottage made according to an ancient recipe, and containing an extraordinary number of ingredients.

Early in the fifteenth century a manor-house that was more of a stronghold than a private home, was erected at Addington, on what is still known as Castle Hill, but it was pulled down in 1780 and replaced by a less ambitious building on another site, that later became a summer residence of the Archbishops of Canterbury, to whom the property passed by purchase in 1807. With the chapel and library, added in 1830, it now presents a very dignified appearance, and is surrounded by a beautiful park.

The parish church of Addington, though it has been much modified by restoration, retains a fine Norman arch dividing the nave from the chancel, some early Gothic arcades and three very ancient windows, with a good modern one to the memory of Archbishop Tait, who with his wife and one of his sons lie buried in the churchyard, close to Archbishop Longley. In the chancel are some quaint old monuments, notably one to some members of the Leigh family, and several interesting brasses, including that to the memory of Thomas Hatteclyff, who was one of the Masters of the Household of Henry VIII., and died in 1540.

There is little very distinctive about the modern village of Addington, though it retains a few quaint old cottages, and is celebrated for its inhabitants' love of flowers. It is, however, set down in very beautiful scenery, that seems likely long to remain unspoiled. Within easy reach of it and of Croydon, the former residence of the Archbishops of Canterbury, are several other pretty villages and hamlets, including Shirley, with a good modern church, finely situated on the edge of a breezy common; Woodside, that is rapidly losing its rural character through its proximity to the racecourse and railway; and Addiscombe, once famous for a fine old mansion, long the residence of Lord Liverpool, which was pulled down in 1863. When Lord Liverpool, who became Prime Minister in 1809, was at Addiscombe, his predecessor in that office, William Pitt, was often his guest, and the story goes that on one occasion the latter had a narrow escape from sudden death, for he and a party of politicians, who had been dining with the Tory statesman, dashed through the turnpike gates, without paying the toll. The keeper, supposing them to be highwaymen, fired his blunderbuss at the offenders, but with such bad aim that no one was hurt—somewhat, it was rumoured at the time, to the regret of Pitt's many enemies, who would gladly have heard of his removal from their path.