EASTWELL

 On the outskirts of Ashford, lies the small village of Eastwell. Most of the land is taken up by the medieval Eastwell Manor, once the abode of the local Lord, but now a  posh hotel and spa.

Tucked away down a little known lane in a remote corner of the manorial lands, is a beautiful lake, and the ruins of St. Mary's church.

St Mary’s was once a fine medieval church on an ancient pilgrimage route to Canterbury and the shrine of St Thomas Becket. Situated within the grounds of Eastwell Park, all that remains is a 15th-century tower, a 19th-century mortuary chapel, built to house the romantic monument to Lady Winchelsea, which can now be seen in the Victoria & Albert Museum, and a slender flint wall linking the two.

A picturesque lake created just to the east of the church in the 19th century brought about the collapse of the nave arcade, as the chalk columns sucked up moisture from the earth and crumbled.
In the 1940s, Eastwell Park was taken over by the army for tank training exercises. Shocks from nearby explosions didn’t help the vulnerable structure. But in February 1951, after weeks of heavy rain the nave roof collapsed and took the arcade with it.
Six years later the church was dismantled. The bells were sold for scrap. The monuments found a new home in the V&A. A sad end for this lakeside beauty.

Eastwell Manor and the church have a curious connection to the last Plantagenet king, Richard III...

 

Richard a bricklayer, or Diccon, as he was known locally, has a story that was laid out in a letter written in 1733 by local clergyman Dr. Thomas Brett.

The incumbent of Eastwell Manor at the time, the Earl of Winchelsea, stumbled across the fact whilst researching information on his own family, and those facts concurred with a tale handed down through his family.

Prior to Eastwell Manor being built, the site was occupied by Wilmington Manor, which was gifted by the Duke of Norfolk, before he died at Bosworth Field, to the Moyle family. Wilmington Manor was pulled down to make way for the new house of Eastwell Manor.

When Eastwell Manor was being constructed in the 16th. century, the owner, Sir Thomas Moyle became curious about the chief bricklayer, who, whenever they took a break, would take himself apart from the others and read books in Latin. After much questioning, Diccon told Sir Thomas that he had been raised by a schoolmaster, and that every quarter, a rich man, who always stressed that he was no relative to the boy, would come and pay for his keep and schooling, and see to his general well-being.

When he was about 15, the rich man took him to a 'fine great house', where he was introduced to a great man wearing a Star and Garter. Diccon's descriptions of these men point to them being the Duke of Norfolk (former owner of Wilmington Manor) and King Richard III. The man spoke to him kindly and gave him some money.

Later, he was taken to Bosworth Field in Leicestershire, where he saw Richard again. Richard told Diccon that he was his father, and that on the morrow he would be fighting for his crown, and that if he lost, he would lose his life also. The King said that if he won, he would acknowledge Diccon as his son, but that if he lost, Diccon was to tell nobody who he was, or of this meeting.

Richard had good reason to fear for Diccon's life. He had several illegitimate children, of whom he had acknowledged two, John and Katherine. After the battle of Bosworth Field, Henry VII, the victor, at first treated John well, but then subsequently imprisoned him for a long time before finally executing him.

Diccon apprenticed himself to a bricklayer, but never lost his love of reading and learning. Sir Thomas Moyle was deeply moved and offered him a living and a residence in the big house, but Diccon merely asked permission to build himself a one-room house in a field, where he lived quietly until his death in 1550.

Had Diccon been 16 at the time of Bosworth (1485), he would have been 81 at the time of his death. Quite an old man for those days, but far from impossible, given his good upbringing and the fact that Moyle probably took care of him for his life's duration.

There are further records of both a Plantagenet Well and a Plantagenet Cottage in the Eastwell area, and in the churchyard of St. Mary's is a memorial plaque on a tomb ascribed to Richard Plantagenet

Much has been made of the fact that this tomb probably pre-dates Diccon's death by 50-60 years, and people pooh-pooh the idea that it is indeed his final resting place, saying that it is almost certainly the tomb of Sir Walter Moyle who died circa 1480. I don't disagree...

.....but consider this - Sir Thomas Moyle firmly believed that Diccon was whom he claimed to be,. Therefore, when he died, would have felt a compulsion to honour him in some way. Building an overtly ostentatious tomb for an old bricklayer would have been both inappropriate and risky. There was still a great deal of ill-feeling towards the House of York even 60 years on. So how about a commemorative slab in the side of the local landowner's tomb?

Maybe Diccon is buried alongside the tomb of Sir Walter; it is not entirely inconceivable that his body was placed in the same tomb.

I can hear all the sceptics deriding this tale as hearsay and local myth....................BUT!

in the Eastwell Parish Registers, there is this entry: 'Rychard Plantagenet was buryed on the 22 daye of December 1550'

Scholars and experts have examined the entry, and declared it is not a forgery.

I certainly feel that there is more than sufficient local knowledge and belief to warrant further investigation. Now they have the proven bones of Richard III, if they exhumed a likely body, a DNA connection could easily prove the veracity of this intriguing tale.

Or maybe, it is better to let locals have their mystery, and let sleeping Plantagenets lie

*The ruins are now maintained by the Friends of Friendless Churches, a national charity, both as a place of pilgrimage and a historic monument. It is my place of peace and quiet contemplation.