Herefordshire - Part 6: Brockhampton

We left the caravan just before noon on the Friday and drove to NT Brockhampton where I had pre-booked tickets as I had read you could pick your own apples and damsons and I do love damson jam.

You could pick as many damsons as you liked for £5 and we were given a large brown paper bag to collect them. Sadly, although you could buy apples ready picked you couldn't pick your own that day.

We managed to collect around 3.25 kilograms of damsons.

Note E had commandeered my jacket as she hadn't brought her own!

Brockhampton is a traditionally farmed estate of 1700 acres with a medieval moated manor house.

There is evidence that there was a settlement at Brockhampton since at least the Domesday Book of 1086.  The estate was named after the original owners - the Brockhampton family who built the chapel now in ruins.

The estate was sold to the Domultons or Dumbletons and they built the manor in 1380/1400 using timber grown on the estate.  John Dumbleton had no sons so the estate passed to his daughter Mary who took her husband's name of Barneby and the manor remained in the same family for 400 years.  

After this time Little Brockhampton manor was occupied by tenants as a farmhouse. Having little money it was never modernised or changed.  John Habington Lutley (member of the Barneby family) inherited in the 1860's and he restored the manor to its former glory having consulted the antiquarian architect J C Buckler.  The last of the line, Colonel John Talbot Lutley, bequeathed the estate to the National Trust in 1946.

The manor has been limewashed to help preserve the old timbers. Neither the Manor or Gatehouse are open at the moment.

The Gatehouse was probably built as a symbol of wealth rather than constructed for defensive purposes.

It was built for the Habingtons in 1543 and it is believed that beween 1559 and 1791 it was used for illegal Catholic masses.  Double V's are burnt into the wood - a symbol of the Virgin Mary. Also I seem to remember they were used as witch protection marks.

The Chapel in Ruins

The original chapel was built mostly from timber and daub. The stone building was probably built for John Dumbleton at the same time as the manor house.  The chapel, as was the moat and gatehouse, was another status symbol to show off the family's wealth.  It is thought it was no longer used when the new church at the upper part of the estate was built.  It remained in a usable state though until 1845 after which it became over-run with wild plants.

Brockhampton is another place we shall be returning to regularly. There are quite a few different walking trails although not all are open at the moment.

We arived home mid afternoon although we are discovering Friday afternoons are not the best time for travelling motorway wise!

I made a Damson Cobbler on Saturday with some of the damsons which was really delicious.

Unfortunately I couldn't make the jam until Monday as I hadn't got enough granulated sugar until the online shopping delivery had arrived and by then quite a few of the damsons had gone a trifle mouldy so I failed to make as much jam as I expected!  On top of that I tried to remove the stones once the damson were cooked and seemed to lose even more weight then!  To crown it all the perishing thermometer decided to stop working two degrees below setting point i.e. a crucial moment. I shoved a saucer in the freezer and tried the wrinkle test and it didn't look set. By this time the thermometer was working again and showed I was two degrees over setting point!  Anyway at least I managed to make one kilner jar of jam and, although it is a little overset, it is at least edible!

Damson Cobbler

All photos taken by me with the Panasonic Lumix FZ330 bridge camera.

I hope everyone is staying safe and well.