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The Colkyns of Esol in Nonington-the final years.
The following is the last section of a larger article “The Knight’s Fee of Essewelle: Wischards, Hotots, and Colkyns at the Manors of Esol and Freydevill’-revised 14.08.19”, which recently reviewed information and further thought has made it necessary to revise. I have posted these revisions as a self contained post for the benefit of readers.
The Colkyns at Essewelle-the final years.
John Colkyn (2), held property at Freydvill’, Esol and Nonyngton during the early 1300’s until his death, the exact date which is not known, but it is believed to have been between 1316 and 1326. The Nonyngton property would have been in the North and South Nonington manors of the Manor of Wingham.
The heir to John Colkyn (2) was his son, another John Colkyn (3), who was in his minority when he inherited his father’s property. As a minor inheriting property held from an over-lord John (3) became a ward of his over-lord. However, at the time John’s over-lord, Geoffrey de Say was also a minor and accordingly a ward of the Crown.
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In 1315 Sir Henry Beaufuiz [Beaufitz, Beaufiz], a King’s Justice, purchased by enrolment of grant a messuage and 25 acres in Esewele from Walter atte Bergh [Walter Abarowe] who had inherited the property from family members. The exact location of this messuage is at present not certain, but it would have made Sir Henry a near neighbour of the Colkyns at their Esol manor house.
After the death of John Colkyn (2) Sir Henry appears to have acquired the wardship of the minor John Colkyn, which meant that Sir Henry had control of John’s property until he came of age. At this time Sir Henry was owed a considerable amount of money by King Edward II in connection with Sir Henry’s military service in the King’s ill fated Scottish campaigns, and so most likely received the young John Colkyn’s wardship as part payment of these debts.
Sir Henry died in 1325 but John Colkyn (3) did not have his property returned to him until Sir Henry’s executors were ordered to do so by King Edward III in February of 1337 [1338] when John proved he had reached his majority, indicating that he had been born around 1316. The property returned was a messuage and a carucate of land held in his demesne [the land retained on a manor by the lord of the manor for his own use] in Freydevill, Esole and Nunynton and held as of fee from Geoffrey de Say by the service of a moiety of a knight’s fee, possibly the same moiety [three parts of the whole] referred to in the sale of moiety of Essewell to Roger de Kennardington in the early 1240’s.
If the messuage and land held in desmesne by John Colkyn were the same as that later held by Sir John de Beauchamp at Esol, then this would have amounted to around 136 or so acres. Sir John presumably held the messuage and land previously held by the Colkyns, but not the knight’s fee of Essewelle or manorial rights at Esol. After the Colkyns tenure ended the knight’s fee of Essewelle had reverted back to the Barony of Say and the manorial rights were held by the Abbot of St. Alban’s.
The year after Sir Henry’s death Alice, his daughter and sole heiress, and her husband Sir William de Plumpton, a Yorkshire knight, sold “2 messuages, 90 acres of land, 70s. rent, and rent of 2 cocks, 20 hens, and 200 eggs, with appurtenences in Nonynton” to Richard de Retlyng (1), these were presumably her father’s Esewele property with another messuage, an additional 65 acres of land, and what appears to be a part of the knight’s fee of Essewelle yielding manorial rents and dues. Sir Henry appears to have acquired a part of the Manor of Esol’s moiety of Essewelle, but unfortunately there is at present no known record of any such transaction.
Some twenty years later Richard (2), son of Richard de Retlyng, (1) was recorded as being one of several people responsible for payments owed for the Essewelle fee in the Eastry Hundred Rolls of 1346. This responsibility appears to accrue from the 1326 purchase made by the elder Richard de Retlyng.
Richard de Retlyng (1) [who should not to be confused with Sir Richard de Retlyn(g) of Retlyng/Ratling Manor, a kinsman but not directly connected to the following events] was a trusted servant of the Crown and served Edward II and Edward III from the 1320’s until his death around 1349. Royal service was well rewarded and Richard’s Post Mortem Inquiry records holdings in “Staple; Nonyngton; Kyngeston [Kingston]; Berfraiston [Barfreston], and Godwyneston juxta Wyngeham [Goodnestone-next-Wingham]”.
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John Colkyn (3) died shortly after regaining possession of his inheritance, his Post Mortem Inquiry was held in September of 1338 and recorded holdings in “Frydewill, Esole, Nunyngton”. He appears to have been only 22 or so when he died and left as his heir John Colkyn (4), who must therefore have been an infant or very young child when he inherited the holdings at Freydevill, Esole and Nunynton from his father.
The 1346 Eastry Hundred Rolls record that John (4), son of John Colkyn (3); the Abbot of St. Alban’s; Edmund de Acholt; Richard (2), son of Richard de Retlyng(1); and their co-owners [parceners] as being responsible for the fee that John Colkyn (3) had held at Esoll and Freydevill from Geoffrey de Say for 40s (£2) annually.
[De Johanne filio Johannis Colkyn, abbate de Sancto Albano, Edmundo de Acholt, Ricardo filio Ricardi de Retlyng, et parcenariis suis, pro j. f. quod Johannes Colkyn tenuit apud Esol et Freydevill de Galfrido de Say – xl. s.].
Richard de Retlyng’s (2) father’s 1326 purchase from Alice de Plumpton of: “70s.[£3.50] rent, and rent of 2 cocks, 20 hens, and 200 eggs, with appurtenences in Nonynton” appears to be what made Richard de Retlyng (2) one of the four joint holders of the Knight’s Fee of Essewelle previously in the sole possession of the Colkyn family. The Abbot of St. Alban’s, Edmund de Acholt and the other unknown “parceners” also seem to have acquired a part of the fee either before or after the death of John Colkyn [3] in late 1338.
The property returned to John Colkyn [3] in 1338 was recorded as being a messuage and a carucate of land held in his demesne [the land retained on a manor by the lord of the manor for his own use] in Freydevill, Esole and Nunynton. However, there is no mention of the knight’s fee of Essewelle or the manors of Esol and Fredvill’, so there is no indication as to how much of the knight’s fee or what manorial rights and revenues he still retained.
John Colkyn [4] was the last Colkyn male to hold the knight’s fee of Essewelle. Why the family actually gave up the knight’s fee is, at present, a matter for speculation. Possibly the infant inheritor died from one of the many diseases then fatal to an infant, or perhaps the young Colkyn heir may have been one of the tens of thousands of victims of the Black Death which swept through England between 1348 and 1450 with sporadic outbreaks continuing into the 1360’s, and his heirs decided that in the aftermath of the Black Death that the knight’s fee, manors of Fredvill’ and Esol, and the Esol messuage and land were no longer of any financial or other benefit? Another possibility is that the infant heir lived on and that his guardians had come to the same decision and sold up to give the young John some financial security.
![The Black Death killed up to a half of the population of England in the late 1340's.](https://i0.wp.com/www.nonington.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/Black-death.jpg?resize=960%2C636)
The Black Death killed between one third and a half of the population of England and as a result of this high mortality land was readily available, but the returns from agriculture were greatly diminished as the cost of employing a now scarce labour force rapidly increased and the market for agricultural produce correspondingly shrank. To counteract this state of affairs the Statute of Labourers was passed in 1351 in an effort to stop labourers taking advantage of the shortage of workers and demanding more money. The statute forced them to work for the same wages as before the Black Death and allowed landowners to insist on labour services being performed instead of accepting money (commutation) in lieu of service. Landowners accordingly profited from the food shortages, whilst the labourers standard of living declined due to substantial increases in the price of basic food stuffs such as bread and ale. A consequence of the shortage of labour was that much of the land previously used in food production was used to rear sheep as wool became more profitable, especially when shipped to Continental markets.
There were potential heirs to the infant John Colkyn’s property living close by. Thomas Colkyn, the infant John’s paternal uncle, lived nearby at Ratling until at least 1345, when he sold land in Nonington to Thomas de Retlyngge, although it is possible Thomas predeceased the infant John.
However, there are indications that Thomas Colkyn and his wife, Alma, themselves had heirs. There there are records of “Isabella filia de Retling de Nonington”, the daughter of Richard de Retling “by the daughter and heir of Colkin” marrying “Johannes Oxenden de Wingham” later in the century.
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When the Colkyns gave up possession of the knight’s fee of Essewelle, apparently after 1346 but before the early to mid-1350’s, it reverted back to the Barony of Say, as did the manor of Freydevill. These facts are known as at some time prior to 1356 Sir Geoffrey de Say, Lord Say, awarded a lifetime interest in the manor of Freydvill’ to Sir John Harleston, with the interest to revert to the de Says or their heirs when Sir John died. This award of a lifetime interest could not have been made unless the manor of Fredvill’ had been in exclusive possession of Sir Geoffrey de Say, so it must have therefore reverted to him by the time of the award. After the death of Sir Geoffrey de Say in 1360 the knight’s fee of Essewelle and the manor of Fredville remained in the possession of his heirs until five-sixths of the manor of Fredville was sold by various inheritors to John Quadryng, a London mercer, in the early 1400’s.
It is therefore possible that the Colkyns retained possession of the Manor of Freydvill’, perhaps until just before 1356, but that possession of the Manor of Esol had at sometime previously, been transferred to other people, possibly commencing in the early 1320’s when Sir Henry de Beaufuiz had the wardship of John Colkyn [III] and appears to have obtained manorial rights and rents of “70s. rent, and rent of 2 cocks, 20 hens, and 200 eggs, with appurtenences in Nonynton” which were sold after his death in 1326 by Alice de Plumpton, his daughter and heiress, to Richard de Retlyng the Elder.
If this were so, then it would explain the divided ownership referred to above in the Eastry Hundred Rolls of 1346. The most likely scenario is that the Colkyns retained ownership of the entirety of the manor of Freydevill and its rights and revenues, and that at some time after the death of John Colkyn [3] the ownership of the manor of Esol and its rights and revenues was further divided by sale or other means between the Abbot of St. Alban’s; who held the majority share; Edmund de Acholt; and other lesser holders, with Richard de Retlyng the Younger already holding a portion obtained in 1326.
The Colkyns of Essewelle and Esol, or their heirs, must also have sold or in other ways transferred ownership of the messuage and lands pertaining to Esol at some time between 1338 and 1349 as the the Abbey of St. Alban’s manorial rent roll for Esol for 1349 confirms that the Abbot then held the manorial rights and rents for the manor of Esol, and that messuage and land that John Colkyn [4] had inherited from his father in 1338 was in the possession of Sir John de Beauchamp, who accordingly paid the manorial rents due to the Abbot as Lord of the Manor of Esol.
Whatever ended of the Colkyns tenure of Essewelle and its constituent manors of Esol and Fredvill’, the Abbot of St. Alban’s Abbey obviously thought that the Manor of Esol, along with its revenues and rights, was worth acquiring. This may well have been because it was contiguous with the Abbey’s own Manor of Eswalt and also had the added financial benefit that its manorial rents and dues had to be paid whether agriculture for the manorial tenants was profitable or not and therefore guaranteed a known annual revenue stream.
Sir John de Beauchamp must also have thought that the messuage and land at Esol was a good prospect, most likely due to its location near to the ports of Sandwich and Dover than for its revenues. The manorial rent rolls showed Sir John de Beauchamp’s holding at Esol [Esole] as:-‘one messuage with dovecot, 60a arable, 12a pasture at a total annual manorial rental of 52 s.6d payable to the Abbot of St. Alban’s’. This messuage and land became known as Bechams, which in recent times has reverted to Beauchamps. Despite a tenure of probably less than thirty years at Esol the ruins of the manor house and the surrounding land still retain his family name nearly 700 years after he bought them.
Over the succeeding years the Abbey’s old manor of Eswalt and the new manor of Esole gradually merged into a single entity which by the early part of the 1500’s was generally known as the “Manor of Esole otherwise Seynt Albons Court”. The assimilation of the two names into Esole has caused a lot of confusion over the centuries with Eswalt being confused with Esole, and vice versa.
As the Lord of the Manor of Esol the Abbot of St. Alban’s owed payment on a half of the knight’s fee for Essewelle, a liability transferred to subsequent owners of the manor. In 1540 the fees became Crown revenue and as such were eventually sold to private individual as fee farm rents.
The fees for the “Manner of Eastwell alias Essoles alias St. Albans Court [in Nonington]” were “extinguished by purchase” by William Hammond in 1738. At the same time the fees for the “Manner of Eastwell alias ffredvile [Fredville in Nonington]“ were also “extinguished by purchase” by the Duke of Newcastle, the then owner of the manor.
![William Boys and the Fredville purchase. It has been held for several centuries by Thomas Philpott, Edward Hasted, and other historians, that a feet of fines dating from July of 1484 recorded the purchase by John Nethersole, William Boys, Thomas Butte and Robert Gerveis of : “The manors of Fredeuyle and Beauchamp’ and 2 messuages, 405 acres of land, 3 acres of wood and 76 shillings and 4 pence of rent and a rent of 8 cocks, 30 hens and 1 pair of gloves in Nonyngton’ and Godneston’” from Thomas and Anne Quadryng'. However, this feet of fines was actually a legal manoeuvre to settle a court case to recover possession of the aforementioned properties which had in fact been purchased by John Nethersole and associates from the Quadryngs at some time shortly before the death of King Edward IV in April of 1483. These recovered properties then came into the sole possession of William Boys in 1485. A manor was a fiscal and legal entity, not a physical one, so that the purchase of “the manors of Fredeuyle and Beauchamp’" did not actually involve the acquisition of land but the acquisition of the lordship of these two manors. This acquisition entitled the holder of these lordships to certain manorial rights, revenues, rents and fines. A messuage at this time was a high status dwelling-house, and the grant of a messuage with its appurtenances not only transferred the house, but also all the buildings attached or belonging to it, along with its curtilage, garden and orchard and the close [surrounding land] on which the house was built. One of the two messuages referred to in the purchase was the Esol [Esole] manor house at Beauchamps, and the other messuage referred to in the purchase is most likely to have been on the site of the present Holt Street Farm house. Where was the Manor of Fredeuyle? Edward Hasted, in his “The History and Topographical Survey of the County of Kent” stated that after the purchase William Boys “removed thither” to Fredville and made it his main residence but returning to live at Bonnington at some time before his death in 1507. In the year he died William Boys of Goodnestone, but not of Nonington or Fredville, gifted to Nonington Church 40/- [£.2.00] towards buying a Antephonar [a religious music book]. William’s will divided the bulk of his estate between his two sons, John, his eldest son and heir who had been born at Bonnington in the mid to late 1470's, and Thomas. William bequeathed to John “all my lands, tenements, customs, rents, suits and services in Nonington, and to his heirs for ever”, and to Thomas “my lands and tenements etc. in Goodneston, and to his male issue, but if no issue to my son John and his male issue; if no issue to female heirs of Thomas for ever”. It is worth noting that William Boys returned to his Bonnington property before his death. Was the Bonnington property then a more comfortable house than that at Fredville? Perhaps the more pertinent question is that, if as Hasted states, William Boys did in fact relocate to Fredeuyle [Fredville], where did he in fact “remove thither” too? At present there is no known documentary or physical evidence of there being a house pre-dating the Tudor and Georgian mansions in Fredville Park. So, if there was no Fredville manor house there, then where could it have been located? There is some compelling evidence to indicate that at the time of William Boys’ acquisition of the aforementioned properties the Manor of Fredville [Fredeuyle] was centred upon the settlement of Holestreete or Holestrete [Holt Street] with the manor house on or near the site of the present Holt Street farmhouse. When the parish of Nonington was founded by Archbishop Pecham in 1282 its constituent hamlets or settlements were listed. One of the hamlets mentioned was Fredevile, previously the name used to refer to one half of the Knight’s Fee of Essewelle, but there is no reference to Holestreete [Holt Street]. The earliest presently known reference to “Freydevill’” is in legal documents dating from 1249 and 1250 while Holestrete is mentioned in the 1283-85 survey of Archbishop Pecham’s manor of Wingham. The survey records Simon of Holestreete and Roger of Holestreete as holding land on the adjacent manor of Acholt, also a part of the Manor of Wingham, showing that Holestreet actually then existed as a hamlet or settlement. “Freydevill’” most likely derives from is from the Old English [O.E.]: " frith or frythe", meaning a wood or wooded country, or the edges or outskirts of a wooded area, and "vill", a Latin abreviation used to indicate a manor or farm in medieval documents. “Freydevill’”, could therefore be taken to mean the manor or farm on the edge of the woods or woodland. Holt Street is a hamlet a half a mile or so to the south-east of Nonington Church, and its name derives from the O.E. ‘holt’, meaning a thicket or wood. Bordering Holt Street to the south-west is Ackholt or Acol, deriving from the O.E.: "ac"; oak & "holt" ; literally an oak thicket or wood, and bordering to the south is Oxney Wood, deriving from "oxena denn"; "oxena", meaning cattle and "denn", meaning woodland pasture. These names indicate that this area was once heavily wooded and therefore almost certainly cultivated after other parts of Nonington, such as Esole. A quarter of a century or so after the Archbishop's survey there is a reference in a 1309 indenture for the transfer of ownership of property in the adjacent manor of Acholt to a windmill “in paroch de Nonyngton juxta Holestrete in ter(re) de Freydvile”, [in the parish of Nonington, next to Holt Street on the land of Fredville]. This confirms that Holt Street was under the jurisdiction of the manor of Fredville, and would therefore be the main settlement of the manor due to its size and the number of its inhabitants at that time. Another indication to the Holt Street farmhouse site having been the location of an early Fredville manor house is that much of the land now occupied by Snowdown Colliery and its spoil heaps is recorded on the 1839 Nonington parish tithe map as “the Great Field”, which lay between Oxney Wood and Holt Street Farm, only a hundred yards or so from the farmhouse. The Great Field is the name often associated with manorial demesne land or land lying close to a manor house. Manorial demesne land was land personally held by the lord of the manor and either worked directly by him for his own benefit or rented out. Archbishop Pecham’s survey was made some sixty years or more before the Black Death swept through England. This epidemic possibly killed between one third and one half of the population of the Nonington area resulting in wide-ranging and long-lasting changes in the structure of land-holding and ownership and the use of agricultural land. In 1670 the Holt Street estate consisted of a capital messuage [principal house], the present Holt Street farmhouse, and some eight or so other messuages and cottages. The earlier Holt Street may have had more dwellings than those recorded in the inventory made in 1670 as only those properties owned by the Boys family as part of the Holt Street estate are recorded. No record was made of any other free-hold property owners in and around the Holt Street estate. After the building of the Tudor Fredville mansion in Fredville Park, almost certainly by John Boys in the late 1510’s or early 1520’s, it appears that the name Fredville became synonymous with the site of this and the later Georgian mansion, and not with the original manor house at Holt Street. By the time Sir Edward Boys the Younger came to reside at the Holt Street house in the early seventeenth century the original manorial centre of Fredville at Holt Street had become known as the Holt Street estate. The present Holt Street farmhouse was built in the first decade or so of the seventeenth century, apparently as a new family residence for Sir Edward Boys the Younger. This new house would have been an ideal residence for the Boys’ oldest son and heir while their father lived at the Fredville Mansion on the hill some quarter of a mile or so to the east. It appears to have fulfilled this role during the Boys' tenure at Fredville. When the Holt Street estate was sold off in the 1670’s to pay the creditors of Major John Boys, the last Boys to live at Fredville, it consisted of the new house, the eight or so smaller messuages and cottages, 250 acres or more of agricultural land, and some woodland. Beauchamp' or Bechams, an alternative residence for William Boys. There is another, and more likely, possibility as to where William Boys “removed thither”. History, and the historians, seem to have forgotten, or ignored, the fact that in addition to Fredville, William Boys also acquired the manor of "Beauchamp’", recorded as "Bechams" in the 1501 manorial roll for the "Manor of Essesole" [Esole] wherein it is recorded as consisting of a manor house and some fifty or more acres of land. The Abbot of St. Alban’s, of neighbouring "Saint Albons Courte" and the lord of the "Manor of Essesole", received an annual manorial rent of £2 2s 9d [£2.14p] payable once a year at Michaelmas [29th September]. "Bechams" was free of suit of court as it was held in gavelkind [freehold]. The pasture land around the remains of the manor house are still known locally as “The Ruins”, and the wood and adjacent lane are still known as Beauchamps Wood and Lane respectively. The above shows Beauchamps appears to have been pronounced as "Bechams " since at least the end of the fifteenth century. "Fredeuyle" was a manor in its own right and held by William Boys as one half of the knight’s fee of Essewelle, whereas "Beauchamp’" was actually at this time a sub-manor of the other half of the knight’s fee and was known as "Esol" or "Esole" with the Abbot of St. Alban’s, of neighbouring "Saint Albons Courte", in possession of the manorial rights. By the time of the 1501 manorial roll "the Manor of Esol" or "Esole" had become the "Manor of Essesole" The manors "Fredeuyle" and "Beauchamp’" seem to have melded into one entity known generally as Fredville, possibly because "Fredeuyle" was the larger of the two manors purchased. Under the broad umbrella of the Fredville name there is therefore a strong likelihood that William Boys resided for some time in the Beauchamp’ messuage and only returned to Bonnington just before he died in 1507, perhaps when he felt he was coming to the end of his time and wanted to spend the last of his days in his ancestral home. The most compelling reason why William Boys would have resided at "Bechams" instead of Holt Street is that the Quadryng family were originally wealthy London mercers, although of varying fortune in the latter part of their occupancy, and recent archaeological excavation of the Beauchamps manor house site has revealed the remains of what was once a quite extensive and high status house and associated out-buildings which would have made a very suitable ready made residence for the William and, later, John Boys, William's eldest son and the heir to Fredville. After inheriting Fredville and its associated properties John Boys continued to add to his holdings during the following decades. In 1512 he acquired property in Sandwich, and in 1528 he bought a quarter of the Manor of Soles from Thomas Norton, a legal and administrative entity which entitled him to certain manorial rights, revenues, rents and fines in and around the present Soles Court, Long Lane farm, and the hamlet of Frogham. In addition to the manorial rights he also purchased from the same vendor 200 acres of land, 200 acres of pasture and 60 acres of woodland in Nonington and Barfreston. As can be seen, John Boys had money to spend in the 1510’s and 1520’s, and this would have been the most logical time for him to begin the construction of a mansion at Fredville to replace a now ageing manor house at Beauchamps. As his wealth and local importance increased John Boys would have aspired to establish himself as a presence in the locality, and what better way to do this than to build a new mansion on a spur overlooking both his inherited and his newly acquired land in and around Nonington. The new house would also have been visible for several miles in the general direction of Sandwich, where he had business interests and held public office. Another possibility is that Bechams was sold after John’s death in 1533 by William Boys, his son and heir, who around 1537 acquired other large estates from the Manor of Wingham in Nonington and adjacent parishes and would therefore have needed money to fund these extensive land acquisitions. The sale of Bechams would have provided a useful sum to help pay for these acquisitions. Whatever the reasoning, Bechams was sold before 1555 as by then the estate had passed into the possession of “Edward Browne of Worde (Worth) juxta Sandwich, a yeoman”, who on 2nd March of that year conveyed it to “Thomas Hamon of Nonnyngton, gentleman”. The property conveyed was: “All that messuage or tenement called BEACHAM situated in Nonnyngton, with all barnes, houses and edifices, now in the occupation of Thomas Hamon and all…. rents, services, …ect…containing 50 acres”, and which was apparently unchanged since the 1501 "Essesole" manorial roll entry.](https://i0.wp.com/www.nonington.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/1484-Boys-Quadryng-ect-Fredville-and-Good-Court-of-Common-Please-underlined-e1570803481224.jpg?resize=75%2C75&ssl=1)
![Beauchamps dovecote](https://i0.wp.com/www.nonington.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/bdc1.jpg?resize=75%2C75&ssl=1)
One Comment
Diana Hammond
I am of The Hammond family that used to live at St Albans Court.