Gotten Manor

Gotten Manor is a house with linked former brewhouse and dairy located in Chale on the Isle of Wight. The building sits on an ancient manorial site recorded in Domesday Book, with references to the manor in an inquest report concerning William de Goditen dated around 1305.

The main house dates from the 17th century, built on an older site with possibly older foundations. It has undergone significant alterations around 1730, 1800, and 1854. The structure is constructed of Isle of Wight stone rubble with red brick dressings and a slate roof.

The composition comprises the main house to the west of two storeys with attics, featuring three windows, flanked by a single-storey link block dating to 1800 and a two-storey brewhouse and dairy to the east. The house displays late 18th-century red brick dressings. The first floor has casement windows of 1854 with marginal glazing, while the ground floor contains three French windows also of 1854 with marginal glazing. The gable ends feature kneelers and end brick chimneystacks, with gables topped by fretted wooden bargeboards and finials. A catslide roof extends to the rear, part dating from the 17th or 18th century with the remainder dating from the mid-19th century; three mid-19th-century casements open to the rear.

The single-storey link block to the south has a French window in a brick surround with marginal glazing; to the north is a six-panelled door with the top two panels glazed, a modern porch, and a 19th-century casement to the right. The brewhouse and dairy to the south features 1930s four-light casements and a French window at ground floor. The north front presents a flight of seven curved stone steps at the ends, leading to the upper floor and a projecting dairy of 18th-century date.

Interior features include an early 18th-century winder staircase with two panelled doors. Some ground-floor doors have a strip added centrally to create the appearance of four-panelled doors. The ground floor west room contains a stone fireplace of mid-17th-century type with elongated spandrels and central keystone, though this may date to the early 18th century. The first floor has two panelled doors and spine beams with beaded sides. The first-floor right-hand chamber contains two chamfered beams with run-out stops and a 17th-century stone fireplace with cambered top. The roof features staggered purlins with run-out stops.

The link block contains a fine lead water pump dated 1800 with the initials J.W. and a moulding of Diana the huntress with hunting dogs, retaining its original wooden pump handle and accompanying stone trough. An early 19th-century cast iron firegrate occupies one room in this block.

The brewhouse and dairy features an ovolo-moulded arched doorway of circa 1600 opening from the link block. It contains a large stone open fireplace with cambered arch in three pieces, a bread oven, and a circular lead-lined copper on the right-hand side. A large chamfered spine beam has lambs tongue stops at one end and run-out stops at the other. The floor is of flagstone. The northern dairy has a stone floor and original wooden tongue-and-grooved shelving. The easternmost room was formerly used for stabling. The first floor features an 18th-century softwood roof with staggered purlins and rafters and traces of lath and plaster. One room was used as a carpenter's shop and may earlier have served as sleeping accommodation for hired hands.

The manor's historical significance is considerable. In 1313, the owner Walter de Goditen was arraigned following the shipwreck of "The Blessed Mary", a vessel carrying white wine from Aquitaine to England, which was looted by local men. He was fined 287½ marks. A local record of 1323 documents that Walter donated an acre of land with buildings to the Church on St. Catherine's Day. St. Catherine's Oratory, a scheduled ancient monument, was subsequently built on this land. In the mid-19th century, the house was owned by W.H. Dawes, nephew of the notorious Sophie Dawes, later Baroness of Fouchères.