Boughton Monchelsea Place, And Courtyard Buildings

Boughton Monchelsea Place is a substantial country house comprising the east and south ranges of a former courtyard house, built circa 1567–75, though possibly begun around 1551–54 as an addition to an earlier house to the west. The building was substantially altered and extended in circa 1685–90, circa 1785–1805, and 1819.

The main structure is constructed of roughly coursed ragstone from immediately south of the porch to the north gable end, with the south end room and entire south return elevation more evenly coursed. Coursed galleted stone appears on the upper part of the east porch. The roof is plain tile. The building comprises two storeys, attics, and a cellar.

The east-facing mid-16th-century L-plan range includes one narrow room to the west return at the south end and three principal rooms on the ground floor of the main range. The two-bay central room or entrance hall was probably two storeys high until the late 17th century, with an attic floor above, and likely incorporated an undershot cross or screens passage extending to the north end (now absorbed within the entrance hall). The first floor probably comprised one room to the south end and a larger principal room to the north of the hall, extending over the cross-passage, with possibly a smaller chamber to the north end. A rectangular 16th-century stone west stair turret, probably built slightly after the main range walls, overlaps the cross-passage and principal room. A two-storey stone east porch, probably of 16th-century origin with possibly 19th-century reworked ground floor, was centrally placed by circa 1720. A late 17th-century brick staircase hall runs parallel to the rear (west) of the main range, filling the gap between the 16th-century stair turret and a short south-west return. The range running west from the south-west return is probably of pre-16th-century origin, largely rebuilt in 1819. The north and west ranges were demolished by 1819 (possibly in the mid-to-late 18th century) and replaced, probably around 1819, by a continuous range of red-and-grey brick outbuildings. A late 18th or early 19th-century two-storey red brick section on a stone base stands at the east end of the north range.

The east elevation features a battered plinth to the north of the porch, with no plinth immediately north or south of it. The south elevation has a low chamfered stone plinth. An ashlared eaves frieze with moulded base and cornice is said to pass behind the gable of the porch without being returned. Early 19th-century battlements, returned along the south elevation, crown the building. The roof is hipped to the south, with the hip returning along the south elevation. A gable to the north has a flat-topped finial. Chimney stacks include one at the junction of the main range and south-west return, another at the west end of the return, a slender rear (west) stack to the south end of the entrance hall, three rear stacks to the north of centre, and a projecting gable-end stack to the north, with two further stacks to the rest of the south range.

Four late 16th-century gabled stone eaves dormers with flat tops, kneelers, and two-light Gothick windows with stone labels are prominent features. The Gothick frames are set within round-headed 16th-century stone lights. Irregular fenestration includes five tall rectangular stone architraves, one beneath each dormer and one to the first floor of the porch (the latter with hoodmould), possibly of the late 17th century but fitted with late 18th-century Gothick lights. Eight similar windows with hoodmoulds appear on the ground floor: one group of three beneath each first-floor end window, one under the south-central dormer, and one adjacent to the north of the porch. A vertical jamb of a blocked ground-floor door or window lies under the north-central first-floor window, with projecting stone beneath it. Another window jamb stands between two north ground-floor windows. Five late 16th-century rectangular two- and three-light stone windows with round-headed lights are set along the ground floor of the south elevation.

The two-storey porch, slightly south of centre, has an ashlared ground floor with chamfered side plinths and early 19th-century battlements above a moulded string. A single round-headed light appears on each side wall of the ground floor. The moulded four-centred arched inner and outer doorways feature a rectangular hoodmould on the latter, with hollow spandrels containing shields.

Within the courtyard, the north range appears to have been built against the lower remains of the stone north wall of the demolished 16th-century range. The west range stops short of the 1819 south range and retains a 17th-century wooden clock turret (bell dated 1647) taken from the pre-1819 south range. Various sash windows and boarded doors are evident. A Hand-in-Hand fire insurance plaque adorns the 17th-century stair turret.

The interior is richly detailed. A blocked chamfered rectangular stone doorway is concealed in the wall between the probable cross-passage and the base of the 16th-century stair turret. The stair turret has a pointed-arched stone doorway to the base of its north wall, blocked by a late 17th-century stack. A 16th-century open well staircase with onion finials to the newels runs between the first floor and attic, with four stone two-light windows with round-headed lights (some blocked). A moulded three- or four-centred-arched stone doorway connects the stair turret to the former principal first-floor room. A moulded four-centred-arched stone fireplace with hollow spandrels appears on the west wall of this room, with a blocked stone window of three round-headed lights set high in the wall beside it. Altered 16th- or 17th-century panelling is present, and a panelled room with shelves and cupboards fitted within the top of the 16th-century stair turret survives. 16th- or 17th-century panelling and a four-centred-arched moulded brick fireplace appear in the north end room of the attic. Stone window seats serve each dormer. The roof structure features side-purlin construction with windbraces.

Three 16th- or early 17th-century moulded stone fireplaces, probably re-used, are positioned in the south range. A late 17th-century open-well staircase with turned balusters, ramped moulded hand-rail, and bolection-moulded dado panelling occupies the staircase hall. A moulded plaster ceiling adorns the stair-well. Three doorways on the first-floor landing bear moulded wooden cornices, with two also featuring eared architraves. Late 17th-century bolection-moulded panelling lines the room over the entrance hall and a small room formed in the ground floor of the 16th-century stair-turret. Bolection-moulded fireplaces appear in each of these two rooms.

The first floor features a sash window with thick glazing bars to the north gable end. A late 18th-century Gothick entrance hall with a shallow vaulted ceiling supported on clustered columns (behind one of which evidence for a 16th-century screens-passage wall is said to be visible) was later created. A wooden shield commemorating the 1832 Reform Bill is displayed, and the floor features parquet with star patterns. Two Gothick ground-floor fireplaces grace the hall. A mid-18th-century fireplace with fretwork design appears in the south-east ground-floor room.

Armorial stained-glass quarries bearing dates of 1567, 1568, and 1575 survive in the north room and entrance hall. Undated quarries appear in windows of the late 17th-century stair-well, along with fragments of early 17th-century North German stained glass, which remained in the church until circa 1832. The building was connected to a 16th-century family related to the Wottons at Boughton Malherbe Place.