36 Southwiek Court, CvMeridge, and Brook House. 



in the " London/^ under the signature of Cato. Besides many 

 pamphlets, he wrote on the South Sea Company, and on the Peerage 

 Bill, and " The Independent Whig/' He died in 1723. Local 

 tradition says that Addison was much at Cutteridge, visiting the 

 Trenchard family ; and such may have been the case ; we know, at 

 all events, that Milston, near Amesbury, his native place, was within 

 a day's ride. There are tablets to the memory of members of the 

 Trenchard family in North Bradley Church. In the note to Aubrey 

 (p. 347) it is said the arms of Trenchard are to be seen there 

 quartering Ashfordby : this I cannot understand, as these arms are 

 over the tablet to the memory of William Trenchard, who died in 

 1713 ; the connection with the Ashfordby family did not take place 

 till 53 years later, as Mr. Ashfordby married Miss Ellen Trenchard 

 in 1766. This Ellen Trenchard was the daughter of Robert 

 Hippisley, of Stanton, who assumed his mother's name, of Trenchard, 

 she having been the daughter and heiress of William Trenchard, of 

 Cutteridge. The arms in question were probably intended for those 

 of Norton of Abbot's Leigh, but they do not agree with Burke's 

 description of this family's arms, though they do with those of the 

 Nortons of London and of Stretton, Shropshire. We may conclude 

 then, that, the man who erected the tablet made a mistake, and cut 

 the arms of Norton of Stretton, instead of the arms of the Nortons 

 of Abbot's Leigh. 



Brook-House or Broke-Hall. Across the fields from Cutteridge 

 we come to Brook-House Farm — even now, in its present state, a 

 large pile of buildings. This property at one time belonged to the 

 Cheney family, already mentioned as having been owners of South- 

 wick Court. 



Sir John Willoughby, '^that came out of Lincolnshire," as 

 Leland says, married the heii-ess to the property, and their son be- 

 came the first Lord Willoughby de Broke. Leland, in a journey 

 from Steeple Ashton (p. 87, vol. iv. old edition) to Warminster, 

 visited Brook Hall, and makes these remarks : " From Steeple 

 Assheton to Brook Hawle about a 2 myle by woody ground." He 

 was not apparently a very good judge of distance, as, had he said 

 four miles, he would have been much under the mark. " There was 



