98 Some Account of the Parish of Monkton Farleigh. 



After Mr. Wade Browne left, first Mr. Hume and afterwards Mr. 

 Smith occupied the house, and it then fell in hand to Bishop 

 Hamilton, who let it to Mr. H. B. Caldwell. Thereafter the Ec- 

 clesiastical Commissioners made a freehold of the whole manor, and 

 on Mr. CaldwelFs death, in 1873, that part which was attached to 

 the manor house and the house itself passed to the present proprietor. 

 Sir Charles Parry Hobhouse. 



He has made many alterations in the old house, one, alas ! the 

 removal of the Duke's tower, made under a misconception, and an 

 irreparable loss. 



What are now a passage, the master's room, and the lower 

 school-room, were before the kitchens and the housekeeper's room. 

 The present kitchen was part of a stable and coal cellar. The offices 

 adjoining are new. The back staircase was opened out after so 

 many years of seclusion that its very existence was unknown. The 

 present library was the dining room. The present dining room was 

 created out of the old library and a part of the chief staircase, and 

 so the dressing room overhead. The front corridor was raised, and 

 the staircase and upper landing are new. The billiard room was 

 made up partly of an entrance hall and partly of what was formerly 

 the master's room — part of the cellars being lowered. 



The parish is now pretty equally divided between Sir Charles 

 Hobhouse and Henry Hancock and Henry Spackman, Esquires. 



The names of Hancock and Spackman are not new to the parish. 



There is a Hancock first mentioned in 1777, and there is still in 

 the parish a piece of land called " Hancock's Piece." A curious 

 token of the family was also found by me in a garden, where was 

 once a cottage, immediately opposite the lodge gates. It is a copper 

 coin of date A.D. 1610. On one side is a hand out-spread, and the 

 words "in Westbury 1610" — on the other is a cock exultant, and 

 the name " Thomas Handcock." It is very well cut. 



The name of Spackman is associated with the parish at a still 

 earlier period, John Spakeman, senior and junior, being mentioned 

 as churchwardens in 1372. 



Of the family of Hobhouse it does not beseem me to make any 

 record beyond what may be said to be already public property. 



