EFFINGHAM HUNDRED 



GREAT BOOKHAM 



SLYFIILD. Gulrs a 

 jesie engrailed argent be- 

 fween three taltirei or. 



1582, by his will proved in 1590 directed his 

 executors not to pull down or deface any manner of 

 wainscot or glass in or about his house of Slyfield. 44 

 In 1598 Henry Slyfield his 

 son died seised of the capital 

 messuage, manor or farm called 

 Slyfields, held of Sir William 

 Howard as of his manor of 

 Great Bookham, leaving a son 

 and heir Edmund, 46 who in 

 March 1614 sold the manor 

 to Henry Breton and his heirs 

 for the sum of 2,000.*' In 

 November of the same year 

 Henry Breton conveyed these 

 premises, for the sum of 380, 

 to George Shiers,* 8 who died 

 in 1642 leaving his second son Robert his heir.*' 

 George Shiers, son of Robert, was created a baronet 

 1684, and, dying unmarried in 1685, aged twenty- 

 five, left his estates to his mother, Elizabeth Shiers, 

 who died in 1 700, having devised this estate to 

 Hugh Shortrudge, clerk in holy orders, 40 rector of 

 Fetcham. The latter suffered a recovery in 1714, 

 and in 1715 conveyed the estate to trustees for 

 charitable uses, but chiefly for the benefit of Exeter 

 College, Oxford, thereby carrying out an intention 

 of Mrs. Elizabeth Shiers, who is commemorated at 

 Exeter College, Oxford, as a benefactor.*' The pre- 

 sent occupants of Slyfield Manor House are Mr. Ed- 

 ward J. M. Gore and the Hon. Mrs. Gore. 



Slyfield House is situated on the main road between 



Letherhead and Cobham on the banks of the Mole, 

 and is near Stoke D'Abernon Church. It now con- 

 sists of quite a small portion of the original house, 

 which was quandrangular or ^-shaped in plan, the 

 present dwelling-house representing about one-half of 

 the south side, while the block which is now used as 

 farm-buildings formed the north-east angle. 



The arms of Shiers occur in two rooms of the 

 house, while there is no in- 

 stance of the Slyfield coat ; 

 and there is nothing to suggest 

 that any parts of the existing 

 buildings arc earlier than the 

 advent of the Shiers in 1614. 

 The house is built of red brick, 

 the south front being of two 

 stories divided into bays by 

 Ionic pilasters standing on high 

 plinths, and running up to a 

 moulded cornice under deep- 

 projecting eaves with modil- 

 lions, with a very picturesque 

 effect. The pilasters have a 

 considerable entasis, and at 

 half height shields in slightly raised brickwork with lions' 

 heads and fleurs de lis, a treatment recalling Inigo 

 Jones's work on the west side of Lincoln's Inn Fields. 

 The western part of this front has a curved brick 

 gable, and the pilasters are differently treated, having 

 simple moulded Tuscan capitals ; this was evidently 

 the central feature of the front, the western half being 

 now represented only by the lower part of its fa9ade 



SBIIM of Slyfield, 

 baronet. Or a bend 

 azure between a lion sa- 

 ble and three oak leaves 

 vert with three tcallops 

 or on the bend. 





SLVFIELD HOUSE, GREAT BOOKHAM 



Surr. Arcb. Coll. v, 45 ; vii, 61. 

 4(1 Chan. Inq. p.m. (Ser. z), cell, no. 

 131. 



7 Close, II Ja. I, pt. xxtY, no. 55 ; 



Recov. R. Eat. iz Jai. I, rot. 51 ; Feet 

 of F. Surr. Mich, iz Ja. I. 



"Feet of F. Surr. Hil. iz Ja. I ; 

 Cloie, iz Ja. I, pt. xxxviii, m. 31. 



3 2 9 



Chan. Inq. p.m. (Ser. z), d, 13 ; 

 inscription in church. 



40 Surr. Arch. Coll. vii, 61. 



41 Manning and Bray,Hf. ofSurr.li,6<)Z. 



