Well (Gardens), Smallhythe Place

Record ID:  130616 / MNA153484
Record type:  Monument
Protected Status: None Recorded
NT Property:  Smallhythe Place; London and South East
Civil Parish:  Tenterden; Ashford; Kent
Grid Reference:  TQ 89355 30126
Choose map:
Choose labels:

Summary

Brick well set in the gardens, near the Priests' House. The well is shown on the 1870 Ordnance Survey map. Its absence from the 1843 Tithe map is probably not significant, and it may well have existed earlier – historical references to a well (exact location unknown) lying next to the king’s highway in Smallhythe in 1445 indicates that the well-shaft may be of some antiquity, although the well-head is modern.

Identification Images (1)

View of well © National Trust
View of well © National Trust

Monument Types

  • WELL (Unknown to Mid 19th C)

Description

The well shaft, 0.93m in diameter, is lined with irregular stones and may be of some antiquity. The well-head is of brick, 0.64m high, with a stone plinth around the base and a flat stone coping. The iron and wooden windlass is supported on two timber uprights, and covered by a tiled, gabled roof with heavy stone ridge tiles (total height to top of roof – 1.3m). The well is set within a brick platform (resembling a patio), flanked to the north-west by a semi-circular arrangement of dwarf stone walls (0.6m high) enclosing a crude stone-flagged surface made up of two large flat slabs (2m x 0.7m) surrounded by smaller stones. A brick path links the well to the Priests' House.

Maintained as a garden feature.

References

  • SNA62999 - National Trust Report: Archaeology South-East. 2005. Archaeological and Historic Landscape Survey of Smallhythe, Kent.

  • SNA70191 - Website: National Trust London and SE Region. 2022-2023. 3D Sketchfab model collection at Smallhythe. https://skfb.ly/oPGAQ.

Designations

None Recorded

Other Statuses and References

  • Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty: HIGH WEALD

Associated Events

  • ENA4668 - Field Survey, Archaeological and Historic Landscape Survey of Smallhythe, Kent, 2005
  • ENA10230 - Field Survey, Photographic surveys to create a series of online 3D models of artefacts, collection items and structures at Smallhythe, Kent, 2022-3

Associated Finds

None Recorded

Related Records

None Recorded