The Nettlestead Place you can see today is in the shape of an L with one segment running east to west dating from the High Middle Ages and the other, at right angles, built from north to south in 1922.
For sure a manor house stood here before. Nettlestead Place was entered in the Domesday Book as part of the possessions of William the Conqueror’s half-brother Odo, Bishop of Bayeux and Earl of Kent. We know it was rented to Haimo, who occupied seven other manors including Mereworth and was Sheriff of Kent between 1077-1100. The value of Nettlestead Place at this time was 8 pounds, and contained ploughlands a fishery, 7 acres of meadow and woodland with pannage for 35 swine.
A tenth century document indicates that the parish of Nettlestead contributed towards keeping up the bridge, specifically the fifth pier, over the Medway at Rochester from which we can deduce the existence of a substantial Saxon manor house. According to the Cartularium Saxonicum a settlement called Nettlestead existed in 558. Nettlestead Place and the neighbouring church have a strategic position along the route of an ancient trackway following the south side of the Greensand Ridge and above a steep slope down to the River Medway where a ford originally stood. The house has the benefit of fresh drinking water from natural springs, which were used to create ponds for keeping fish, a crucial food supply for winter sustenance.
The older portion of the house, including the vaulted undercroft, was built by Haino’s descendent Walter de Wahull (also spelt Wodhull) in the 1260s. Yet throughout the Middle Ages Nettlestead Place is principally associated with the De Pympe family, and we can conjecture it passed to them around 1300 probably via marriage from the Wahulls. It may have been Philip De Pympe who had the Gatehouse built at the beginning of the fourteenth century. The portcullis is no longer there, but it has a well-preserved portal which experts date within the reign of Edward I. Philip was a lively figure who was incarcerated in Canterbury gaol for harbouring an outlaw in 1318 and received a royal pardon for homicide in 1337. After being knighted in 1339 he was appointed by King Edward III as defender of the Kent coast. Philip’s nephew William, owner after 1360 held the prestigious role of Sheriff of Kent three times.
The De Pympe to leave the greatest legacy however, was William’s son Reginald, who was also Sheriff of Kent in 1409 and knight of the shire which meant he served as member of parliament.
Reginald, who was responsible for the vast improvements to the church including the rebuilding of the nave and the impressive stained glass windows, put in the large windows on the south side of the house and constructed the narrower room to the east of the undercroft. It is also believed that Reginald added the easternmost of the three buttresses on the south side of the house if not all three, although Anthony Emery, author of ‘Greater Medieval Houses of England and Wales 1300-1500’ is inclined to the view that these were built at the same time as the undercroft.
Reginald was succeeded by his grandson John who fought with King Henry V at Agincourt in 1415 and we can assume the family came into considerable wealth thanks to the spoils of war. Certainly, as noted, there were significant changes for Nettlestead in the 1420s and 1430s. Historical records allude to a Great Hall, probably where the family were accommodated, which is believed to have also been built by Reginald roughly where the modern portion of the house stands today, though the structure no longer exists.
John died in 1454 and was succeeded by his son John, then a minor, under the wardenship of the Stafford family whose arms appear in the windows of the church. John was brought up as a Yorkist and took part in Edward IV’s French campaign, and later supported the Duke of Buckingham when he rebelled against Richard III. As a result of this he suffered forfeiture of his estates, but these were returned on the accession of Henry VII. John died in 1496 and in his will left an endowment for the construction of the church porch.
The next significant period of improvements to the house took place at the end of the sixteenth century after Nettlestead had passed to the Scott family by marriage. The Scotts owned Scotts Hall, one of the finest houses in Kent and much else: one could ride from London to Ashford without leaving their possessions.
Sir Thomas Scott was knight of the shire, deputy lieutenant and in 1588 commanded the Kentish force that mustered on Northbourne Down at the time of the Armada threat. He died in 1594 leaving Nettlestead to his second son Sir John, who was a soldier that had served in the Low Countries where in 1588 he had been knighted on the field of battle.
Sir John commanded a ship on the failed expedition with Lord Essex and Sir Walter Raleigh to the Azores to accost Spanish treasure ships in 1597. He was also an early investor in the colony of Virginia, and member of parliament. At the time of Essex rebellion he was arrested on suspicion of complicity but then released. Sir John must have had access to the royal court having married Elizabeth Stafford, a lady of the bedchamber to Queen Elizabeth. Known by the queen affectionately as ‘My Bess’. Elizabeth’s father had also been married to Mary Boleyn, sister of the Queen’s mother Anne, and as ardent protestants they had spent a period in exile in Basel during Queen Mary’s reign where they had lived next door to John Knox. Elizabeth Stafford, later Scott, is buried in Nettlestead church and a large effigy is dedicated to her. Across from Elizabeth stands a memorial to Sir John’s second wife, Katherine. The statues of both ladies are positioned in a prominent place facing the pews so that churchgoers are reminded every Sunday of Nettlestead Place’s most illustrious female inhabitants.
During the Elizabethan Scotts’ tenure circular windows were put into the three buttresses on the southern side of Nettlestead Place. There is a door leading to the garden from the room to the east of the undercroft with the date 1587 inscribed – maybe the date of the new circular windows – but Anthony Emery has opined that the door dates from late fifteenth century along with the adjacent window. In those days they did not take pride in being ancient!
The new owner allowed the building to fall into ruin, and the house would never again be in the possession of a knightly family. There is evidence it was used as a school and in the bedroom there is an inscription on the window of a couple of who spent their wedding night here in 1773. Oast Houses were added to the western side of the house and it is likely it was used for agricultural storage.
In 1913 the house was bought by Ronald Vinson who saw the potential of revitalising the medieval glory of the house. After a delay through the onset of WW1 he employed architect Morley Horder to devise the modern part of the house which was built in harmony with the older section, using the same local Kentish ragstone, but in a distinctly modern style, and completed in 1922. He also established the core of the modern garden including construction of the large pond fed by a strong spring which in the medieval period was the source of water for the house and fish pools.
In 1977 the house was bought by Roy and Annabel Tucker as a family home alongside the surrounding farm. They completely restored the Edward I Gate House which is now occupied as a (somewhat unusual) residence. After the great storm of 1987 when more than 40 trees were lost the Tuckers saw the opportunity to redevelop large parts of the 1922 garden and also to greatly enlarge it. The garden is listed under the National Gardens Scheme. Nettlestead Place today is both a family home and a wedding venu