Alice Buckland

GREAT BUCKLAND MANOR

The Alice who married John Polley of Detling was the sole heiress of the manor of Great Buckland, which lay in the valley of Luddesdown, near Meopham. (36). Here lies a fragment of all England:-the remains of an Iron-age hut, the foundations of a Saxon manor house, one of the lost churches of Kent, (bode), the work of Tudor craftsmem are all to be found within the bounds of this ancient village. (41 and 48). The manor was granted by Hubert, Archbishop of Canterbury, to an ancestor of Alice, Alan de Buckland, during the reign of King John (1199-1216), to be held in frank fee, not gavelkind as had been the case when the estate was held by Saxon thanes. (49)

In the year 1270 the possession of the whole manor by Alan's eldest son Walter was disputed by his youngest son Alan, on the ground that the Archbishop had changed the form of tenure without the consent of the Chapter of Canterbury. The plea was overruled. (37)

The Polhills and the Bucklands possibly became acquainted soon after, for in a charter of 1334 in the British Museum, (No, XXVI 30) the names Edmund de Polle and Richard de Bocland appear amongst others. (49)

The manor passed through the hands of John de Bocland to Thomas (1327-1377) who founded a chapel on the north side of Shoreham Church and was buried there with his wife Agnes (36 and 37). His son Thomas held Preston and Buckland and added other estates in the Shoreham district. He died about 1461 leaving Alice, his only daughter and sole heiress. (37).

The manor of Great Buckland passed by the marriage with JohnPolley to the Polhills, (36), but the tithes became part of the endowments of the Convent of St. Mary and All Saint Maidstone, at which Joan Buckland was a nun. (3). On the dissolution of that house in 1546 the tithes passed to the Crown. The demesne continued in the possession of the Polhills. In a survey of the adjacent manor of Paddlesworth in 1560 the ownership of the demesne of Buckland, lying to the west and north of a piece of land called Doude Chapell Crafte is stated to be 'now of John Polhill.(3).

Edward Polhill, rector of Etchingham, died possessed of Buckland, Luddesdown in 1654, (49). Subsequently the demesne was divided into the a portions and passed into the possession of other owners. (42)

The estate was originally described as of one yoke, ten acres, with appurtenances at Maidstone. (57). A yoke is usually understood to be a unit of taxation and that measure of land equivalent to the area which could be ploughed annually by a single yoke of oxen, and peculiar to the County of Kent. The area would naturally vary according to the nature of the soil, and from the beginning of the 13th. century was regarded for practical purposes as 100 acres. (25). The appurtenances at Maidstone, when possessed by the convent were said to cover 400 acres. In a return made in 1535 of the convent income the rentals from the farm at Buckland and of lands and tenements at Maidstone accounted for L27.9.7 out of a total amount of L221.5.3 1/2. So that, as possessions were reckoned in those days the manor was a worthy one.(57).

The farmhouse was rebuilt in Elizabethan days but the fine half-timbered building in which Queen Elizabeth is reputed to have slept, was burnt to the ground in about 1910. Only the charred foundations and acluster of about half-a-dozen dwellings and outhouses remains.(41)

The arms of the Buckland family are described as "argent an eagle displayed sable, beaked and anguled or." John Polley impaled them with his own, "argent, on a bend gules, three cross crosslets or," and thereby preserved them for posterity. (36).

Source - http://polhill.info/book.php?p=1