Discover Historic Cobham: A Guide to Visiting this Picturesque Kentish Village

ByMagdalena Marsden

It may be a few minutes drive from Rochester but the tranquil inland village of Cobham can lay claim to numerous historic connections ever bit as momentous as its noisier maritime neighbour. And it’s a bold story of brasses, burials and ashes lost and regained.

Both share a Dickens link with the timbered Leather Bottle pub being mentioned in Pickwick Papers. Full of Dickensian memorabilia inside, it’s an ideal starting or stopping point to discover the village.

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Practical info for visiting Cobham village

  • Walks: any direction, so many options – woodland and lovely field and meadow walks
  • Country Parks: The National Trust Cobham Wood (use village car park), Ashenbank Wood (small free car park as you are approaching the village from A2), Jeskyns Community Woodland (paid parking, cafe, toilets), Shorne Woods Country Park (other side of A2, paid parking, cafe, toilets).
  • Refreshments: 3 pubs – The Leather Bottle, The Ship Inn, The Darnley
  • Shopping: Cobham Community Stores – always great choice of fresh bread, fruit and vegetables as well as locally produced crafts, art and artisan food.
  • Parking: Free car park next to the football pitch – marked as you enter the village

St.Mary Magdalene Church

Heading back into the village, St Mary Magdalene Church dates from the 13th century and like many buildings locally is made from flint and stonework. The chapel is lined with one of the finest collection of memorial brasses depicting the medieval lords of Cobham.

Cobham College & Almhouses

Across the way, is Cobham College, a quadrangular building which was originally a seminary and later converted into almhouses for the poor. The narrow strip separating the Church from the College and its arched entrance would make an ideal setting for a scene from any period drama.

Cobham College was established in 1362 by John Cobham, 3rd Baron Cobham. The college employed five priests whose purpose was to pray for the speedy passage of Cobham’s soul and those of named others through Purgatory and into Heaven. The priests had a fairly comfortable live as the college included living quarters and a communal great hall.

Interestingly enough, during the Dissolution of the Monasteries, Cobham College was one of the very few chantries in England that were not dissolved by Henry VIII in 1539-40. Instead, the master and brethren of the college surrendered it privately to its patron, George Brooke, 9th Baron Cobham.

The possession of the college was secured by Act of Parliament, and its possessions and landholdings were not sold-off under the supervision of the Court of Augmentations like many other chantries.

The former chantry priests’ building remained unoccupied until 1597 when William Brooke, the 10th Baron Cobham, allocated funds for the establishment of 21 almshouses within the abandoned structure. The almshouses were intended to provide shelter for the elderly poor of the local community.

The old building was divided into 21 separate dwellings, each consisting of one room on the ground floor and one on the first floor, with its own entrance door. Above each entrance door is a brass plate that indicates the electing parish of the occupying pensioner.

In 1981, the college’s interior was restructured to create 13 self-contained dwellings, which are still used for charitable purposes. The building is currently managed as a charity by “The New College of Cobham (retirement properties)”, providing 29 low-rent 1-bedroom dwellings with resident management staff, a lounge, laundry-room, guest facilities and a garden.

To qualify for residency, applicants must belong to the Anglican faith and have previously lived in one of the following nearby parishes: Chalk, Cliffe, Cobham, Cooling, Cuxton, Gravesend, Halling, Higham, Hoo, St Mary Hoo, Shorue and Strood.

Richard Dadd connection to Cobham village

Just before the main entrance to Cobham Wood is Richard Dadd’s path – a pathway which in life led to the Royal Academy, artistic fame and then murder, insanity and incarceration. I must confess that I’d never heard of him before. His paintings often depict fairy like miniature figures drawn with intense realism.

In 1843, shortly after returning from a grand tour of North Africa, he stabbed his father to death in the park at a spot now known as ‘Dadd’s hole’. A lifetime in first Bethlem and then the newly build Broadmoor awaited him but he continued to paint his grotesque visionary images.

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Darnley Mausoleum

A walk in Cobham Wood starts by a thatched cottage and barn where tickets from April onwards can be bought to visit the Mausoleum which lies in the woods and east of Cobham Hall.

When I first visited the Mausoleum well over a decade ago, it was virtually derelict and seemed almost beyond repair. However, thanks to Lottery funding, it’s been restored to its original white neo-classical grandeur.

It’s the home of successive generations of Darnleys, the owners of Cobham Hall which itself can be glimpsed through woods to the west, rising tall with its many, turrets, chimneys and three cupola towers. Both magnificent buildings were built by Sir James Wyatt and have their own stories. Built in 1783, the Mausoleum, was never consecrated, as the Bishop of Rochester, is said to have refused, due to the foundation stone having been laid in a thunderstorm.

Set amid the twisted bare trunks and human like torsos of mangled trees stripped of their bark, I could well image the gothic scene on a bleak winter’s afternoon.

Cobham Hall & Deer Park

However, when I visited I was more struck by the herd of shaggy Highland cattle which roamed over the ferns and heathland. The path through the woods and adjoining farm estate is well trodden by man and beast although these days it’s cyclists weaving in and out of the mud whose tracks are most visible.

Cobham Hall History

Cobham Hall is now an independent girls boarding school. It was forfeited to the crown in 1603 after an abortive attempt by the eleventh baron to place Lady Arabella Stuart on the throne instead of James VI, which also implicated Sir Walter Raleigh. Later it was the home of the Dukes of Lennox, second cousins to James and two of the Duke’s sons were killed in the Civic War.

Their portraits hang in the Gilt Hall. The gardens were landscaped by George and John Repton and the lime avenue once stretched all the way to Cobham village. The Hall is open to be public on a limited basis. On my return, I looked on the website and dates for 2024 had yet to be announced.

Cobham Hall connection to the cricket and the ‘Ashes’

As grand as the Hall certainly is, for me, its main attraction is a story which lies at the very heart of a piece of cricket history – the Ashes. When the visiting Australian team defeated England in 1882 at the Oval, the Times printed a mock obituary about the death of English cricket.

The article stated that the ‘body will be cremated and the ashes taken to Australia’. This caught on and the Ashes then became known as the term for test series between the two countries. The English team that then set out to recover the Ashes was led by the Hon Ivo Bligh, later to become Lord Darnley and owner of Cobham Hall.

After England had won the first two matches, some of Melbourne’s society ladies burnt a bail, put the ashes in an urn and gave it to Bligh. It must have created quite an impression because he married one of them – her Countess portrait hangs in the long gallery.

The urn was kept at Cobham and it was only in the 1920s, I think that it was moved at Lords where it’s kept in the Museum. There’s a story that the urn was accidentally broken while at Cobham when a maid dusting the mantelpiece knocked it to the floor, spilling its contents.

So it may not contain the ashes of the bail but whatever remains, the urn itself remains at Lords no matter which side wins the Ashes (currently Australia). The English authorities story is that it’s a private memento between husband and wife – at least that’s what they tell visiting Australians!

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Owletts House

On the other side of Cobham village, you can find the Owletts, a National Trust property, dating back to Charles II’s time. Built by a wealthy farmer, its plaster ceiling is adorned by berries, hops and other signs of local farming life.

In the nineteenth century it was owned by Sir Herbert Baker, an influential architect, who renovated the property. Today, one can view his collection of ceramics and mementoes from his work in South Africa and India, where with Lutyens, he was responsible for designing Imperial New Delhi.

The property is open infrequently, mainly in the summer and you can access only 3-4 rooms on the ground floor. The garden is lovely thought and most days, you can find honesty box tea room set up on the lawn. Owletts is rented out to tenants, who look after the house and that’s is the reason, why only few rooms are available to the public.

Although it took only about an hour to look around, I’ve really enjoyed my visit to Owletts, as I’ve been to most of the larger National Trust Properties and it was lovely to see a house that’s still lived in.

This blog post was originally published on 14 January 2015 and last updated on 14 January 2024

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