Charing Palace: A Palace Hidden in a Barn

Sometimes there is a call for funds from a brave heritage charity which the Historic Houses Foundation can support in partnership with other funding bodies.  When The Spitalfields Trust decided to risk taking on the surviving medieval buildings at Charing Palace in Kent, their ambition demanded attention.

Charing Palace may not be a household name but there was a time when it witnessed some of the major events of history and, unlikely as it sounds, there is a major Archbishop’s Palace tucked away little recognised in a sleepy Kentish village. The key is its strategic position between London and Canterbury but the survival of many of its 14th century buildings owe more to its journey into obscurity in the eighteenth century than to its continuing national importance. Dan Cruickshank, architectural historian and chair of the trustees of The Spitalfields Trust, points out "The Archbishop's Palace at Charing in Kent is a marvellous architectural survival of intense historic interest embedded - in almost a secret manner - within one of the county's most attractive villages.”

The Palace has origins in the 8th century when it was the first foundation granted to Christchurch Canterbury by Offa, the Saxon King of Mercia, from where it became a residence for the medieval Archbishops of Canterbury. The earliest surviving building, part of the current farmhouse, may date from the 13th century but the farmhouse was substantially altered once the Palace was sold into private hands.  Other buildings have survived as barns and farm buildings. The main group – the Great Hall, Gatehouse and Porter’s Lodge - seem to have been built around a courtyard by John de Stratford, a shrewd politician who survived the fall of Edward II to become Archbishop of Canterbury, Treasurer and Chancellor to Edward III in the 1330s. The palace was then substantially rebuilt by John Morton, Henry VII’s powerful Archbishop in the 15th century but there is little surviving evidence of his “great building” here.  What is certain is that Henry VII made several visits here with Archbishop Morton as his host and after his death, Henry VIII was a guest of Archbishop William Wareham when he stayed here with his queen, Katherine of Aragon, en route to the famous meeting with Francis I of France in 1520, known to history as ‘The Field of the Cloth of Gold’. After the Reformation, the Palace became home to Archbishop Cranmer but he was forced to hand both Charing and his house at Knole to his guest Henry VIII in 1545 in exactly the same way that the King had coveted Cardinal Wolsey’s house at Hampton Court. In 1559, the Palace passed into private ownership and began a slow history of decline.

A major grant from Historic England backed up by a grant from the HHF will fund a study to date the age of the timbers before repair. The project means this important survival from medieval England can be restored and converted back into a building in which someone can live once more while maintaining public access. Once again, a small grant from The Historic Houses Foundation is acting as a stimulant for other grants to get the ball rolling.

Images © Historic England