Abandoned farm House

 

Today's adventure is a happy accident. The derelict house is almost completely masked from the street. Completely by chance, I happened to stand at just the right angle and caught a glimmer of brickage through a wall of leaves. It's been a long time since anyone gave this place any love, but it's still somehow wholesome.

 

 

The windows are boarded, but the door is unlocked, decorated with a plea for help and a warning not to enter, no doubt scrawled by the same bored teenager/middle-aged manlet. It's perhaps a few years away from being completely obstructed by brambles, but I shall not be getting stabbed my plants today.

 

 

Slipping inside brings us to this staircase with some Victorian-era floor tiles peeking out through the dirt. It all feels rather dated, reminding me of the house I grew up in more so than the characterless box I now inhabit.

I wasn't at all surprised to find that it was actually once on a wealthy estate. It still is, technically, but the big cheese of said estate doesn't live there and doesn't seem to care. In fact renovation of this house was curiously stopped some time ago when the owner decided that the land around it would be great to build newer houses on. So it seems that the plan is to let this one fall into ruin to make way for that.

The last occupants were a man called Reg, his wife, and their plethora of feline companions, and by all accounts they were rather lovely people. Such accounts are entirely from the 1970s but that doesn't mean they weren't here for longer. But I do know that they were the last occupants, and the house has been empty ever since.

 

 

The rooms are as I expected. Spacious, empty and almost indistinguishable in regards to what purpose they served, although presumably fulfilling the roles of lounge and dining room. This one definitely has dining room vibes. 

 

 Whereas this has a bit of a cosy vibe that makes me think it might have been a lounge.

 

The yellow room, with its sole extant work surface cupboard combo is almost definitely the kitchen.

 

 

And I'm really loving the wallpaper. It gives it some character. It's a hint of homeliness shining through all the trashitude.

 

 

There's still a hook attached to the ceiling beam, which probably once had a pan or something hanging from it, such was the norm back in the day.

 

 

There's also a set of stairs behind the kitchen wall.

But it's the pantry that I found particularly interesting.

 

 

Purely because there's actually stuff left behind here. 

 

 

These are the final remnants of Reggie and his wife's life here, left to gather dust. I guess when the whole place was cleared out, someone forgot to finish the pantry. But then why are books even in the pantry? That seems rather odd. 

But these books are very telling. "Husband in Training" by Christine Rimmer is a romance novel that was published in 1999. "No Way To Begin" is another romance novel first published in 1991.

 

 

"Finders Keepers," by Candice Adams, was published in 1985.

So it's given us a rough idea of how long Reg and his wife lived here. Even though most recollections of them that I could find were dated around the 1970s, they clearly survived to at least 1999. It's possible that they're still alive and have just moved out.

 

It's time to slip upstairs.
 

 

Through some additional digging, I found that in the 1940s this place was lived in by a man named Frank, who was the Butler of the estate. But soon he would be joined by the grand poobah of the estate too, a chap named Jock. 

 

Jock was born in 1883, and ticks all the rich folk boxes. His parents were cousins, he attended Eton school, which is basically Hogwarts for wankers, and at the outbreak of the first world war he avoided being sent to the frontlines by being ill.

But poor Jock was a bit of a misfit. His mother died when he was two, and his father was a bit tight on the purse strings, making him "the poor one" at Eton. 

Consequently when he did finally get financial autonomy he went a bit nuts. It was said that he'd rather make £10 crookedly than £100 straight. Ultimately he faced scandal when he nicked some paintings and his first wife's pearls in order to fraudulently claim insurance. Oh dear. 

 

Jock. (Photo not mine, obviously)

So already marked with controversy, and with another world war looming, Jock took his second wife to Kenya, where they joined the Happy Valley Set, a group of British aristocrats who had set up their own private paradise, notorious for their hedonism, dabbling in drink, drugs, sexual promiscuity and whatnot.

Jock was said to be slightly out of place in such a world of rampant alcohol and adultery. Despite the fact that his second wife was already unfaithful and not making a secret that she was with him for his money, even referring to him as a dirty old man, he seemed to actually be hurt by the attention she was getting. 

They'd only been married for three months when she had an affair with a man who considered himself the top dog of the Happy Valley Set, a philanderer and serial womaniser, specifically targeting married women. 

 

The affair was very public and Jock, hurt and humiliated, ended up giving it his blessing before resolving to return to the UK alone. Shortly after, the other man was discovered shot dead in his car. Jock was the chief suspect, but it's also been said that there's an over-abundance people who would also have reasons for wanting the man dead. Many referred to him as a first-rate shit. The story made waves in the media, with the whole subject of rich people killing each other over their own depravity bringing some much-needed juice to the British public in wartime. But Jock was ultimately found not guilty.

Despite this, Jock lost everything. He was shunned by the Happy Valley Set. His wife left him for another rich man, who Jock described as the most boring man in the world. He turned to drink and was then flung from his horse, resulting in him being encased in plaster with a spinal injury. He returned to England, alone. But his grand house, the seat of his estate, had been commandeered and repurposed for the war effort. 

With nowhere to go, he came here and lived with his butler.

 

So it kinda makes me see this place from a whole new perspective. It's a large house by my own peasant standards, but for Jock this must have been hell to adjust to. He was used to refinery and grandeur. Now he was sofa surfing with the working class. It's an interesting dynamic, and I wish I knew more about this period of his life.

 

Upon arriving back in the UK, Jock was questioned by police due to the theft of his first wife's pearls, which only really served to give him more grief on top of what he was already going through. For a rich bloke who was used to getting what he wanted, life in this spacious four-bedroomed manor house was a bit of a kick to the teeth, and he told nobody that he had returned, apart from his butler Frank, who had to deal with his depressed alcoholic employer moping around the place. It's not like he could really comment or even object to the sudden intrusion either, because Jock owned the house, the land it was on, and paid Franks wages too. 

In 1942 Jock went to his solicitor and put together a very flimsy will. To his daughter he offered "any trinket she desired," and to his son he gave a gold cigarette case, a gold watch and a shotgun, stating that he was to have nothing else because he was already amply provided for. As for Frank, the loyal butler who had put him up, he gave £100 (equivalent of nearly £4000 today) and some bedroom furniture, a subtle hint that maybe he wasn't impressed with his decor.

Jock then went to a hotel in Liverpool. He had previously come here with his second wife back when he was still married to his first wife. Perhaps this is something he regarded as his biggest mistake. He gave the hotel staff orders to not disturb him because he'd be looking after himself, and then he overdosed on barbiturates and died.

The story of Jock is a sad one, but it was all of his lifestyle choices that led him to that point. His story is one of self destruction, and in the end he knew it. 

Now onto the best part of any abandoned house, the bathroom.

 

,,

 Still in better condition than the toilets in some pubs and clubs.

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 It's weird to think that rich boy Jock, head of the entire estate, has shat here.

 

 

While it didn't happen here, the nearby land was also the scene of a gruesome murder in 1835 that I want to briefly digress into. The victim in question was a girl called Mary, the domestic of the estates land steward, described as a remarkably fine girl with pleasing manners whose conduct had been exemplary. While the local papers at the time said she was seventeen, her gravestone says she was fifteen. I guess it's all rather immaterial now. She was a child either way. I know all the Royal buttlickers say that this age is perfectly fine when the person doing the letching is Prince Andrew (and not a brown person), but young is young. 

 

Mary had, at midnight, come knocking on her mistresses door requesting to be allowed to return to her parents home, because she had received word that her mother was ill and dying. Her mistress allowed her to go, but didn't inquire about where the message had come from. She heard Mary go down the stairs and out through the door. In the morning, they found the door locked and the key missing, presumably taken by Mary. There was also a ladder lying on the ground outside of her window, presumably the means by which the messenger had relayed the news to Mary.

Mary's mother, however, was perfectly well, and Mary was found dead in a field, having been duped out of the house. Her clothes were a mess, and the grass around was disturbed as if a struggle had taken place. She had bruising and scratching around her throat and thighs. The verdict was that someone had tried to rape her but not succeeded, and she had been choked to death.

An hour later, a labourer in his fifties named Thomas, sharing the same employer, was found hanging in one of the farm buildings. He was described as quiet, honest and hard working, of a rather reserved disposition, but in his pocket was the key that Mary had taken, so he was quickly concluded to be the culprit. His wife recalled how she had called him to bed late multiple times late into the night and he had kept on saying "I'm coming" but when the wife woke at 2am she found that he had left the house.

The story is recapped on Marys grave, which says "he escaped the punishment of the law by adding his own death to that of his innocent victim."

 

Interestingly in 1998 the great-great-great granddaughter of Thomas learned of his actions while researching her family tree, and was outraged to the point that she is now hellbent on proving his innocence. Which baffles me, if I'm honest. I've researched my own family tree too. My forget-how-many-great grand uncle was shipped off to Australia back when that was a thing, and I'm not outraged, because that isn't me or anyone close to me, so why take it personally? Any outrage seems to be far more ego-fueled than anything. It's as if she's personally insulted by the idea that she's descended from someone nefarious. But I hate to piddle on everyone's picnic, but we probably all are, somewhere down the line. Humans are great at being shit. 

Thomas's descendant has one small fact to bring to the table, that Mary was friends with Thomas's daughter who happened to be a victim of rape. She believes that Thomas caught the same rapist going after Mary, lost his shit, and the two had a fight. The rapist ultimately killed both, but made Thomas's death look like suicide to set him up for Mary's murder. The source of this information? Psychics and mediums, of course! People who are literally paid to tell you what you want to hear. 

Honestly this is really petty. If you're descended from a criminal, it's not a personal attack on you. Just live with it.

Ultimately the murder of Mary and the suicide of Thomas has very little to do with this house, but it happened in the vicinity and it's a good story, so I've included it anyway. 

Onto the out-buildings...

 

 

There's a room around the back which contains a couple of freezers, although why they're here when the kitchen is perfectly spacious is anyone's guess. 

 

 And of course there's barns galore.

 

 

And it wouldn't be true urbex without a badly drawn cock somewhere.

 

There's a sign on the wall about cow milking, but apart from that it's fairly ruinous. 

 

 

This part of the barn is just full of brambles and nettles and other pointy things designed by nature to hurt my feelings and ankles. But I don't need to go in there. I can see it all from the window, and it's nothing I haven't seen before. 

 

Aaaand that's all I've got. 

I actually really like this place. I know houses aren't the most stellar adventures of the urbex world. I say that as someone who once swam out to a capsized cruise ship, so it goes without saying that I like things to be a tad more exciting. But things like this make for a fun mooch. There's loads of places that are commonly trekked by the casual urbexer that I'll see during the most rudimentary Instagram doomscroll, and I'll know exactly what I'll see when I go there. This was a roadside find, completely accidental and off the common urbex radar, which I actually enjoy more. This means I have no idea what I'm getting into. It's very much like that military base where I stumbled across an entire horse skeleton, completely unexpected. And people were begging me to tell them where it was, and I just didn't see why. They weren't going to get the same "Holy shit" feeling that I did, because they'd know it was there. What's the appeal? I love not knowing what I'll find. I love an authentic adventure even if, in today's case, it is just a house. The next unexpected roadside find might be something awesome.

Sadly for the urbex world, all of the suicide and murders that loosely tie into the history of this place actually take place away from the house, so it's dodged the clickbait and cringey "paranormal investigation" labels thrust upon them by the trash-tier urbexer. Unless they lie, which is not unlikely. 

But hey-fucking-ho. 

Coming up next, I'm turning my attention to my travel blog with my invasion of Europe and a story that I can't wait to dig my teeth into. But until then, if you like my blogs and want to keep up with them, then my social medias are by far the best way. Although referring to social media and "best" in the same sentence feels like a contradiction in terms. But we live in an era now where people are tired of the shittery that comes with the usual webshites and their algorithmic hellscapes cancelling our reach and trying to sell it back to us, and consequently, we now have options. Vero provides something reminiscent of an old Instagram experience, albeit slightly buggy, so I can be followed there, whereas Blue Sky perfectly encapsulates a pre-Elon (prelon?) Twitter, so that's interesting. Some genius has even remade Myspace as Spacehey, so I'm there and still trying to figure out how I can bend it to my flavour of shameless self-promotion in a world that lacks the modern newsfeed of today. And of course, I'm on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Threads and Reddit. But I don't know why. As soon as these alternatives get big enough, let's jump ship. There is hope for the future.

Thanks for reading!