The Abbey Church

The church was the most important building within any religious community – it was here that the canons gathered for the eight services that punctuated their day. On feast days there were elaborate religious processions. Rich patrons were buried within Bayham’s church, and there is evidence that in the summer of 1299, during the Anglo-French war, Edward I stopped there to give thanks for good news that he had received from France.

The original early 13th-century church was ambitiously extended in about 1260 with an unusual, angular east end. The ‘stiff-leaf foliage’ sculpture on the corbels (supports) is similar to contemporary work at Westminster Abbey. Later, in the 15th century, Bayham’s long, narrow nave – typical of Premonstratensian churches – was largely rebuilt. Something of its glory can be glimpsed in the surviving pillars, with their distinctive fluted decoration, and the enormous windows in the south wall.

During excavations in 1966, fragments of fine stained glass were found in a vault above the north transept. This richly decorated glass dates from several periods spanning the 13th to 15th centuries, and the quality and style of some of the 13th-century glass has been compared to the glass at Canterbury Cathedral.

Bayham in the 15th century

During his regular inspections in the late 15th century, Bishop Richard Redman, the Abbot of Premontré’s visitor-general in the British Isles for 46 years, often criticised Bayham Abbey. He found that parts of the building had been allowed to fall into a ruinous state, and was also concerned that the daily services were not being carried out properly as there were not enough canons at Bayham. In 1472 he complained that Bayham was very poorly supplied with grain ‘and other necessaries’.

Nonetheless, Bayham’s canons felt sure enough of their future to embark on a major programme of building works in the 15th century, perhaps spurred on by Bishop Redman’s findings. And in 1500 Redman even praised Bayham’s abbot for his laudable administration of the monastery.

Yet Bayham was closed on Cardinal Wolsey’s orders in 1525, as one of 20 small monasteries whose endowments he wanted to use for colleges he had founded.

Bayham and the Pratts

After Wolsey’s fall from power Bayham’s estates mostly reverted to the Crown, and Henry VIII leased them to royal favourites. Eventually in about 1580 Elizabeth I granted Bayham to Anthony Browne, 1st Viscount Montagu.

In 1714 the lawyer Sir John Pratt, who became Lord Chief Justice of England four years later, bought the Bayham estate. For over 250 years the Pratt family used the estate as a residence and country retreat.

In about 1750 Sir John’s grandson John (III) extended an existing villa here (later known as the Dower House) by adding a north wing, an early example of the Gothic Revival style. At a time when there was new interest in the picturesque qualities of ancient buildings, the house, close to the abbey, formed a perfect vantage point from which to appreciate the ruins.

John Pratt (III) and his wife, Sarah Eyles, had been given Bayham on their marriage in 1746. This was one of several marriages the Pratts made in the first half of the 18th century with the Eyles and Jeffreys families. Both these families (which were also interconnected by marriage) were extremely rich, their wealth deriving from many sources including land ownership and global trade. Through marriage with the lawyers and politicians of the Pratt family, heiresses brought this wealth to Bayham.