Hidden Treasures: Three Wells House/Eastfield documents (D16629)

It is utterly amazing what can be found in an archive. Proof of this was recently brought to my attention when I looked at one of our accessions. Accessions are groups of records/documents that come to an archives and we then carry out initial processing of them, which we as archivists call accessioning. 

The accession was simply listed as Bourton OTW house-listed building Deeds, conveyances, research plans. The name Bourton immediately aroused my curiosity as it was where I spent the first 19 years of my life and where I still have family. So, I examined the accession more closely. It turned out to be for Three Wells House otherwise known as Eastfield. This sent even more alarm bells ringing as I knew the name Eastfield. Eastfield was owned by the Morris family who also owned the model village (a major tourist attraction in the village) and were publicans of the Old New Inn pub, hotel and restaurant. My grandmother had worked at the Old New Inn for many years as indeed did my sister and myself. 

So, what did the accession contain. Upon examination many documents known as title deeds. These are legal documents that constitute evidence of a right, especially to ownership of property. Title deeds include such documents as wills and indentures. In modern times these would include such documents as a Title register, Title plan, Conveyance deed, Transfer deed, Charge deed, Lease deed and Abstract of title. It also contained two rolls of maps and two sheets of modern typed notes. 

What do the records show us? Basically, the records detail the history of Eastfield house and provide a wonderful snapshot of life in Bourton dating back at least as far as 1746.  As the collection is more fully catalogued, which is the second of a two-stage process after accessioning, more fascinating insights are sure to be revealed. This can be illustrated by the discovery of sales particulars amongst the records. For those that don’t know, these are a brochure produced when selling a property. The major advantage of sales particulars is that they contain photographs and therefore provide a visual record of the property (in addition to descriptions that you would get in purely word-based documents from earlier times before the advent of photography).

This image is taken from the sales particulars for Eastfield and is from 2002. It shows the outside of the property, the stable block and views of two of the rooms in the property. This document is provisionally assigned to have the reference number D16629/1/2/1.

For Eastfield there were sales particulars from 1964 with a black and white photograph on the front and 2002 in a colour brochure including 5 colour photographs. The latter show the outside of the whole property from two different angles, the stable block and two of the rooms inside the property. The two maps have been examined and are a survey of Eastfield showing the ground and first floor and a part map of Bourton including: Eastfield, the Old New Inn, the River Windrush, Rissington Road, the Post Office, High Street and Station Road. 

This image is of a part map of Bourton-on-the-Water showing the area immediately around Eastfield. 

Unfortunately, the date of the map is at the present moment unknown.

This document is provisionally assigned to have the reference number D16629/3/2.

I have many happy memories of working for the Morris family at the Old New Inn cleaning toilets, emptying bottles from the pub from the night before, re-filling the pub shelves with bottles and helping to run the entrance kiosk at the Model Village. I would therefore very much like to keep you informed of what I find as I more fully catalogue the records. I hope that is something that you would be interested in?

Written by Jon Shepherd (Community Cataloguing Archivist)