Inside the warrior monks' rural retreat

MEDIEVAL ORIGINS: The Old Hall was built during the heyday of the
renowned Knights Templar

HARD to believe today, but this quaint-looking cottage in the Solihull countryside was once the local headquarters for an ancient order of warrior monks. 

The Old Hall, at Temple Balsall, was previously at the heart of the preceptory (command centre) for the Knights Templar in Warwickshire.

The building's name isn't an empty boast either, tests of the roof timbers have revealed the frame dates back perhaps as far as the 1200s.

It was beneath these beams that one of the most fearsome fighting companies in Christendom conducted their business, before their dramatic fall from grace in the early 14th century.

OUTSIDE: The neat cottage garden.
The parish church is visible behind.

The hall, which is Grade II*-listed by Historic England, is today encased in red bricks that would have been laid in the 1800s.

But behind the work of Sir George Gilbert Scott, a prolific architect, is a much older Medieval structure. Although largely hidden today, it survived the more recent modifications.

When experts decide on the importance of any particular building, they consider not only its age or what it looks like but the history around it. 

This has a number of different strands. First there is the fact that somewhere was, in the past, linked to a particular group or activity or person.

Sometimes these connections are rather flimsy; think how many coastal pubs in this country claim to be former smugglers' havens or the number of old estates insisting that a particular King or Queen got some kip there many moons ago.

The Old Hall has, by contrast, copper-bottomed ties to the Templars, who were gifted the land by a wealthy admirer and ally.

The history of the site is fairly well documented, the very name of the hamlet today derives from the order which once held sway over some 640 acres of arable land.

Historian Eileen Golder, who has written extensively about the estate, paints a picture of a thriving farming community. She describes how sheep were fattened here, apples pressed for cider and how the country landscape would have even been enlivened by exotic peacocks.

As Golder notes Balsall, with "its space and seclusion and reasonably central position" had much to recommend it. 

It was the abundance of agricultural activity, here and at similar sites elsewhere, that allowed the order to raise funds for the religious crusades it engaged with overseas.

Amid the milling and ploughing and animal breeding was the Old Hall, which appeared to become an important site for welcoming new recruits and meting out punishments to those in the order who fell foul of its strict moral codes. 

If past events are one part of heritage, actual objects associated with them are another. The archaeological importance of Temple Balsall is why a wider area around the Old Hall is actually marked out as a legally protected "scheduled monument". 

In the 1980s, the property's cellar was excavated and while the finds were much later than the Middle Ages - consisting mostly of pottery from the hall's 17th century period - it is proof that physical artefacts can and do get unearthed.

What else may lie undiscovered is something we might explore as we visit other buildings in this still deeply rural part of the borough in future posts.

Knights Templar: The military order was set up in 1119 and several decades later, during the reign of King Stephen, acquired land at Temple Balsall.

This was a gift from the nobleman Roger de Mowbray and by the early 13th century the estate was firmly established as the local preceptory.

For another 100 years the Old Hall and the land around it was an important asset for a group who Temple Balsall's one-time vicar, Reverend R.F Fairburn, had described as "soldier-monks".

The fact he was writing about their local links almost a century ago shows the Templars have long been the subject of interest and intrigue.

Although his account, first published in 1927, perhaps centres rather more on the chivalry of the age and less on the crusades' often bloody legacy.

Aside from being a monastic order the Templars were after all a formidable force in the religious wars which wracked the Middle East throughout the Medieval era, often described as "shock troops" or the protectors of pilgrims on their way to the Holy Land.

But the Templars' fearsome reputation failed to prevent the rapid unravelling of the order in the early 1300s. Dark rumours about some of their ceremonies and a French king keen to contrive a way to discharge his deepening debt sealed their fate. Friday 13th, 1307 saw the arrest, torture and execution of many members. And five years later the Pope disbanded the order altogether.

References:

A brief history of Temple Balsall from the Foundation of Lady Katherine Leveson

Historic England Heritage List for England listing (1952)

Temple Balsall 1150-1870: A Short History, Eileen Golder (2002)

The Knights of the Temple ... and their connection with Temple Balsall, F.R Fairburn (1927)

The Templars History & Myth, Michael Haag (2009).

Castle Brom's last farm - a link to the rural past

SURVIVING: The former farmhouse/ Google Street View

STOOD at the roadside, near the pristine paintwork of a mini roundabout, is a building that has been a part of the area for at least three centuries.

What was once Beechcroft Farmhouse is perhaps easy to overlook on a suburban street where rows of homes are now crowded on both sides.

But it is a important link back to Castle Bromwich's rural past, when only a scattering of isolated cottages speckled the route of the old Chester Road.

It is fair to say that the patchwork of fields, which once covered the parish, are now far more a feature of ageing ordinance survey (OS) maps than living memory.

Although Beechcroft is a reminder that that isn't entirely the case. As the Castle Bromwich Village Trail - a concise guide to local sites of note - confirms, this was the last of the area's working farms and its agricultural days lasted rather longer than some may realise. 

PERIOD FEATURES: The porch
and distinctive barge boards

Indeed, those who lived locally might recall how now vanished pastures to the rear were still used to graze horses and cows into the 1970s.

Its relatively recent use means that while other estates only survive in the names of streets signs or developments - think perhaps of The Firs or Park Hall - here is one where a building itself is still standing.

From the roadside the pebbledash walls don't jump out as belonging to the 1600s; this is the date which heritage records suggest the farm came into use, although they acknowledge it might have been even earlier.

But of course many structures change over time and a lot of the features you can see today, such as the 19th century gabled porch and the decorated bargeboards, would have been added much later.

Numerous outbuildings, included an old barn, were ultimately bulldozed.

In its final years, this barn was perhaps notable for a distinctive V-shape in the tiles of the roof.

According to Colin Green's Castle Bromwich: In Times Past, the V - for victory - was created by workmen repairing damage caused during a wartime bombing raid. The farmland was of course only a short distance from Castle Bromwich Airfield and the nearby Spitfire factory - an important target for the German Luftwaffe.

After the barn and farmland failed to escape the housing developments of several decades later, Beechcroft itself was turned into a residential dwelling following the departure of the final farmer (a Mr Rawlins).

The building was deemed noteworthy enough to be included on Solihull Council's Local List - a document I will be referring to quite a bit in these posts as it is something of a treasure trove for more obscure historic landmarks.

Such lists are drawn-up by local authorities around the country and include sites which are of significant value - and deserve to be preserved - but have not been deemed quite important enough to receive a national listing from Historic England.

As with several buildings in this part of the borough, Beechcroft's age is perhaps made less obvious by the gradual development to have taken place around it. 

And yet its survival is a reminder that while Solihull's motto is "Town in the Country", there are also some important remnants of the country in built-up areas.

References:

Castle Bromwich Village Trail, produced for the Castle Bromwich Bell Restoration Project (2017)

Castle Bromwich: In Times Past, C.W Green (1984)

Old Ordnance Survey Maps: Birmingham & District 1910 (reprinted 2014)

Solihull Council's Local List of Heritage Assets (revised October 14, 2022).

Future plans for historic gatehouse stones discussed

KEY FIND: The gatehouse remains uncovered / HS2 Ltd

THE remains of a Medieval gatehouse - unearthed at a HS2 dig-site near North Solihull - have been removed from the site but the structure is unlikely to be rebuilt as it was.

Archaeologists excavating the former site of Coleshill Manor had speculated the heavily fortified entrance may have been witness to one of the earliest skirmishes of the English Civil War.

In an update, delivered to Solihull Council earlier this evening, experts confirmed that the red sandstone blocks had been loaded onto pallets and retained.

While there are hopes the masonry might form a feature somewhere along the rail route, the possibility of rebuilding the gatehouse in its entirety elsewhere appears to have been ruled out.

Hayley James, HS2's archaeology and heritage advisor, suggested this might have limited value now the blocks had been lifted from their original setting.

"We may not aim to reconstruct it," she said, when asked by Meriden councillor Andrew Burrow if this was an option under consideration.

"One of the most important things about archaeology is it having its context.

"Once it is not where it originally was, it does lose a little bit of its significance."

But she said the aim was to work with the rail project's design team to put the materials to use in a "creative and informative way".

The scale of the gatehouse at the moated manor house was entirely unknown before teams got to work a few years ago.

Around 200 marks from muskets and pistols pockmarked the walls, fuelling the theory that there was a confrontation there almost 400 years ago.

The possible link with the Civil War comes from the fact that the first recorded battle of the conflict took place at nearby Curdworth Bridge in August 1642.

The find was significant enough to feature in an episode of Digging for Britain - the BBC series presented by Prof Alice Roberts - earlier this year.

"I was amazed at just how much of the monumental stone building, with its two great octagonal towers, had survived below the ground," she said.

Excavations at sites of historic significance have been taking place across the length of the Birmingham to London rail link.

While a number of important finds have been made, the intention has never been to keep discoveries in-situ since many of the trenches have been dug on land earmarked for development.

Information on other excavations in the Solihull area, highlighted at this week's meeting of the HS2 implementation advisory group, will feature in a future post.

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Ringing the changes: A campaign to save our red boxes

GOOD CALL: A booth in Bickenhill now stocking books

"BUT phone boxes aren't buildings," some of you might be grumbling. Let's be honest many of them aren't even phone boxes these days, but we'll come on to that.

It's certainly self-evident that the classic kiosks I'll be writing about this week are obviously not the same as farm cottages or shops. They can, however, fall under the wider umbrella of what are often called "heritage assets".

I'm keen to try and avoid overloading this blog with technical terms, not least because "A tour of the borough's heritage assets" is not the catchiest title.

But it's still interesting that something we might dismiss as the thing from which we used to call cabs is an important part of Solihull's history.

It's coming up to a 100 years since the first of the now famous red boxes appeared in the UK and with the design having become something of a cultural icon there's often a strong attachment to them.

And if you don't believe me then take the word of Historic England - which has national responsibility for listing historically important landmarks. They have written an entire booklet on preserving so-called street furniture, including bollards, street lamps, post boxes and, yes, phone booths.

Still not convinced? Then consider how a number of communities across Solihull have already stepped in to ensure the future of their local kiosk.

As long ago as 2008, parish councillors in Bickenhill agreed a deal with BT to take on responsibility for their red box - paying just £1 for the privilege.

Announcing the decision, then chairman Frank Bunce had described the structure, in St Peter's Lane, as "an iconic British image that is so synonymous with a village landscape."

HISTORY CALLING: The box adoption in the news 
Solihull Times: October 2008

At the time the agreement was innovative enough to make the front page of the Solihull Times, but the villagers in fact turned out to be "early adopters" of a scheme that has become increasingly popular around the country.

A number of other Solihull communities have moved to ensure that their own booths are secure, in an era when an ever increasing number - especially in more rural locations -  are being disconnected from the telecoms network.

In Berkswell several boxes have been transformed into miniature book exchanges; this proved especially useful during the pandemic, when Covid restrictions forced the closure of the village's branch library.

While at Millisons Wood, near Meriden, it was decided to turn a defunct kiosk into a first response station, complete with a life-saving defibrillator.

The affection for the boxes today may have come as a surprise to some of those around for the initial installation, when the eye-catching shade of red often caused public concern.

Indeed there were more than a few pleas for kiosks to be painted in more muted colours, especially in leafier settings.

Such calls bear striking similarities with debates that still rage today over the installation of infrastructure; in 2020 councillors agreed a 20 metre phone mast in Shirley on condition that it be camouflaged with a coat of "Solihull green" paint.

The fact that the now widely-admired phone boxes were the subject of similarly heated discussions pre-war goes to show that yesterday's eyesores can yet become iconic within a few generations. 

Hence the fervor of forward-thinking residents' groups moving to prevent former communication hubs becoming urination hubs - or worse. 

The danger is that, without action, these features will fall into disrepair and in time be at risk of disappearing altogether. This is why conservationists more widely are always keen to ensure that options to find new uses are regularly reviewed.

With kiosks in particular, expect this trend to continue as the demand for landlines increasingly declines. Indeed, only last month BT announced that a further 36 phone boxes across the West Midlands - including one in Solihull - would be made available for adoption.

Notably the scheme has escaped the effects of sky-high inflation, with the asking price for "owning a piece of history" still set at a pound.

Know your phone boxes: The first of the famous red boxes arrived on British streets in 1926, although in a scenario still rather too familiar today the K2 model was largely restricted to London. Later iterations were, of course, rolled-out rather more widely. Indeed it was the K6, the first widely installed outside the capital, which arguably cemented the status of the kiosk. This particular version was designed in 1935 to commemorate the Silver Jubilee of King George V. Public usage of boxes continued to grow and peaked in around 1990, when there were 100,000 in use nationwide. Although  the arrival of mobile phones has since driven a long-term decline and by 2021 the number of boxes still in use had fallen to 20,000.

Welcome: A tour of the borough's historic sites

THE most famous view in all of Solihull - the one on all the postcards and council handbooks - is probably looking up the High Street towards the striking spire of St Alphege.

A quick glance at Google throws up variations of the same image, which tends to suggest that even in the age of the iPhone shots first circulated in the days of black and white photography are spreading increasingly widely.

The church appears in half of the search engine's first 10 Solihull images, with four others showing some other stretch of the High Street. Only a picture of a UK-wide map with a rather bold red arrow pointing at the middle of the country breaks the trend.

All of this came to mind because of the photo I chose as the wallpaper for the page you're now reading. In its own very small way this blog is only adding to a long tradition of holding up one scrap of one street with the apparent intention of saying "this here is Solihull".

Of course the sandstone blocks of the parish church or the 19th century brickwork of the adjacent Mason's Arms pub aren't Solihull - they're just a few structures in one corner of a community where 200,000 plus people live.

Ironically the image is entirely out of kilter with the vast majority of streets you might stroll down in the wider area.

Timber beams of the type seen on the right-hand side are rare survivors not common features. And the grand old lamp-posts, with a design harkening back to a pre-electric past, are a world away from the modern street lights that line the vast majority of kerbsides.  

All the same, there's no doubt that local landmarks, with stories that in some cases stretch across several centuries, are a hugely important part of local identity. There's a reason they jump so easily to mind.

It is stating the obvious to say that part of the reason is that they've been there an awful long time; evolving but enduring even as old country tracks have become avenues and villages have grown into towns.

Let's take St Alphege, whose bells rang out to welcome the new King's coronation earlier this year. It was already old when another Charles (of a different number) saw his reign come to a rude end in the mid-17th century.

The church's 800th anniversary was somewhat lost in the panic and disruption of the Covid-19 crisis; an exhibition scheduled for early 2020 had to be abandoned when The Core gallery abruptly shut its doors.

It is worth reflecting of course that while almost no-one alive today was there to witness the previous global pandemic, the church had stood through not only the Spanish Flu but also the Black Death, which first ravaged the borough in 1348. Another testament to its significance

The sudden closure of sites like St Alphege, and its near neighbour The Mason's Arms, three years ago was also a useful reminder that buildings - particularly buildings of a certain age and status - are far more than just bricks and mortar. They're meeting places that are full of memories and when the lights suddenly go out in the window or the bells fall silent an area feels instantly different.

In this blog I hope to look at historic buildings around Solihull - how they came to be built, how they've changed over time and what they mean to people now. The intention is to weave in some architecture, some archaeology and some historical context.

If I chose to open with a post that focuses on a scene anyone local will be familiar with, I hope we can quickly move the attention to far more obscure sites too; places off the beaten track or which are often overlooked. All suggestions obviously welcome.

Hopefully posts will show a history of more than just the very rich landowners or public officials whose names are more likely to survive in the old archives, but the population as a whole. 

A history not just of Solihull's ancient villages but the neighbourhoods that are rather more modern and are sometimes absurdly assumed to have no history - as if the houses and road signs simply dropped on some dead space on a map.

And a history which escapes the trap of only focusing on what has been lost or easy assumptions that things used to be better back then - whenever "then" was. 

One slight issue I have with some of the nostalgia sites that have gained popularity in the social media era is that sometimes they become dominated by slightly aggressive opinions about what the world looks like today, which misses an opportunity to take a proper look at and learn from the past.

Above all I hope to keep the site interesting and engaging to as many people as possible. Let's see where this takes us...