An icy and blustery day greeted our arrival at Jeake’s House in the November of 1985 and snow was falling in Mermaid Street. Francis and I had sold our comfortable family home in The Grove and as we opened the front door of the old Store House (built in 1689), the words of the American writer and poet Conrad Aiken who also had bought it in 1924 rang in my ears. “We felt as though we had bought the Taj Mahal…as we may encounter rooms yet unnoticed, filled with mice and foul with bats…rodents putting ancient grizzled snouts out of holes in the floors...the wallpapers hang in mouldy festoons...the garden is a haunted wood of black weeds and savage hollyhocks…”
I suppose the house spoke to me, but I honestly can’t remember quite what it said when all those years later the extent of the near-dereliction became clear.
Long centuries of neglect had left our brave old house in a serious state of decay, certainly filled with rodents and both wet and dry rot. The steady tick of the Death Watch beetle echoed in the dusty silence.
The vermin were quickly despatched but the still undiagnosed creaks and groans of the house’s tired and aching beams took many years to be addressed. Our elderly beetle seemed reluctant to cease in its feverish hidden activity, and the children who were still quite young complained bitterly about the frost on their eyelashes when they woke for school.
The restoration seemed exhausting but was carried out with great attention by local builder Dave Couves, later to be known by us all as “Super Dave”, a man from whom we learned many life skills including the art of “repurposing” as it is called today. Our grateful thanks go to countless more local tradespeople and our small, loyal staff who have all worked so very hard on this long journey.
The Great Storm of 1987 stripped us of all our roofs and we feared for the future, as did so many other Rye residents.
Time passed, of course and the children grew. One of our most exciting discoveries was in finding the original Baptismal font which lies beneath the floor boards in the old chapel – probably laid there in about 1753. The children were keen to fill it with fish, all to be named after the former Baptist Ministers…
Our many ghosts were clearly grateful for the installation of heating and modern day plumbing after centuries of freezing conditions and the house seemed to settle into its new role of welcoming guests.
Over the years we have been lucky enough to receive a great deal of public recognition, some splendid awards and today Richard and I are delighted to have welcomed visitors from all over the world and proud that Jeake’s House still stands in its rightful place in the rich and fascinating history of Rye.
Had I had been able to talk to Samuel Jeake himself I wonder if he would have found some “cosmic alliance” (as he did when he laid the foundation stone in 1689), and have considered this to be “an auspicious time” for my departure?
In his later years Conrad Aiken referred to it as his “deeply cherished home...lighted by laughter, the kind of light that never goes out.” I have cherished it indeed and consider myself fortunate to have been its custodian for forty years.
