An Essex Dovecote Rediscovered
Taken from Essex Archaeology and History News, No. 104,
December 1988
The cover of the August issue of the newsletter featured
illustrations of two dovecotes, taken from Donald
Smiths's Pigeon Houses and Dove Houses of Essex (1931). The following note describes a dovecote not featured in that work.
"When the Manning
family lived in the old house on
the moated site at Great Garnets,
there
being
six
daughters,
it was not uncommon to find lovers under the old archway. However, it was not until a few years
ago,
when
one
of Maurice Gepp's
daughters
kindly
sent me a few old photographs of High Easter district taken by her father,
that
I realised there had been a lover in the
archway roof as well! The photograph
was taken in about 1890 and shows that the archway was formally
used as a dovecote, the
lover
(or
louvre)
being clearly visible. The archway
still stands today, but the louvre has vanished,
having been pulled down and the area tiled over. It is interesting to note that this archway is shown on a map of 1622 of
High Easter, by the surveyor
Samuel Walker1, with what appears to be a louvre in the roof. Since the R.C.H.M.
(Vol 2, p129) does not mention the louvre in their report
of the Great Garnets outbuildings, one would presume the louvre to have vanished before
then. However, a detailed
examination of the loft area above the archway
could still confirm the evidence of the photograph."
1. British Library Add. M.S. 41848
Derek E. Bircher
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