Fancy owning a piece of literary history? The former home of the author and playwright J.B. Priestley is on the market with BCM for £3 million.
Priestley's old stomping ground, Billingham Manor, is a Grade II-listed country estate set in an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty on the Isle of Wight.
Priestley, the author of An Inspector Calls, moved to the house in 1933 and lived there for 15 years, until 1948. He had grown up in Bradford, and after studying at Cambridge University, he married his second wife, Jane, in 1926. The couple moved into the house together.
Under Jane’s guidance, the house was “exquisitely decorated”, according to his biography written by Judith Cook.
Priestley also extended the property to build an “art room” on the second floor, overlooking the downs. There, he is thought to have written his autobiography, Rain Upon Godshill, published in 1939. The art room is no longer part of the house today.
Priestley penned his 1947 play The Linden Tree at Billingham, writing in his dedication: “So far as the play itself has any virtue, it was a virtue plucked out of necessity. The heaviest snowfall the Isle of Wight had known for about a hundred years found me down at Billingham, in a house hard to warm and then desperately short of fuel.
“Besieged by this cruellest of Februarys, I ate, toiled and slept in one small room, and there the Lindens were born; and for ten days or so, while I worked at the play, they were almost my only company and the people I seemed to know best.”
Although Priestley is the house’s most famous former resident, the property was also rented in 1928 by Irish diplomat and writer, Sir Shane Leslie —who alleged that it was haunted— and the writer Olivia Manning had her ashes buried at Billingham after her death in 1980.
According to agent Thomas Dawson, who is regularly asked, the house is “definitely not” haunted.
Dating back to 1631, the house was remodelled in a classical neo-Georgian design around 1730, gaining its listed status in 1951.
Some of its historical features still remain, including an oak staircase from the Queen Anne period and, more mysteriously, an 18th century rotating bookcase hidden by a sliding panel. This reveals a staircase, leading to a secret passage under the house, previously used by smugglers.
“How can I describe it? You’re in the lounge, and you’re looking at a very nice panelled wall. When you lift up a bit of the hatching there’s basically a hidden staircase which takes you down to the basement, which has a tunnel which goes from one side of the house to the other, not in a straight line,” says Dawson.
“I haven’t done it — I don’t really want to — but I’ve told a few buyers that I would do it if they buy it.”
Set over four storeys, the six-bedroom, 6,862 sq ft manor house has a drawing room, sitting room, entrance hall, billiards room, scullery and two kitchens on the ground floor, with six double bedrooms above.
There is also a large cellar and an attic with four large rooms which were previously used as additional accommodation. These, according to the agents, are “not all habitable” but have the potential to be converted.
As well as the manor house, the sale includes the two-bedroom Billingham Manor Cottage, 10 outbuildings —including a Grade II-listed granary and a number of barns and sheds— and 123 acres of land. The land is also available for purchase as three separate lots.
The size of the estate also means it has the potential to generate significant income for its owners, says Dawson. Currently, Billingham Manor Cottage and the surrounding farmland is let by the owners. “It depends on the buyer, but if someone was simply after the manor, then they have a good rent roll coming in on the land and the cottage. At least they know that they’ve got money coming into the estate.”
The property has been in the hands of its current owners for the past 44 years, used as a family retreat for summer holidays and Christmases with their children. Now, though, they are selling because they are getting older and no longer using the property as much as they would like.
The property requires some work to "bring it back to how it was," says Dawson. So far, there has been interest from locals, the mainland and from overseas. “It’s been a mix of different types of buyers,” he says. "It's not limited to what it could become.”
“The views [from the property] are stunning. You have to get there to appreciate how nice it is,” adds Dawson. “It needs someone to go in and love it like the owners have done for the last 40 years. And in reality, you don’t get an opportunity like this that often, where you can put your own stamp on it.”
