the spirit of man

...I mentioned Holme Priory and its connection to the Bond family when I photographed the flooded river Frome in December. The house is on the site of a Cluniac monastery that was a cell of Montacute Priory. Unlike most of our local religious houses, this monastery survived the Dissolution and was granted to Edward, Duke of Somerset. The estate passed to William Hanham in 1554 and it is from this date that the oldest parts of the present house can be found. William's descendants sold it to the Bonds in 1690. At that time, the priory church was still in existence but it was sadly demolished in 1746 to create parkland. One part of the priory church, the chancel arch, was preserved and is built into the little chapel in the grounds of Creech Grange.

Denis Bond extended Holme Priory during the late 18th century after which it passed to his nephew, who was the first of four Nathaniel Bonds to live here. Some of these were later to move up to the main seat at the Grange. One of the Nathaniels was a distinguished KC who famously defended Jane Austin's aunt against a shoplifting charge. For almost 100 years the property was let but, in the 1950s, Martin Bond, the grandson of the last of the aforementioned Nathaniels, took it on and it is now owned by his son, William, whose own son is called - you guessed it, Nathaniel.

You may also remember that one of the Nathaniel Bonds (1804-1889) was rector at Steeple parish church, something that always reminds me of Jeff Wayne's The Spirit of Man song from his The War of the Worlds...