Hareston, Brixton

The mansion house built during the reign of King Henry VII (1485-1509) burned down partially in an accidental fire at the beginning of the 18th century, and in 1822 the surviving part, the Hall and Chapel, was being used as a farmhouse.

[1] It was described by Candida Lycett Green in her 1991 book The Perfect English Country House as: "The most forgotten Manor House Farm In England, untouched for hundreds of years, sits safely, impossible to find, down miles of private sunken lanes which in the spring brim with Campion, Bluebells, Purple Orchids, Primroses, Violets, Speedwell and Stitchwort.

[13] The estate was subsequently the seat of the Carslake family, whose daughter and heiress married John Wood (alias Atwood), the son of William Wood by his wife the daughter and heiress of Walter Wibble of Venn in Devon.

[17] The noted chess-player Thomas Winter-Wood (1818-1905), educated at nearby Plympton Grammar School, was a member of this family, and sold the Hareston estate in 1868/9,[18] his father having in 1824 reversed the order of the surname.

[19] Another prominent descendant of a branch of the Wood family of Hareston was Sir Matthew Wood, 1st Baronet (1768-1843),[20] ancestor of the present Page-Wood baronets, who quarter the arms of Carslake of Hareston: Argent, a bull's head erased sable.