Derelict building, Mongeham Farm, Mongeham Road

Image: © John Baker Taken: 20 Mar 2016

This was one of the two malthouses in operation in the village through the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. In the nineteenth century [this] one was operated by the Bray family and the other by the Harrisons http://www.greatmongehamsociety.co.uk/great-mongeham-history/east-kent-history/139-great-mongeham-malthouses.html The second malthouse [this one] in the village belonged to Samuel Shepherd who lived in the Manor House in the early eighteenth century. He might very well have built the large malthouse next door. He was later to move to Faversham where he was to found the brewery that was to become Shepherd Neame. In 1775 Admiral Bray bought the Manor House, together with the malthouse. The house and malthouse were to remain in the family until 1892. Although malting provided a substantial income, the Brays were principally farmers. They employed a maltster, Joseph Hewitt, for the day to day operations of the malthouse. In a declaration in 1864 by Margaret Bray, daughter of John Bray, she writes that Joseph had been in the service of the family for more than sixty years and maltman for 54 years. He lived in the house from which his wife ran a grocer’s shop. It was situated next door to the Three Horseshoes. By 1883 the malthouse had been leased to Thompson’s brewers of Walmer. In the First World War it provided stabling for horses bound for the front http://www.greatmongehamsociety.co.uk/great-mongeham-history/east-kent-history/139-great-mongeham-malthouses.html?start=4

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