Early Owners of Troy Town Properties

When the houses in Troy Town were built, or even while they were still building, they were bought by various individuals. Some of them can be identified from title deeds held by Medway Archives Centre, from fire insurance policies sold by Jacob Cazeneuve Troy, from local newspapers and from wills held at The National Archives.  

Some purchasers lived in their houses. Other houses were occupied by people other than their owners; their owners may always have intended them to be investment properties, rather than homes.      

In 1790, William Cluff and his wife Isabella purchased 'a piece of land and a new built brick messuage with wash house, garden etc' abutting to land intended to be a street called King Street. At the time of the purchase, William Cluff was described as a victualler. According to the  Oxford English Dictionary, a victualler might be:

A purveyor of victuals or provisions; specifically one who makes a business of providing food and drink for payment; a keeper of an eating-house, inn, or tavern; a licensed victualler;

One who supplies, or undertakes to supply, an army or armed force with necessary provisions;

One who furnishes a ship or navy with provisions.

Any of those definitions might apply to William Cluff; there were licensed premises in King Street, although it is not known if William Cluff occupied any of them, and there certainly would have been men whose business it was to supply provisions to the army and navy at Chatham. 

In his insurance policies, 1791 and 1793, and in his will made in 1813, William Cluff described himself as a gentleman. At the time of making his will he was residing in his 'messuage or tenement' in King Street. 

Isabella was to have the house in King Street, its furnishings, and £500 after William's death. William left legacies totalling £220 to various other people. The residue was to go to his nephew, Daniel Hulme. 

William and Isabella Cluff both died in 1814.  

Thomas Harling was described as a brewer in his insurance policy of 1793 and in his will made in 1826. He was proprietor of the Troy Town Brewery, probably founded by his father Edward Harling around 1745-50. Although it became known as Troy Town Brewery, it pre-dated the founding of Troy Town, so cannot always have been known by that name. It is not within what is today generally thought of as Troy Town, being on the opposite side of East Row. Today it is better known as Woodhams Brewery. 

The brewery included brewhouses, stables, storehouses, outbuildings, yards, garden and ground, plant, casks and other utensils and implements, drays, and other carriages, horses harness, malt, hops, beer, corn, hay and other stock in trade and effects pertaining to the trade of a brewer. 

Thomas Harling owned a freehold messuage or tenement with outbuildings, ground and appurtenances in Cazeneuve Street. At the time of making his will this was occupied by George Morson or Morton. He also had two acres of freehold land with a barn at Borstal and a 'messuage formerly divided into 2 tenements on the south side of the High Street lying east of St. William's Gate in St. Nicholas, Rochester' which he held on lease from the Dean and Chapter.

St William's Gate is believed to be the passage later known as Black Boy Alley, from the inn known as the Black Boy which was once to the west of it. 

Black Boy Alley. 

OS 25 in, Surveyed 1864, published 1866

Reproduced by permission of the National Library of Scotland

Likely location of Thomas Harling's tenement indicated in red.The buildings fronting the High Street now would not have been there in Thomas Harling's time. 

The alley or passage was used by pilgrims visiting the shrine of St William in the cathedral. William of Perth was one of Rochester's own particular saints. 

In addition to his freehold and leasehold property, Thomas Harling had £5,000 invested at 4%. 

Samuel Hill was insured for a property in King Street in 1791. He was a 'back maker', according to his insurance policies of 1791 and 1792, his will of 1807, and newspaper advertisements. The OED says that a 'back' was a 'large shallow vessel (chiefly for liquids); a tub, trough, vat, cistern; especially applied to those used by brewers, dyers, and picklers'. A back might be made of stone, copper or wood. 

An advertisement in the Kentish Gazette in 1792 informed prospective customers:

Samuel Hill died in 1808, but his widow Mary intended to continue the business; she placed an advertisment in the Kentish Weekly Post or Canterbury Journal returning her 'sincere thanks' to the friends and customers of her late husband and soliciting their future favours. She assured them that 'every possible attention shall be given to their orders, which will be thankfully received and expeditously executed'.

Looking at just a few of the owners of Troy Town properties sheds light on the history of Troy Town itself and of the City of Rochester. It is a subject whch this blog will return to in the future to build up a more detailed picture of early Troy Town.

Next: King Street

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