Few manors in Surrey have passed through more distinguished hands than Bletchingley. At the Conquest it was given to the great Richard de Tonebrige, and perhaps he built Bletchingley Castle. He was pretty well off for land in Surrey, for he held thirty-eight manors in that county alone. He was the head of the de Clares, and they held Bletchingley for eight generations. The most famous of them was the Red Earl who knew how to change sides between Simon de Montfort and Henry III so as to be cursed as a traitor six centuries ago and recognised by later generations as a patriot and a statesman, who could curb the barons as well as resist the King. He was the last but one of the de Clares to hold Bletchingley, and it was during his absence, at the battle of Lewes, that a Royalist party destroyed the Castle. His son died at the head of his horse at Bannockburn, and the manor came by marriage into the Stafford family. They held it for another six generations, until the third Duke of Buckingham, Lord High Constable under Henry VIII, ended the splendours of the Staffords on the scaffold. Sir Nicholas Carew had the manor next, and followed Buckingham to Tower Hill. Then Anne of Cleves, too plain for Tower Hill, lived there, and Sir Thomas Cawarden managed it for her and succeeded her. He is the fascinating figure. He moves in a royal light of Courts and Kings, of hunting and hawking in the sunshine, and plotting in dark chambers, and guessing the value of a queen's smile. He was Henry VIII's Master of the Revels, and Keeper of the King's tents, hales, and toyles (which were wooden stables and traps for game), and at Bletchingley he entertained Henry and perhaps more than one of his queens. You picture the Master of the Revels riding in velvet by Catherine Howard, and wondering whether her eyes would take her by the same stairway as Anne Boleyn.