Summary
From the late medieval period until the late nineteenth century – and with a brief twentieth-century reappearance of the family – Larden, in Shropshire’s Corve Dale, was the seat of the More family. Their house, prior to its demolition in 1968, was composed of two distinct elements of stone and timber framing, the latter said to have been enlarged from a house built in 1477 by William More.
This lower range, was externally of the late sixteenth century, with a prominent jettied two-storeyed, gabled, timber-framed wing with chevron timbered panels. Adjoining this range, a tall stone wing was added by Jasper More (d. 1614). This had two prominent projecting, rectangular bays, rising up through three storeys, with gabled attics flanking a recessed gabled bay. At ground floor level, the doorway bore the date stone of 1607. Inside, the interior was described by H.E. Forrest in 1915 as having:
a newel staircase of oak blocks, and Elizabethan panelling in the hall and dining room, both of which have the fine carved mantelpieces, while in the drawing-room is one made up from carvings which were formerly over the front door.
The Mores, who later became associated with Linley (q.v.) and with Millichope (q.v.), came into the property in 1434 when Richard More of Nether Larden bought it from his brother-in-law, William Bailey of Brockton. Then, in 1463, More settled the property on his grandson, Richard More who seems to have been succeeded by his brother William, (fl. 1477–1505) and then by William’s descendants until the death of his great-grandson, Jasper More (d. 1614).
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- The Country Houses of Shropshire , pp. 340 - 342Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2021