Rich farmland of Addiscombe
The Ashburton family owned a fairly grand home which included a farmhouse on the land.
The Addiscombe farmhouse was built in 1676. The original flint work remains at the front of the house and the date has been clearly inscribed in red brick between the upstairs front windows.
The original building consists of a two storey structure with central entrance and end chimney. There were two rooms on each storey. Service rooms were added later to the area which now contains the staircase and one original bread oven with a heavy cast iron door.
A further additional to the east of the house was a diary which had a stone lagged floor. The interior walls were partially covered with the most attractive hand painted tiles, 57 of which are illustrated with decorative birds each painted differently. There are also plain tiles together with geometrically decorated ones which are thought to be Portugese.
There is evidence that this part of the house was used as a shop where locals would purchase bread and dairy products.
On the ground floor a room situated to the west contains an inglenook fireplace which was uncovered in 1950 by the then owners of the property. It is apparent that the brick area originally contained an oven.
The farmhouse is now a Grade II listed building with deeds that date back to 1676, although previous owners have fought it to be older in parts. It was part of the farm leased by William Marshall who wrote 'minutes of agriculture...near Croydon, Surrey'.
The outbuildings included cowsheds which spread east as far as what is now Fryston Avenue. Marshall used the farm building but lived at Home Farm which has since been destroyed.