History

Can you imagine an ancient ecclesiastical site with Holy Well here at Dunfield? Was the stained glass in the windows on the staircase part of a medieval Dunfield House? What kind of house surrounded the authenticated late 17th century staircase? Why was the house called Downfield on a map of the 1600s? Were those fine fire places added during the house’s Victorian facelift? Did Churchill visit for high level talks before the D-day landings? Was the a dog roaming Hergest Ridge the inspiration for ‘The Hound of the Baskervilles’?

There are many questions which we may never be able to answer about the history of Dunfield. What we know for certain is that a Charles Vaughn was born and married here in Elizabethan times. The Miles family, living here in the 1800s, added and altered the house to take on the character of a Victorian Mansion complete with landscaped woodland gardens, with steam, canal and ornamental lake. In more recent time the house was requisitioned during the war and housed American Servicemen. In post war years the house was partly refurbished and was to be opened as the ‘Mountain View Hotel’; it was never completed. In 1965 the house was purchased by the Community of Christ as a residential centre for retreats and youth camps.