Walters Green Farm

Frances and Tim Lyle moved to Walters Green Farm in 1968, purchasing 250 acres and around 13 tenanted properties from the Meade Waldo Estate. Over the years, the farm has slowly increased in size and is now around 800 acres. In the 1970s, Brookers Farm came up for sale; their son, Dick, and his wife Nerina were later able to buy Saxbys; other additions include land at Chiddingstone Hoath, and land by the river at Walters Green.

Frances and Tim met at a dance; Frances was at school with Tim’s sister.  Frances’ grandparents were both from farming families and moved from Scotland to Kent, where her father farmed and became a JP. Tim’s father and grandfather were eye surgeons at Farnborough Hospital, but during WW2 Tim grew up in Somerset, with a farming family, returning to Tatsfield, Surrey as a young man with a love of farming and the countryside.

Tim was Whipper-in, later Master of the Bolebrook Beagles before becoming Master of the West Kent Hunt. The West Kent foxhounds were kennelled at Walters Green Farm from the mid 1980’s until the Hunt merged with the Old Surrey and Burstow Hunt in 1998.

In the 1980’s the WKH Point to Point moved from Ightham to its current home at Brookers Farm, Penshurst. It has been held there regularly ever since.

Crops grown on the farm include wheat, barley, rape, linseed; livestock include Aberdeen Angus beef cattle, sheep, pigs and turkeys. Hops were planted below the farmhouse when the Lyles first moved to the farm, but suffered from wilt and were discontinued.

There are 7 natural springs on the farm, the closest one to the farmhouse being in front of Goose Cottage.

Of the thirteen properties within the farm, Goose Cottage used to be a shop and also an Inn, sited at the foot of Packhorse Way, the historic route of Whitepost Hill. Other houses include Mews Cottages, Weavers Cottage, Finches Green, the oast, barn and piggery (now known as the Granary) at Walters Green. A shared water bill for all the thirteen properties is carefully divided up by Nerina Lyle, Dick’s wife, based on the number of people per household.

Ralph Stockman farmed at Walters Green before the Lyles. Brothers Arthur and George Stone worked for both the Stockmans and the Lyles, living on the farm.

Metal detectors have unearthed old coins and artefacts including a penny from the rein of Edward I (1272-1307), and a half groat from the rein of Elizabeth I (1558-1603), belt buckles, flint and stone axe heads. An annual fair or market was probably held at Finch Green Field, accounting for the number of coins found there. £200 has also been found in modern coins after the point to point!

Two spitfires crashed on the farm during WW2, one near the former Blacksmiths Arms, one near Saxbys, Cowden. There is an unexploded bomb behind the Mews Cottages gardens at Walters Green.

A programme of the popular 1980’s television series ‘Minder’ was made on the farm. A film about John Betjeman was also partly filmed on the farm, near the former Blacksmiths Arms.

Tim Lyle leading out hounds on foot

Tim Lyle, Master of the West Kent Foxhounds

Tim Lyle racing

Farm sign

Brookers Farm

Walters Green Farm Jan 2017