Kentwell Hall

Long Melford

The Clopton family came to the Manor of Kentwell Hall in 1385 when William (the first of several Clopton Williams) Clopton married the then Kentwell heiress. Here the family remained seated for some 300 years. Members of the Clopton family were distinguished locally with just one or two (in the late 15th C. and early 16th C.) in the thick of national events. In the 15th C. they rebuilt Melford’s famous church which, before later depredations, was more a monument to Cloptons than to piety, with numerous stained glass windows illustrating the family and brasses to their dead. Successive members built the present Hall between about 1500 and 1550, gradually over perhaps 5 or 6 phases to create what is to be seen today. The last Clopton descendant died at Kentwell in 1661.