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City & Village Tours :0845 812 5000 info@cityandvillagetours.com
Fuller went way beyond the call of noblesse
oblige and whereas in some areas men and
their families starved, in Squire Fuller’s domain
work was not so much found as created.
Fuller ordered a wall to be built around his
entire estate. At little more than four feet tall
in places it was unlikely to keep much out but
stretching a full four miles it kept many men
occupied in paid employ for two years.
Perhaps with the aim of creating more work
or perhaps because in this pre-industrial age
what else was there for a rich man to spend
his money on, Jack Fuller set about erecting
a series of follies that to this day dot the local
landscape – decorative structures quite devoid
of practical use. Opening a new front in the
ongoing Anglo-Gallic cultural rivalry
Napoleon’s Expeditionary Force had stumbled
upon the Rosetta Stone in the Nile delta and
the subsequent decoding of its ancient
Egyptian hieroglyphs had been the starting
pistol in the race to find the treasure that had
lain hidden beneath the shifting desert sands
for millennia. Soon across Europe fashionable
society lapped up all things ancient Egyptian.
Once more showing his excessive streak our
eccentric squire excelled himself by erecting
a massive pyramid in the sleepy churchyard
at Brightling. It stood ready for his eternal rest
a full twenty-five years before he qualified for
entry. It is said that the vicar of Brightling only
allowed this pagan mausoleum to tower over
his churchyard in a deal that saw Brightling’s
only pub up sticks and move a full three miles
outside the village. Perhaps another clerical
sweetener was the barrel organ Fuller had
installed in the church. For a modern man like
Fuller this magnificent machine, still in the
church today and in full working order, was a
state of the art sound system that married his
philanthropy with his peculiarity.
Since I first visited Brightling three years ago
we have launched our brand of Together
Tours, days out that include morning coffee
and lunch and I now realised that this was how
we could make Brightling work for groups
coming from outside Sussex. So a few weeks
later I returned to Mad Jack Fuller’s world
armed with a map on which my assistant Craig
had marked every pub in the district. After
visits to a dozen pubs that were too small, too
scruffy or (that modern scourge) too posh and
gastro-uppity I was just beginning to lose heart
when I happened upon an absolute winner.
This pub sits on the very edge of the Vale of
Ashburnham with breathtaking views across the
treetops of this deep, deep valley and all the way
to Beachy Head. A view, it turns out, that was
painted by Turner on commission from Jack Fuller.
This isn’t an old pub as such, a mostly 1970s
extension with great big picture windows to
capitalise on the view has been built onto a much
older core. Until the current landlord arrived it was
all rather dated and sorry for itself. Sean, the
landlord, is a great bear of a man with a ready
smile who made me feel welcome as soon as I
walked in the door. I’d barely got to the end of
saying
my name is Gyll King and I’m from a
company called City & Village Tours
before he
said “yes, I’ve know of you, my parents go on your
trips. They went to the Olympics with you last
Wednesday”. Crikey. Turns out Sean’s mum and
dad are members of Kent group the Hoo Active
Retirement Association and are indeed no
strangers to our day trips.
Serendipity reared her lovely head again a few
weeks later with a bird watching chum who I meet
up with about twice a year on a Dungeness bird
walk (and who it transpired had also enjoyed one
of our Olympic days with her local NADFAS since
last we met). Jane almost jumped with joy when
I told her about the lovely Sussex pub I’d found.
Turns out it’s on the border of her village of
Netherfield near Battle and she tells me that the
good people of that parish absolutely love Sean
and his pub. Small, happy world in which we live!
So there you have it. Sean will provide morning
coffee and a posh ploughman’s in his pub with
spectacular views to frame a morning on the Mad
Jack Fuller Trail. After lunch there is time for an
hour’s browsing in historic and picturesque Battle
en route to buy tea at Bodiam Castle. We don’t go
into the castle but you can enjoy tea in the National
Trust Cafe or a shandy in the pub. More active
members will enjoy a walk through the meadow to
the castle and moat. Bodiam Castle only survives
today due to the munificence of the Pharaoh
Squire of Brightling. He was a good egg.
The Mad Jack Fuller Trail is described on page
24 of this years brochure (call if you want a
print copy) or you can take a look online