SCAWTON CROFT [continued]
Frederick Medd the son of Stephen Medd of Old Byland. The farm was sold by auction in 1979 when the house and 4 acres were purchased by Dennis and June Purssey and the remaining land was bought by Walter Fenwick of Ashberry Farm. The owners of Scawton Croft in 2005 are Dr Christopher Honeyborne and his wife Veronica.
BUNGDALE HEAD FARM
The origin of the name of this farm also dates from the middle of the 12th century when Brunesdaleschede was part of the Scalton land granted to the Rievaulx monks by Hugh Malebisse the Lord of the Manor of Scalton and it was later leased by the Abbots of Rievaulx to the Fairfax family and was in their possession in the last quarter of the 17th century.
In 1694 John Thompson was the tenant of 97 acres known as The Lund and as modern Ordnance Survey maps show Lund Slack to the south west of Bungdale Head it is likely that Thompson was farming some of the land that later became part of the farm and his descendants continued to be farm tenants throughout the 18th century.
A John Thompson was tenant of 62 acres in 1812 and as his 63 acres in 1839 were clearly land that is part of the present-day farm it is possible that there had been continuity of tenancy since 1694 and although the 1851 census showed William Thompson as tenant of 50 acres at Hagget Mouth this area was so close to Bungdale Head that the enumerator is thought to have made a mistake and when part of the estate was sold to Lord Feversham in 1866 34 acres of it were part of Bungdale Head in the tenancy of William Thompson. The 1881 census showed him as tenant of the 111 acres that was the farm though it was occasionally referred to as the White House at the time.
John Thompson was the tenant in 1901, 1909 and 1913 but the tenancy had been taken by his son Henry Mark Thompson by 1927 and he was still at the farm when it was purchased by John Hetherington in 1939 and when he retired and went to live in Helmsley in 1955 the farm was purchased by Kenneth and Ruth Mary Wardell who still own it in 2005.
Although the fragmented parish registers and estate records make it impossible to prove a continuous tenancy record there is a strong possibility that the Thompson family tenancy on the land that is now Bungdale Head Farm lasted over 280 years.
MANOR FARM
This name was not known until the beginning of the 20th century and there is little evidence to allow identification of the earliest tenants but one small clue is the land held by Mr Skelton in 1694 which was said to lie within Seamer Gill and included 7 acres of Seamer Bank Wood. On modern Ordnance Survey maps Seamer Howl lies east of the present-day Manor Farm so it is possible that Mr Skelton, thought to be John may have held land that is now part of the farm but though the Skeltons father and son continued to be tenants throughout the first half of the 18th century there is no further way of linking them with this land.
The tithe map of 1839 shows a dwelling near the site of the present-day farmhouse which was in the tenancy of George Walkington who also had 24 acres and another dwelling at the foot of land
