of the town first came to Dover with the express purpose of exploiting the lands and tithes of this and other suppressed religious houses of the area. 18th and 19th centuries Illustrations from the 18th and early 19th centuries of the Priory Farm show its decaying Norman buildings and its two ponds as a picturesque ruin and a pleasant spot on the edge of the town. Upon the Duke of Wellington's installation as Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports in August 1839, a grand fete was held in the Priory meadow. Much of the buildings were demolished during the first half of the 19th century, including the two barns, one in the north-west corner of the grounds some time after 1850, and one in the south-west corner in 1868. In 1840 the Priory site's owner (a farmer called John Coleman) the south-eastern parts of the enclosed site was let on a building lease to Parker Ayres. This damaged the remaining buildings but fortunately, between 1845 and 1847, the local cleric Dr. F.C.Plumptre had already noted everything he possibly could about the foundations of the original buildings. His reconstruction suggests that the builders probably created Effingham Street along the site of the dormitory, chapter house and transepts, Effingham Crescent along what might have been the reredorter, and Saxon Street and the houses and gardens of the north side of St. Martin's Hill along what was once the nave of the church. From c.1840 to 1868, the local timber merchant Steriker Finnis leased or owned the western portion of the site. In 1868 the ponds were drained and this portion of the grounds became Priory Gate Road and part of the yard of Dover Priory railway station. Dover College In 1869 Robert Chignell, who had a private school at Westmount, in Folkestone Road, leased part of the Priory buildings for a private school. He passed on his interest, however, to a group of leading citizens in Dover who had formed the Dover College Company to promote the foundation of a public school on what remained of the Priory site with the dual intention of providing a public school education for local boys and of using and thus preserving the Priory's remaining ancient buildings. Dover College opened modestly in 1871. It acquired the large hall, or guest-house, in 1879 and converted it into a chapel for the school by enlarging the east end