This week Gerry Brooke travels down the A370 to the small Somerset village of Brockley.

It's easy to dismiss, especially if you are in hurry to get to the airport via busy Brockley Combe, but this little village of some 300 souls packs in a lot of history.

For this was once the seat of the wealthy Smyth Piggots, the Lords of the Manor, who owned many thousands of acres between here and Weston-super-Mare and where they had yet another home – Grove Park.

Despite this, the parish – still mostly woodland and farmland – was only ever sparsely populated.

Like many rich landowners of the time, the Smyth Piggots created acres of parkland here and long wooded drives to impress their guests.

The interesting little church of St Nicholas, now safe in the hands of the Churches Conservation Trust, has a Norman doorway and font.

The narrow churchyard is entered through an iron gateway beyond which is an avenue of yew trees.

In spring, when I last visited, snowdrops carpeting the floor made a delightful picture.

Before entering the locked church (a key is obtainable nearby), have a good look around you.

A large marble tomb here marks the burial place of Lord Sinclair, whose family once lived at Cleeve Court, further up the main road.

Another stone, displaying a skull and crossbones, is reputedly the grave of a sick, but penitent, pirate who spent his last days in Brockley being cared for by the vicar.

St Nicholas itself has much of interest.

The manorial pew, for instance, built into a disused chantry chapel, contains a fireplace.

Boxed off from public view, this little room must have been a very cosy place for the lord and his family on bitter winter Sundays.

A carved marble tablet above the fireplace – it shows a weeping, mourning, woman – is actually a memorial to a former rector of Weston, the Rev Wadham Pigott.

A rare Somerset-style pulpit complete with canopy dates back to the 15th century.

Nicholas Wadham, the founder of Wadham College, Oxford, and a Pigott ancestor, is commemorated in a stained glass window.

Next to the church, but set back, is the gabled Brockley Court, once home to the Smyth Pigotts.

Brockley Hall, an 18th-mansion with a fashionable portico, later housed the growing family, together with their numerous books and paintings, in a little more comfort. After lying semi-derelict for many years, the hall has now been restored into separate family units.

This Georgian house was, in fact, the family's third home – the first being ancient Brockley Court Farm.

We know what the family members looked like because their portraits are held in a special collection at Weston museum.

Despite its small size, the village managed to get a mention in the Domesday book where it's called Brochelie, the place of the badgers.

And it was while climbing the rocky but sylvan combe – no doubt a quiet and restful place 200 years ago – that a young Sam Coleridge felt inspired to write one of his sonnets.

Brockley is reputedly the most haunted village in Somerset but that, as they say, is a story for another day.