Nicholls Hackett was left the North Crawley Estate when his father died in 1689.
Chibnall who had access to the Boswell papers tells us that after this date Nicholls acquired two more farms.
Firstly he bought from William Bennett a small farmhouse lying to the west of the churchyard, with a cottage, the two Caldwell closes and 14 acres of arable land.
Secondly in 1694 he bought Brook End Farm in the occupation of Edward Kingham consisting of 176 acres of arable land and two small home closes or pightles which had been called in Elizabethan days, le Fine pightles.
He was the last of the male line of the Hacketts in North Crawley and on his only daughter Elizabeth’s marriage to Sir Nicholas Carew of Beddington Surrey in 1710 he settled his Crawley Estate on her , reserving for himself only two annuities of £50 and £84 respectively.
Sir Nicholas was a spendthrift and by the time Nicholls Hackett died in 1720 Sir Peter had spent most of the money. In February 1716 he mortgaged the Estate to the Lord Chief Justice Sir Peter King, who advance £7000 at that time and further sums in 1719 and 1721.
The following year Sir Peter foreclosed on the mortgage and Sir Nicholas sold the Estate to William Temple who was believed to be a nominee of Sir Peter and took up residence in the Mansion.
Chibnall had full access to the Boswell muniments and says that the conveyance to Temple contained full particulars of each farm or holding, and the open-field arable land, enumerated strip by strip and parcelled out into the three seasons on which the cropping program for the village was based.
A rental drawn up by the Estate Steward William Leverett was also in the papers.
William Temple on 25th November 1723 sold the Estate to William Lowndes, Secretary to the Treasury.
In 1721 Nicholls Hackett left a Will
Still giving some money to the notorious son in law Sir Nicholas Carew!