The following text is from the original listed building designation:
RAMSGATE LONDON ROAD TR 3764 SW (South- side) 17/250 Bon Secours Nursing Home 5.11.74 GV II House, now nursing home. Core built c.1795, extended C19 and especially 1884. Stock brick the main block rendered with flint extensions and plain-tiled roofs. Entrance front: 3 storeys rendered ground and 1st floor with string course to shaped gabled 2nd floor. Hipped roof with flat railed central portion with stacks to left and to right with shaped gables to return elevation. Wooden casement with label hood in gable, 3 to 2nd floor, 3 mullioned and transomed windows with label hoods to 1st floor and 2 to ground floor with double half-glazed doors in arched moulded surround in central projecting porch with pierced parapet. The corners of this central block are recessed and curved with elaborate scrolls incised into the render. 2 storey hipped wings to left and to right with mullioned and transomed and label hooded windows to each floor, extended to right by 1 storey C20 weather boarded range with flint tower behind, and to left by projecting 2 storey stock brick wing, dated 1884 in shaped gable, with 2 sashes on each floor of each face. Garden front: Central 3 storey hipped block (the original late C18 range), with attic, and later C19 cross-wing behind with shaped gables. Single dormer, 3 wooden casements and 1 small light to left on 2nd floor, and 3 on 1st floor with tented canopy. Mullioned and transomed bays on ground floor with glazed door to centre left with verandah, also carried across right hand wing. Two storey hipped wing to right with sash on first floor, mullioned ground floor openings. End wing to right of 2 storeys, with canted bays of differing sizes on 1st and ground floors. Gabled 2 storey flint wing to left with mullioned and transomed window and door ensemble. At end left is a round, battlemented flint tower, certainly there in 1806 (as illustrated in contemporary prints). At the end of range of outbuildings to the right (east) are 2 further flint buildings, the remains of other flint towers illustrated 1806. The outbuildings here include a laundry building with an open arcaded ground floor with segmental cornice, and corniced windows. Interior: large staircase hall with wreathed handrail to stair and gallery. The house was built c1795 for Joseph Ruse and named Belmont. Purchased and the home of Earl of Darnley 1801-1817 (re-named West Cliff House), seat of Warre family 1877-1904. Princess Victoria was a frequent visitor to this, one of Ramsgate's most important seats. A nursing home since 1949 (See Busson, Ramsgate, 110 & 120).
Listing NGR: TR3710464340

Description from record TR 36 SE 337:
House core built c.1795, extended 19thC and especially 1884. Stock brick the main block rendered with flint extensions and plain tiled roofs. Entrance front: 3 storeys rendered ground and 1st floor with string course to shaped gabled 2nd floor. Hipped roof with flat railed central portion with stacks to left and right with shaped gables to return elevation. Wooden casement with label hood in gable, 3 to 2nd floor, 3 mullioned and transomed windows with label hoods to 1st floor and 2 to ground floor with double half-glazed doors in arched moulded surround in central pojecting porch with pierced parapet. The corners of this central block are recessed and curved with elaborate scrolls incised into render. Two storey hipped wings to left and to right with mullioned and transomed and label hooded windows to each floor, extended to right by one storey C20 weather boarded range with flint tower behind, and to left by projecting 2 storey stock brick wing, dated 1884 in shaped gable, with two sashes on each floor of each face.

Garden Front: Central three storey hipped block (the original late 18thC range), with attic, and later 19thC cross-wing behind with shaped gables. Single dormer, three wooden casements and one small light to left on 2nd floor, and three on 1st floor with tented canopy. Mullioned and transomed bays on ground floor with glazed door to centre left with verandah, also carried across right hand wing. Two storey hipped wing to right with sash on first floor, mullioned ground floor openings. End wing to right of two storeys, with canted bays of differing sizes on first and ground floors. Gabled 2 storey flint wing to left with mullioned and transomed window and door ensemble. At end left is a round, battlemented flint tower, certainly there in 1806 (as illustrated in contemporary prints). At the end of range of outbuildings to the right (east) are two further flint buildings, the remains of other flint towers illustrated in 1806. The outbuildings here inculde a laundry building with an open arcaded ground floor with segmental cornice, and corniced windows.

Interior: Large staircase hall with wreathed handrail to stair and galley.

The house was built c1795 for Joseph Ruse and named Belmont. Purchased and the home of Earl of Darnley 1801- 1817 (re-named West Cleff House), seat of Warr family 1877 - 1904. Princess Victoria was a frequent visitor to this, one of Ramsgate's most important seats. In 1921 the house was sold to St. Winifred's Private School which continued here until the outbrak of war when the school was evacuated. During the war the house was taken over by the army. After the war the House briefly became a hotel until it passed to the Order of the Bon Secours Sisters who have run a nursing home here since 1949. (1)

A building recording survey was undertaken between January and March 2002 of the buildings and gardens of the former Bon Secours Nursing Home, Ramsgate, in advance of redevelopment of the site. The original house was three-storey with a cellar, under a roof of truncated pyramidal form, the shaped gables on the north, east and west elevations are later nineteenth century additions. It had two small, single -storey side wings, and had two fronts facing north and south. The footprint of the central block of the house is probably original. During the survey of the buildings and gardens a tunnel was re-opened that led southwards from the south central room of the cellar. The tunnel stretched about 15.5m to the south, of which 12.2 represents the original excavation and the remainder, a later extension. (2)

An Evaluation undertaken at the former Bon Secours Nursing Home by th Trust for Thanet Archaeology in Jan-Feb 2002 uncovered evidence of activity ranging in date from the Early Iron Age to the Post Medieval period (TR 36 SE 418). (3)

English Heritage, List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest (Map). SKE16160.

<1> Peter Bushell, Westcliffe House, Ramsgate: A History (Unpublished document). SKE7888.

<2> Canterbury Archaeological Trust, 2002, Building Recording at Bon Secours Nursing Home, Ramsgate (Unpublished document). SKE8210.