Standing in rolling country near to Lydbury North, Totterton could be said to bear out the maxim that neighbourly imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. The house is a reduced version of Walcot (q.v.) – as that house appeared until its twentieth-century rebuild – and the Bright family – who owned Totterton until the late nineteenth century – were evidently inspired by the works undertaken for the Clive family. The east-facing brick front with its elevated central pediment and the single-storey Doric portico with flat entablature, is a delightful shrunken version of the neighbouring house.

The Brights had been in south Shropshire longer than the Clives. They appear to have been settled in Shropshire from the Tudor period, with William Bright in 1574 described as ‘of Myndtown’, but, by the early seventeenth century, they had become seated at Totterton. The stone walling, incorporated into the north-west corner of the present house, is said to be a part of their earlier dwelling, although the mansion appears to have been rebuilt as a three-storeyed house of brick in the second half of the eighteenth entury and this is still evident on the west elevation.

The male line of the family failed in the late eighteenth century with the death of John Bright (d. 1790) – the son of John Bright (1710-c.1768) and Priscilla Reynolds. His sister, Priscilla, had married Richard Betton from Great Berwick (q.v.) and the Bettons’ younger son, the Rev. John Bright Betton (d.1833) – later John Bright Bright – inherited Totterton. He married Mary Beale of Cheltenham in 1805 and served as Vicar of Lydbury North.

During their reign at Totterton, a rebuilding of the place took place circa 1814, when Rev. J.B. Bright paid Joseph Birch for ‘Bricklayers, Plasterers, and Slaters work…in alterations and additions’ which had been measured and valued by John Carline. This work may have accounted for the east front of the house with its five bays and two storeys crowned by the raised central pediment inspired by Veneto villas – or perhaps Walcot. Broad brick pilasters divide the bays, whilst at the centre of the ground floor is the single-storey stone portico of pairs of Tuscan Doric columns, which formerly had an iron balustrade above the entablature.