A CONVERTED barn once owned by The Thirty-Nine Steps author John Buchan has gone on the market for nearly £1m.

Manor Barn is part of the Elsfield Manor estate near Oxford, where the writer entertained friends including Virginia Woolf, Robert Graves and TE Lawrence.

He bought the house in 1919, four years after his famous spy thriller, which was later turned into a film by director Alfred Hitchcock, was published.

The Scottish author, who was also a politician and lawyer, wrote: “The war left me with an intense craving for a country life,” and described his new property as the “little manor of Elsfield”.

He said: “Elsfield was rich in those secret glades, sometimes only an acre wide, but all ancient clearings whose turf had been cropped for centuries.”

The manor house was converted into three apartments and the barn into living space during the 1970s.

Manor Barn, priced at £975,000, includes a kitchen/dining room, snug, sitting room, five bedrooms and two bathroom.

The property comes with its own barn/stable and garage Mark Charter, of agents Carter Jonas, said: “Manor Barn is in the grounds of Elsfield Manor where John Buchan lived.

“The fact that he is associated with the place adds to the overall interest, both the history of the barn and the setting will appeal to someone who is artistic.”