WRITING in COUNTRY LIFE (May 11, 2000) of Grade I-listed Runnymede Park near Englefield Green, Surrey, the architectural historian John Martin Robinson commented: 'Although many fine country houses were demolished in the aftermath of the Second World War, it is remarkable how many others have been rescued from the brink of demolition or ruin by optimistic and determined owners. Runnymede Park in Surrey is a perfect example of such a heroic rescue.'
Known as Crippsfield in the Middle Ages when it was owned by Chertsey Abbey, Runnymede passed to the Crown at the Dissolution in 1538 and was later acquired by Edmund Hilles, who built a home on lower ground to the south of the present house and owned the estate from 1575 to 1633.
In 1760, John Jebb, Dean of Cashel in Co Tipperary, bought the old house and estate for £1,400. He died in 1787, leaving his property to his son, David, a prosperous flour miller who owned mills at Slane and Drogheda. He had the old house demolished and commissioned Samuel Wyatt to build the present one between 1789 and 1792 on a more elevated site to take advantage of the fine view south-east over Runnymede towards the River Thames and London. By a series of purchases and exchanges, including that of some Crown land in 1807, and the diversion of the nearby main road away from the house, he also established the boundaries of the park-still some 66 acres overall.
David Jebb would have known of the Wyatt brothers Samuel and his younger brother, James-through his Irish and milling connections. James designed Slane Castle for Jebb's Irish business partner, William Conyngham, and Samuel designed and built, in 1783-86, England's first steam-powered flour mill, Albion Mill at Blackfriars, London, a company with which Jebb was also involved.
Bu hikaye Country Life UK dergisinin July 27, 2022 sayısından alınmıştır.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Giriş Yap
Bu hikaye Country Life UK dergisinin July 27, 2022 sayısından alınmıştır.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Giriş Yap
Save our family farms
IT Tremains to be seen whether the Government will listen to the more than 20,000 farming people who thronged Whitehall in central London on November 19 to protest against changes to inheritance tax that could destroy countless family farms, but the impact of the good-hearted, sombre crowds was immediate and positive.
A very good dog
THE Spanish Pointer (1766–68) by Stubbs, a landmark painting in that it is the artist’s first depiction of a dog, has only been exhibited once in the 250 years since it was painted.
The great astral sneeze
Aurora Borealis, linked to celestial reindeer, firefoxes and assassinations, is one of Nature's most mesmerising, if fickle displays and has made headlines this year. Harry Pearson finds out why
'What a good boy am I'
We think of them as the stuff of childhood, but nursery rhymes such as Little Jack Horner tell tales of decidedly adult carryings-on, discovers Ian Morton
Forever a chorister
The music-and way of living-of the cabaret performer Kit Hesketh-Harvey was rooted in his upbringing as a cathedral chorister, as his sister, Sarah Sands, discovered after his death
Best of British
In this collection of short (5,000-6,000-word) pen portraits, writes the author, 'I wanted to present a number of \"Great British Commanders\" as individuals; not because I am a devotee of the \"great man, or woman, school of history\", but simply because the task is interesting.' It is, and so are Michael Clarke's choices.
Old habits die hard
Once an antique dealer, always an antique dealer, even well into retirement age, as a crop of interesting sales past and future proves
It takes the biscuit
Biscuit tins, with their whimsical shapes and delightful motifs, spark nostalgic memories of grandmother's sweet tea, but they are a remarkably recent invention. Matthew Dennison pays tribute to the ingenious Victorians who devised them
It's always darkest before the dawn
After witnessing a particularly lacklustre and insipid dawn on a leaden November day, John Lewis-Stempel takes solace in the fleeting appearance of a rare black fox and a kestrel in hot pursuit of a pipistrelle bat
Tarrying in the mulberry shade
On a visit to the Gainsborough Museum in Sudbury, Suffolk, in August, I lost my husband for half an hour and began to get nervous. Fortunately, an attendant had spotted him vanishing under the cloak of the old mulberry tree in the garden.
