Tag Archives: Manor House

BERKSHIRE

OCKWELLS MANOR

One of the finest specimens of an old English Manor House that has played host to Kings and Queens.

Ockwells Manor is an historic and highly impressive Grade I listed timber framed manor house. Image: Knight Frank.

The Manor House of Ockwells, or Ockholt, as it was called when Sir John Norreys, High Sheriff of Berkshire, and a courtier of Henry VI, started to build it between 1440 and 1450, is one of the most complete and satisfying examples of an English manor house of the fifteenth century. It embodies all that is best in the design and workmanship of the Middle Ages and has some remarkably contemporary heraldic glass of eighteen shields of arms, two of them Royal, in the east windows of the Great Hall.

A comprehensive view from the south-west in 1952. The gateway in the buttressed wall leads to a main drive. Image: The British Newspaper Archive.

Norreys’ house, which stands on land at Bray, near Maidenhead, given to Ricardo De Norreys by Henry III in 1267, was completed in 1466, the year after his death. In his will, dated April 4th, 1465, he is recorded as having left a sum of £40 to complete the building of a chapel. When completed it formed part of the manor buildings, but fire destroyed most of it in 1720.

Ockwells Manor was described by Sir Nikolas Pevsner as “the most refined and most sophisticated timber framed mansion in England.” Image: Knight Frank.

Much of the uniqueness of Ockwells lies in the fact that it is constructed entirely of local materials. It still retains undisturbed today in its entirety the massive oak framework and timber which the Windsor forests originally gave it. It retains also the pleasantly symmetrical architectural features of Tudor building. Ockwells is built round its small Cloister Court. The Great Hall also has its notable features: the massive oak screen with complementary service quarters behind it, a 24 ft long table made of two planks, fine armour and furniture and a large, colourful Flemish tapestry.

The house is faithful to its period and boasts spectacular panelling, stained glass windows and herringbone pattern brickwork. Image: Knight Frank.

Nearly a century after Sir John had completed his manor house it passed, on the marriage of Elizabeth Norreys, to Sir Thomas ffetiplace. And Elizabeth’s daughter, Katherine, in turn, took Ockwells as part of her dowry on marrying Sir Francis Englefield. It was this Lady Elizabeth’s close friendship with Elizabeth I which is known to have brought the Queen to Ockwells on many occasions. King Charles I used it for some time as a shooting box and when George IV visited he was so pleased with its architectural beauty that the style was introduced at Windsor in the building of King’s College in the Great Park.

Ockwells has been greatly extended and restored since the first brick was laid, particularly since 1889, when substantial work was carried out. Image: Knight Frank.

In about 1600 a new staircase was added, the hall furnished with wainscoting and some new chimney pieces added. The fabric of the building then fell into decline until the late 19th Century when Charles Grenfell moved some of the glass to his home at Taplow Court for safe keeping. In 1885, his son William offered to return the glass if a new owner would grant him a 99 year lease of the manor in return. By this time, Sir Stephen Leach came to the rescue and he stripped the whole frame back and repaired it. It was then purchased by Sir Edward Barry, another enthusiastic antiquarian, who recast the building in its present form in stages, enlarging the dining room, inserting fireplaces and windows and moving the Jacobean staircase to its present position. By the 1950s, Ockwells was owned by Mr S.H. Barnett who, at the time, was praised for preserving rather than destroying the fabric of the house.

 The present owners have owned Ockwells Manor since 1986 and with the help of Mansfield Thomas and Partners of Hertfordshire, returned it to its present order.

Aside from its architectural and historical pedigree, the house functions as a beautiful family home ideal for entertaining or family living in equal measure. Image: Knight Frank.
The Jacobean staircase, 17th Century panelling and 15th Century stone fireplace are particularly striking features of the house. Image: Knight Frank.
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SUSSEX

FINDON PLACE

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“Where the house at Findon Place, or the Manor House as it used to be called, now stands, there had doubtless been a house for many hundred years, and it is probable that Edward I spent many a night here.”

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Image: Knight Frank.

Findon Place is a stunning example of classical Georgian architecture. It has an extensive and rich history and is listed Grade II* due to its architectural and historical merit. The present house was largely built in the mid-18th century by John Cheale, Norroy King at Arms. It occupies the site of the original Manor House, and some parts of the present building date back to the reign of Henry VII, if not earlier. It is now on the market at Knight Frank with a guide price of £6 million.

At the time of Edward the Confessor, the lands at Findon were in the possession of Harold, the last of the Saxon Kings, who was succeeded in the ownership of Findon (then called Fine-dune) by William de Braose, who as a kinsman of the Duke of Normandy is said to have received no fewer than forty gifts of property from William the Conqueror. At the time the estate equated to a 15,000-acre deer park.

Findon Place stayed in the hands of the Braose family until 1317 when William VIII gave the house to his daughter Aline and her husband John de Mowbray.

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Image: Knight Frank.

The new family ownership of John de Mowbray was cut short as he was beheaded in York in 1322 after being part of the revolt against the Crown. The King granted a licence in 1324 to allow Aline, the ability to grant the manor to Hugh de Spenser.

Findon Place was then in the hands of the Crown from 1525 until 1538, when Richard Rich obtained a licence and passed on the tenure to Thomas Cromwell. During Cromwell’s ownership, a larger house was constructed over the medieval foundations. There is still evidence of one of the grand chimneys between the present kitchen and the sitting room, which is now blocked off.

Edward Shelley was passed the house in 1541 from Cromwell, and it remained in the Shelley family until 1604.

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Image: Knight Frank.

Coming to later times we find Findon Place held by John Cheale, Norroy King of Arms in the reign of George IV, who rebuilt most of the house before passing it to his nephew, William Green, a friend of the Sovereign who, when Prince of Wales, often visited Findon from Brighton, for the excellent shooting on the estate. Green’s devisees in trust reserved twenty acres and the sepulchral Chapel, in the Church, and sold the remainder to William Richardson.

William Richardson bought the house in the 18th Century and was married to Mary Margesson, the eldest daughter of John Margesson of Offington, who died without issue and the property was bequeathed to a cousin, William Westbrook Richardson, himself the son of Frances, second daughter of John Margesson.

It was soon after his arrival in 1787 that the house was restored, and the reception rooms rebuilt. After his death in 1801, his widow built the big room to the west end of the house.

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Image: Knight Frank.

Findon Place was later sold to Lieutenant-Colonel William George Margesson in 1872, who added a storey to the east wing, which improved the servant accommodation. He also built a reservoir holding 15,000 gallons on the hillside. However, Margesson died in 1911 and his two sons died in the First World War, leaving no heirs.

During the early years of the 20th century the house was let and one of the occupiers, Mr E.J. Spencer, carried out several extensive internal improvements, embracing among other things an electric lighting plant, heating, drainage and septic tank, additional bathrooms, panelling to several reception rooms, a new reservoir holding 45,000 gallons, new croquet lawn and two tennis lawns.

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Image: Knight Frank.

In the 1920s and 1930s, Findon Place was let to the Savills and then to the Hartridges, who eventually bought it.  John Hartridge sold it to Keith Middlemas, who in 1972, sold it to John Young.

The oldest part of the present house are the cellars, which were originally the base of the medieval house. The hard stone foundations, laid about 1200-1300, can be seen and a cut chalk and red mortar wall from before 1300.

The property is beautifully set back from the lane, with a stone gravel drive. The accommodation is well proportioned and arranged over four floors. Of note are the three principle reception rooms, which have extraordinary high ceilings.

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Image: Knight Frank.

The house has been adapted for modern day living with a great balance between formal and informal areas and maintains the ability to entertain on a grand scale. The bedrooms are arranged over two upper floors and as expected are well proportioned. On the first floor there are six principal bedrooms served by four bathrooms, including a generous master suite with bedroom, bathroom and dressing room. The second floor is served by a separate staircase and provides more flexible accommodation with a kitchenette, five bedrooms and two bathrooms giving the ability to create a separate apartment for staff or guests.

The gardens provide the most glorious setting and have been laid out to create a high degree of privacy and protection. They include a mixture of high flint walls, herbaceous borders, mature trees and areas of level lawns. There is a range of additional outbuildings including stables, garden stores and a hexagonal room. They also include a heated outdoor swimming pool and tennis court. The grounds extend to approximately 52 acres and is a mixture of pasture and woodland.

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HEREFORDSHIRE

DINMORE MANOR HOUSE

An impeccable Grade II listed manor house with Gothic touches 

Dinmore Manor 1 (Savills)

This country house estate at Hope Under Dinmore is currently on the market and likely to cost potential buyers well over £30 million. At its centre is Dinmore Manor, a Grade II listed large country house in a well-wooded, hilly part of Herefordshire. It includes a substantial acreage of about 1,552 acres including productive arable land, pasture and woodland. The house was erected on the site of a Preceptory about the time of Queen Elizabeth and, according to records, altered around 1830 and extended about 1928.

Since 1732 it was in the possession of the Fleming and St. John families and has enjoyed remarkably few owners since.

By the turn of the 20th century it was in the possession of the Rev. Harris Fleming St. John (1833-1903), who, as an only son, inherited from his father, Fleming St. John. He graduated from Trinity College, Cambridge, with a Master of Arts and in 1878 married Gertrude Margaret Ward, the eldest surviving daughter of Charles Ward of Clifton. He enjoyed an ecclesiastical career after being ordained as a Deacon in 1859 and a Priest from 1861. He became Chaplain of Dinmore Preceptory Chapel in 1879 having formerly filled curacies at Kempsford, Gloucestershire, and Leeds, and had acted as Domestic Chaplain to Bishop Wodford of Ely (1873-85). The chapel at Dinmore was fully restored by him in 1886. Being Lord of the Manor at Dinmore (and owning Henwick Grange, Worcestershire) meant he was also a considerable landowner.

Dinmore Manor 26 (Savills)
Following Harris St. John’s death, the Dinmore estate passed to his son, Oliver Stukely Fleming St. John (1881-1955), a man more akin to the land, who made his wealth as a fruit grower at Kipperknowle Farm.  He was educated at Marlborough College, Wiltshire, and later gained the rank of Lieutenant between 1916 and 1919 in the King’s Shropshire Light Infantry. He married, firstly, Agnes Margaret Jane Jenkin in 1913 and, secondly, Elizabeth Sarah Ross in 1924.

In 1927 the estate was bought by Richard Hollins Murray (1882-1957) who was responsible for the house we see today. Murray was a Chartered Accountant and a Manchester-based Company Director, also owning a large house called Erlesdine, at Bowden, Cheshire. In 1927, the same year he bought Dinmore Manor, he patented the idea of reflective glass beads for advertising signs and road signage, a concept later developed by Percy Shaw to create ‘cat’s eyes’ in the road.

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Richard Hollins Murray (1882-1957) bought Dinmore in 1927. (Image: HollinsMurray/Ancestry).

Richard Hollins Murray spent a considerable sum on the house, including several ‘Gothic’ additions, and restored the 13th century chapel of the Knight Hospitallers of Jerusalem, as well as the cloisters leading from the chapel to the manor. (Murray was an Officer of the Order of St. John Jerusalem). The gardens were also re-landscaped with the creation of a new rock garden. They became his ‘pride and joy’ and were regularly opened to the public. He enhanced them with amplifying apparatus in the belfry of the chapel through which classical music concerts were broadcast while visitors walked around the grounds.

Following his death in 1957 the estate passed to his son, Charles Ian Murray (1911-1976) and remained with the family until the end of the century. In 1999 it was bought by Martin Dawes, ‘a serial entrepreneur’, who made his fortune renting television and radio sets in the North-West in the Sixties. He pocketed £70 million from the sale of his Martin Dawes Telecommunications business to Cellnet and probably used this windfall to buy Dinmore Manor. Later, in 2002, he made up to £29 million by selling his 35 per cent stake in Opal Telecom, which was bought by Carphone Warehouse, of which he became a director.

In addition to the Manor House, the wider estate now includes 21 other residential properties, a magnificent shoot, an outstanding cattle breeding facility and a world class equestrian complex set up by Dawes for a reputed £14 million.

All images courtesy of Savills, except where stated.

Dinmore Manor 4 (Savills)

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This home-made 8mm movie was produced by the Murray family of Dinmore Manor, Herefordshire, in 1938. The sound was added some years later. Music; excerpts from Les Preludes, Liszt.