Draft:Woodborough Hall

Woodborough Hall
Interactive map of Woodborough Hall
53.0235025°N 1.069504°W / 53.0235025; -1.069504
Location	Woodborough, Nottinghamshire, England
History
Built	c. 1660
Built for	Philip Lacock
Site notes
Architect(s)	Thomas Chambers Hine (remodelling, c. 1850)
Owner	Kidd Hospitality
Website	woodborough-hall.co.uk
Listed Building – Grade II*
Official name	Woodborough Hall
Designated	15 July 1985
Reference no.	1227555

Woodborough Hall is a Grade II* listed English country house situated in the village of Woodborough, Nottinghamshire, England, approximately eight miles north-east of Nottingham. The present building dates from around 1660, when it was constructed for Philip Lacock on the site of an earlier manor house, and was subsequently remodelled in the mid-nineteenth century, probably to designs by the noted Nottingham architect T C Hine. Over the course of its history the Hall has served as a military headquarters, a nursing home, and a restaurant, and is today operated as a wedding and events venue, boutique hotel, and restaurant by Kidd Hospitality, who purchased the property in 2022.

The Hall is a three-storey, four-bay structure of brick with a rendered finish, hipped slate roof, ashlar dressings, and mullioned and transomed casements with Gothick glazing bars. Its interior retains fine late seventeenth-century features, including an impressive dog-leg staircase, carved stone fireplaces, and woodwork attributed to Mansfield Parkyns, one of the Hall's most notable occupants.

The ownership of the land on which the Hall stands can be traced in unbroken succession from before the Norman Conquest, making it one of the most historically documented estates in Nottinghamshire.

Architecture

Woodborough Hall was constructed around 1660 for Philip Lacock, the third son of George Lacock, a Nottingham solicitor who had purchased the estate in 1640. The building Lacock erected was a two-storey structure with a gabled and tiled roof. During the ownership of the Story family in the early nineteenth century, the original gabled roof was removed and a third storey added, resulting in the current three-storey form. These alterations are believed to have involved, at least in part, the noted Nottingham architect T C Hine, who later undertook a more substantial remodelling for Mansfield Parkyns from around 1850.

The building as it stands today is described in its Historic England listing as a house of brick, rendered, with a hipped slate roof, ashlar dressings, a rendered plinth, two ridge stacks and two side-wall brick stacks. It presents three storeys and four bays on a square plan, with mullioned and transomed casements fitted with Gothick glazing bars.

The interior retains a high quality of late seventeenth-century craftsmanship. The entrance hall contains a chamfered stone fireplace with a carved wooden surround flanked by fluted Doric pilasters and two large boxed-in beams. The dining room has a comparable fireplace with fluted Ionic pilasters and a raised and fielded overmantel. Much of the wall panelling is thought to date from the mid-nineteenth century. The staircase is a very fine dog-leg form with carved scroll balusters, square newel posts decorated with carved swags, vases, and pendant drops, and a matching dado rail. The top landing features a tall door surround topped with a broken pediment, with flanking round arches and carved panels. One of the principal bedrooms retains an ornate fireplace surround of fluted Corinthian pilasters and a carved frieze. An elaborately carved wooden buffet in the dining room is attributed to Mansfield Parkyns, who was an accomplished woodcarver.

A stained glass window on the staircase, three lights wide and two lights high, bears the heraldic shields of the Parkyns family and is thought to have been installed during Mansfield Parkyns's ownership in the latter half of the nineteenth century.

In 2008 and 2009, under the ownership of Timothy and Mrs Lock, a new orangery was added to the building. Designed to complement the Grade II* listed main hall and its gardens, the structure directly adjoins the historic building and provides additional event space. A well-preserved Anderson shelter dating from the Second World War also survives in the grounds.

History

Pre-Conquest origins

The first recorded reference to the landholding at Woodborough appears in the Domesday Book of 1086. The survey records that the land, which had previously belonged to Ulchel, an English thane, had been taken from him following the Norman Conquest of 1066 and given to William Peveril, the son of William the Conqueror, along with substantial portions of Staffordshire, Derbyshire, and Nottinghamshire, in exchange for a fixed number of soldiers. The site of the Hall is believed to have formed part of Ulchel's manor of approximately four and a half carucates, equating to around 540 acres.

The de Wodeburg and de Strelley families

Following the Conquest, the land passed to a Norman who took the name Ralf de Wodeburg, and the manor remained in the de Wodeburg family for nearly three centuries. The family is mentioned in the Domesday Book and held the estate until around 1336, when it passed by marriage to Richard de Strelley, son of Sampson de Strelley, who had been responsible for the construction of the chancel of the nearby St Swithun's Church, Woodborough.

The de Strelley family held the manor through numerous successive generations, representing continuity of ownership of around 300 years. The Strelleys took the Royalist side in the English Civil War, and the financial consequences are thought to have contributed to the eventual loss of the estate. In 1622 the property passed to Isabel Bold, whose grandson Strelley Bold sold the lands to George Lacock in 1640. This was the first recorded sale of the estate since the Norman Conquest.

The Lacock family and construction of the Hall

George Lacock was a Nottingham solicitor and a Parliamentarian during the Civil War. He purchased the estate around 1640 and demolished the existing manor house. His son Philip Lacock built the present Hall between approximately 1660 and 1670 — a two-storey structure with a gabled and tiled roof, containing the carved stonework and woodwork that survives in the Hall's interior to the present day.

Philip Lacock died in 1668, and the property subsequently passed via a daughter of the family to the Bainbridge family.

The Bainbridge and Story periods

The best-remembered occupant of the Bainbridge period was Elizabeth Bainbridge (1716–1797), who never married and lived at the Hall until her death. When Elizabeth died in 1798, the manor passed to the Reverend Philip Story, a cousin and the second son of her aunt Ann Lacock, who had married John Story.

During the Story family's occupation the old gabled and tiled roof was removed and a third storey added with a new slate roof, transforming the Hall into its current three-storey form. These alterations may have involved the noted Nottingham architect T C Hine. The Storys were largely non-resident and the Hall was let to a succession of tenants including Captain Fenwick, a Mr Worth, and Colonel Hancock.

After standing empty for seven years, the Hall was sold in 1842 to John Ingall Werg, together with 53 acres of land. This was only the second recorded sale of the estate since the Norman Conquest.

The Mansfield Parkyns era

John Ingall Werg's tenure proved brief. According to the Reverend Walter Buckland's History of Woodborough (1897), Werg invested unwisely and was forced to sell. In 1852 the Hall was purchased for £4,500 by Mansfield Parkyns, the second son of the 5th Baronet Sir Thomas Parkyns.

Mansfield Parkyns (1823–1894) was a noted explorer who, after being sent down from Oxford University, had set out with the intention of walking across Africa from east to west. He spent many years in Abyssinia and Egypt before returning to England. He settled in Woodborough, where he had eight daughters, and became one of the most influential figures in the village's history. He served as Lieutenant Colonel, commanding the Royal Sherwood Foresters and the 1st Administration Battalion, Nottinghamshire Rifle Volunteers, which developed into the local Territorial Army regiment.

Parkyns commissioned a substantial remodelling of the Hall around 1850, a project attributed to the architect T C Hine. Examples of Parkyns's woodcarving can be seen in the balustrade of the oak staircase and in the elaborately carved wooden buffet in the dining room. A stained glass window on the staircase, bearing the arms of the Parkyns family, is also believed to date from his ownership. Parkyns died in 1894 of an illness contracted during his years of foreign travel and was buried at St Swithun's Church, Woodborough.

The Hall was sold in 1895 to Charles Hose Hill, a Nottingham company director. In 1917 Hill introduced a piped water supply to the Hall, drawing water from a reservoir in Stanley Wood, on a hill above the property. The Hall changed hands again in 1923, passing to Hubert Dowson, and was subsequently placed on the open market for auction in October 1937.

Military occupation

Just before the outbreak of the Second World War, the Hall was purchased by the Crown to serve as the official residence of the Air Officer Commanding, No. 12 Group RAF, based at RAF Hucknall, Nottinghamshire. From around 1936 the Hall was used as both a military base and a strategic planning headquarters.

Among the most distinguished wartime occupants was Air Vice-Marshal Sir Trafford Leigh-Mallory, who commanded No. 12 Group RAF from the Hall during the early stages of the war. While resident at Woodborough Hall, Leigh-Mallory and Acting Squadron Leader Douglas Bader developed and advocated the controversial Big Wing tactical formation, which proposed meeting Luftwaffe bombing raids with a massed formation of three to five squadrons rather than engaging them piecemeal. The strategy was a significant point of contention with Air Vice-Marshal Keith Park of No. 11 Group RAF, whose squadrons were bearing the heaviest losses in the south-east of England during the Battle of Britain.

All domestic staff at the Hall during the RAF period were RAF personnel, whose duties ranged from catering to serving as batmen. Leigh-Mallory's wife, Doris, coordinated the housing of evacuees in the village, the majority of whom came from Sheffield. A substantial bomb shelter was constructed in the grounds of the Hall during this period, the entrance to which survives to this day.

The Hall also served at various points as a temporary headquarters for both the Riding Hussars and the Sherwood Foresters. Following Leigh-Mallory's tenure, the property continued as a senior RAF residence, housing Air Vice-Marshal R L M Atcherley, Air Vice-Marshal W J Crisham CBE, and Air Vice-Marshal Frazer, who departed in 1958 to take up a post at the Air Ministry in Uxbridge.

In 1959 the Hall passed from the Air Ministry to the Army, becoming the official residence of the General Officer Commanding the 49th (West Riding and North Midlands) Division and District. A succession of Major-Generals and Brigadiers occupied the Hall through to 1979, including Major-General Sir Richard Goodwin, Major-General T H Birkbeck, Major-General P F Glover, and Major-General R Gordon-Finlayson. During the Army occupation, regimental bands including the South Nottinghamshire Hussars regularly performed in the Hall's grounds as part of the annual Woodborough Feast celebrations.

Leigh-Mallory was killed in November 1944 when his aircraft crashed over the French Alps while he was en route to Ceylon to take up the post of Air Commander-in-Chief of South East Asia Command. He was among the most senior British officers, and the most senior RAF officer, to die in the Second World War.

Several structural alterations were carried out during the military occupancy, most notably in the 1960s during Major-General Glover's tenure. The original front door on the Bank Hill side of the Hall was blocked up to form a dining room, and the main entrance was relocated to the lawn-facing front elevation.

Later twentieth and twenty-first centuries

The military ceased using Woodborough Hall in 1980 and the building stood empty for four years. It was sold in 1984 to a Mr Oxby for £144,000. By this point the East wing had been demolished and the West wing was in poor condition. Oxby occupied the main rooms of the ground and first floors and converted the upper floor into flats. In 1986 the outbuildings and coach house were also converted into residential units.

In 1988 the Hall was purchased by Dennis Wright and Gerald Poxton, who refurbished the main building, restored the West wing, and rebuilt the East wing. The Hall then operated as a residential nursing home until February 2004, when the nursing home closed.

The Hall was awarded Grade II* listed building status in 1985.

In 2005 the Bellamy family opened the Hall as a high-end restaurant under head chef Des Sweeney, but sold the business in 2008 to Timothy and Mrs Lock. The Locks added a new orangery in 2008 and 2009, adjoining the main listed building, and established the Hall as a wedding venue.

In July 2022, following a period of decline, the Hall was purchased by Kidd Hospitality. Over the following five months the new owners undertook a phased programme of renovation and refurbishment covering compliance work, structural restoration, interior decoration, and design fit-out. The project used predominantly local contractors, including Bonsers, who carried out roof, guttering, chimney, and stonework repairs. One notable element of the restoration involved the removal of a bar that had been built in front of an original fireplace, restoring the room to its historic appearance. The Hall reopened in December 2022 as a wedding and events venue, boutique hotel, and restaurant.

Connection to the founding of MI6

The Hall is associated with a notable episode in British intelligence history. When Mansfield Parkyns purchased the Hall in 1852, his nephew was Captain Sir George Mansfield Smith-Cumming, who became the first director of the Secret Intelligence Service, more commonly known as MI6. According to local historical accounts, Smith-Cumming held a meeting at Woodborough Hall in 1909 at which the Secret Service was founded. The organisation was initially small and highly secretive, specialising in foreign espionage and internal counter-espionage.

Smith-Cumming served as director of MI6 from its founding in 1909 until his death in 1923. The Hall therefore holds a place in the origins of British foreign intelligence, preceding the agency's prominent wartime role in operations such as the breaking of German codes and ciphers at Bletchley Park.

Notable occupants

• Mansfield Parkyns (1823–1894) — explorer, soldier, and woodcarver; owned the Hall from 1852 until his death. Travelled extensively in Abyssinia and Egypt and commanded the local Rifle Volunteers on his return. His woodcarving is preserved in the staircase balustrade and dining room.
• Air Vice-Marshal Sir Trafford Leigh-Mallory — occupied the Hall as Air Officer Commanding No. 12 Group RAF during the early years of the Second World War. A central figure in the Battle of Britain and, alongside Douglas Bader, the architect of the controversial Big Wing strategy. Killed in a plane crash in the French Alps in November 1944.
• Captain Sir George Mansfield Smith-Cumming — nephew of Mansfield Parkyns; believed to have convened the founding meeting of MI6 at the Hall in 1909. Served as its first director until 1923.

See also

• Colwick Hall
• Newstead Abbey
• Annesley Hall, Nottinghamshire
• No. 12 Group RAF
• Battle of Britain

External links

• Official website
• Historic England listing
• Woodborough Heritage Group
• Conservation & Heritage Journal article

Category:Country houses in Nottinghamshire Category:Grade II* listed buildings in Nottinghamshire Category:Hotels in Nottinghamshire Category:MI6