Bishops Waltham, Hampshire, England

The palace of Bishop's Waltham was originally built by Henry de Blois bishop of Winchester during the twelfth century, and was shortly afterwards the scene of two important councils: in 1182 when the barons met Henry II and granted him supplies for the second crusade; and in 1194 when Richard I held a council here preparatory to his last expedition to France. The palace seems to have been a favourite residence of the bishops, and to have been frequently visited by royalty. The wills of both Henry II and William of Wykeham are dated at Waltham, and Wykeham spent his last days here. Cardinal Beaufort in his will bequeathed to Queen Margaret of England his 'blue bed of gold and damask at his palace at Waltham, in the room where the Queen used to lie when she was at that palace, and three suits of the arras hangings in the same room.' William of Waynflete also made his will and died at Bishop's Waltham palace. The State Papers of the reign of Henry VIII contain many references to the visits of that king and of Wolsey and Thomas Cromwell to Bishop's Waltham palace; and in 1512 it was the scene of the convention between king and emperor which came to be known as the Treaty of Waltham. Within a few years of this date Leland described the palace as 'a right ample and goodly Maner Place moted aboute, and a praty Brooke renning hard by it.' Later in the sixteenth century, when the manor and palace of Waltham were in the hands of the crown, Edward VI described the palace as 'a fair old home, in times past of the bishops of Winchester, but now my Lord Treasurer's.' The great Civil War saw the destruction of Bishop's Waltham palace, which after a gallant defence by 200 cavaliers under Colonel Bennett surrendered to General Brown, on 9 April, 1644. On the 11th a cavalier wrote: 'Waltham House in ashes.' Bishop Curll, who was resident in the palace at the time, is said to have effected his escape in a dung cart. For some time after this anyone who required building stone helped himself from the palace ruins. In 1869 the property passed into the hands of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, who sold the site and ruins of the palace to Sir William Jenner. Since the latter's death in 1898, his widow Lady Jenner has owned the place.

The ruins of the palace are still imposing, though little is left but the shell of the north wing. The house was probably foursquare, with an inner court, and a gateway in an outer court on the north-east, round which the offices were built. The whole was defended by a moat, which remains very perfect on the north and east, and a large space south and west of the moated site is inclosed by a picturesque brick wall, built by Bishop Langton (ob. 1501), with a square two-story garden-house remaining at its southeastern angle. Through it a stream runs northwest towards the Hamble, leaving the inclosure at a second red-brick garden-house in the north-west angle, which has served as a latrine. In the western part of the inclosure stands the house known as Place House, owned by Lady Jenner, part of which may be of seventeenth-century date, but its chief attractions are its garden and the view of the ruined palace.

Part of the arrangement of the palace building is still to be made out, though the site is much overgrown and heaped with fallen rubbish. The south front is 180 ft. long, with a square tower at each end, projecting beyond the line of the main wall. The general appearance of the work is that of a fifteenthcentury building, but in reality a great deal of twelfth-century walling and detail exists, especially in the western part. In the centre of the range stands the hall, with tall two-light windows on the south, the inner or north wall being in this part entirely destroyed. At the east end are the kitchen and offices, and at the west of the hall are living rooms. Along the west wall of the hall are remains of a twelfth-century wall arcade, and in the room immediately adjoining it a large twelfth-century window remains in a fair state of preservation. The other wings of the house are completely ruined, but the remains of the chapel, a small twelfth-century apsidal building, were excavated some years since, and are still to be seen, though much overgrown, to the south of the hall. Parts of the outer gatehouse exist at the north-east angle of the inclosure, the side walls only being left, with fireplaces in what must have been the porter's lodgings. At the south-east angle of the inclosure is a long building standing east and west, and formerly of two stories. At the east end is a large fireplace, and the building was probably a bakehouse, brewhouse, or the like, and is of late fifteenth-century date.

The large pond to the south of the palace, separated from the southern arm of its moat by the high road, is an artificial pool made to work the mill at its west end. Below the mill are the banks of a second pool, now dry, and there seems to have been a third bank further down stream. All the pools no doubt served as stew-ponds for the use of the palace.