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Historic Buildings of Staffordshire
England
Image right - Whitmore Hall
Image Geograph © Copyright Stephen Richards and licensed for reuse under Creative Commons Licence.
See Historic Buildings of Britain and Ireland - Main Page
The object of this project is to provide information about historic buildings in the county of Staffordshire, with links to sub-projects for specific buildings as appropriate. GENi profiles of people associated with those establishments can be linked to this project and/or to individual projects where they have been set up.
If you have information about any of the Buildings mentioned below please share it here. If you have ancestors linked to any of the places please add them to the project.
Historic houses in alphabetical order
Including Castles, Abbeys, Priories, Manor Houses, Mansions, Stately Homes, Country houses, Estate houses, Courts, Halls, Parks and other listed buildings of historic interest.
Full sizes of the thumbnail images can be seen in the Gallery attached to the project or by clicking the thumbnail image. TIP - Use ctrl+the link to open the image in a separate tab, or use "back" to return to this project page) Sources for the images can be found in the image details as seen in the gallery.
Names with Bold links are to Geni profiles or projects. Other links take you to external biographical web pages. Please copy and paste the bullet used - ● - instead of * when adding items to the list.
A
● Abbey House, Ranton (ruined)
● Alton Castle
● Alton Towers
● Ancient High House
● Apedale Hall
● Aqualate Hall
B
● 
Barlaston Hall
Image http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/3442977Geograpy] © Copyright Stephen Richards and licensed for reuse under Creative Commons Licence.
The eminent Georgian architect Robert Taylor built a series of villas in which he experimented by mixing up the shapes of the rooms (as well as the interior decoration), manifested externally by square projections (seen here), canted projections (to the sides), and bowed projections (the back). Barlaston was built c1756. The pediment is embellished by ball finials and Taylor has used his favoured distinctive octagonal window panes. A most elegant composition. Grade I listed.
Thomas Mills, an attorney from Leek, in 1756–58, built the house to replace the existing manor house that he had acquired through marriage. The hall has a red-brick exterior, and is one of a few of Taylor's buildings which retain his trademark octagonal and diamond glazing in the sash windows.
The gardens and grounds of about 4.5 acres (1.8 ha) were landscaped by William Sawrey Gilpin. The house is located beside the parish church of St John the Baptist (now deconsecrated).
The hall came into the Adderley family in 1816 when Rosamund Mills, co-heiress of the Barlaston estate, married Ralph Adderley of Coton Hall, Hanbury, Staffordshire. Their son Ralph Thomas Adderley was High Sheriff of Staffordshire in 1866.
By the 1970s the house was in a very sorry state, in large part due to the neglect of its owners Wedgwood, but it has since been restored (the details can be found on Wikipedia)
● Beamhurst Hall
● Beaudesert (house) {demolished}
● Betley Court
● Betley Hall (demolished)
● Biddulph Grange
● Blithfield Hall
● Broughton Hall
C
● Calwich Abbey (demolished)
● Caverswall Castle
● Chillington Hall
● Cresswell Hall - established by the late 18th century, demolished 20th Cenbtury. marked on Yates’ map of Staffordshire (1775), Linked to John Whitby, of Cresswell Hall
Image can be seen at http://www.lostheritage.org.uk/houses/lh_staffordshire_cresswellhal...
● Croxall Hall
D
● Drayton Manor
● Dovecliff Hall
● Dunstall Hall
E
● Elmhurst Hall
● Erasmus Darwin House
● Etruria Hall
F
● Ford Green Hall
● Forton Hall
G
H
● Haselour Hall
● The Heath House
● Himley Hall
● Hoar Cross Hall
● Horseley Hall was established in the last two decades of the 19th century, although an earlier hall, marked on Yates’ map of Staffordshire (1775), existed to the south west, now the site of Horseley Farm.
● Houndhill Farm , situated close to a medieval moated site, was built at a similar time to Marchington Hall but replaced an existing house. The farm dates back to the 12th century when Earl William de Ferrers was renting land to Engenulph de Houndhill. The name may be Scandinavian in origin so it is possible that Hound Hill may have been used by the Vikings as an observation point. By the 16th century the Vernons were living at Houndhill manor and remained there until the early 20th century.
I
● Ilam Park
● Ingestre Hall
J
● Johnson Hall - established by the late 18th century, marked on Yates’ map of Staffordshire (1775)
K
● Knypersley Hall
L
M
● Madeley Old Hall
● Maer Hall
● Manley Hall (demolished)
● Marchington Hall - built in the late 17th century either by John Egerton, Earl of Bridgwater, or possibly his son Charles Egerton who owned the manor in 1684/5. It is built of brick with a gabled front. It belonged to the Talbot family in the late 18th and early 19th centuries until it was sold again and for a while it was under the ownership of the Vernon family.
● Milford Hall
● Moseley Old Hall
N
O
● 
Oxley Manor - Oxley Hall;
Image - Courtesy of Patrick Comerford The History of the Comerford, Comberford and Quemerford Families
A colour plate dating from 1870 of Oxley Manor, Bushbury, two miles from Wolverhampton, by the Revd Francis Orpen Morris (1810-1893)
Oxley was the home of the Austen family until the death of Thomas Austen in 1613.
P
● Packington Hall
● Patshull Hall
Q
R
● Rolleston Hall (demolished)
S
● Sandford Hall
● Seighford Hall - Country Estate established by the 17th Century.
● 
Shugborough Hall
Image Georgaph © Copyright David Dixon and licensed for reuse under Creative Commons Licence.
Shugborough is a country estate on the edge of Cannock Chase, approximately 4 miles from Stafford. It comprises a country house, kitchen garden, and model farm. It is owned by the National Trust and maintained by the leaseholder, Staffordshire County Council.
The estate was owned by the Bishops of Lichfield until the Dissolution of the Monasteries around 1540 and thereafter passed through several hands until it was purchased in 1624 by William Anson, a lawyer, of Dunston, Staffordshire. In 1693, William Anson's grandson, also called William, demolished the existing manor house and constructed a three-story building which stills forms the central part of the hall.
William's elder son, Thomas Anson MP (1695-1773), further extended the house in the 1740s, adding two pavilions flanking either side of the central block. It was Thomas's younger brother, however, who would fund these changes; Admiral George Anson, created Lord Anson in 1747 and First Lord of the Admiralty in 1751, amassed a great fortune during his naval career and when he died without issue he left the majority to his elder brother. Thomas also died childless and the estate passed to his sister's son, [George Adams of Orgrave, later Anson of Shugborough George Adams, who adopted the surname Anson by royal licence.
In 1806, George's son Thomas was created Viscount Anson. The 2nd viscount, was created Earl of Lichfield in the coronation honours of William IV. The Earl led an extravagant lifestyle and amassed several large debts, which, in 1842, forced him to sell the entire contents of the house in a two-week-long sale. While the 2nd earl did much to restore the house and contents to its former glory, by the time his son inherited the estate it was heavily mortgaged.
It remained in the Anson family until 1960 when the estate was gifted to in lieu of death duties. The family (most notably Patrick Lichfield) resided in private apartments on the upper floor of the house. Following the death of Patrick Lichfield, the private apartments have been opened to the public and may be viewed during a visit to the house.
● Somerford Hall
● 
Stafford Castle
Image Geograph © Copyright Philip Halling and licensed for reuse underCreative Commons Licence.
Stafford Castle is an ancient Grade II listed building that lies two miles to the west of Stafford. The stone building is an important early example of a 14th-century keep, later redesigned in a Gothic Revival style. The structure was built on the foundations of its medieval predecessor and incorporates much of the original stonework.
A wooden castle was originally built on the site ca. 1070s by the Norman lord Robert de Tosny who had been given a large amount of land in the area by William of Normandy in order to control and extract taxes from the native Anglo-Saxon community, in preparation for the Norman invasion of Wales in 1081. The earthworks cover over ten acres, while the site backs onto woodland (sixteen acres).
Ralph de Stafford sealed a contract with a master mason in 1347, ordering a castle to be built on the castle mound. The rectangular stone Keep originally had a tower in each corner, but was later adapted, with a fifth tower being added on in the middle of the North Wall (actually facing west).
In 1444,Humphrey Stafford was created Duke of Buckingham and the stone castle reached its heyday. Humphrey's grandson, Henry, had become a ward of the Yorkists following Humphrey's death at the battle of Northampton in 1460. Henry was initially a supporter of Richard III, but later rebelled in favour of the aborted invasion of Henry Tudor (Henry VII) in 1483. Henry Stafford, second Duke of Buckingham paid with his life, but his son, Edward Stafford, escaped and was later restored to his lands by a grateful Henry VII.
Edward Stafford's royal blood made him a threat to Henry VIII, who had him executed in 1521. The Stafford's Estate, which included the castle and its deer parks, was seized by the Crown. The Stafford's Estate was seized by the Crown.
Stafford Castle, along with a small parcel of land, was restored to the Staffords, but they never regained the wealth or status of earlier years. Through lack of maintenance, the Keep fell into disrepair and in 1603, another Edward Stafford wrote a letter in which he referred to 'My rotten castle of Stafford.'
During the early phases of the Civil War it was defended by Lady Isobel Stafford, a staunch Roman Catholic and Royalist. The Parliamentarians had captured Stafford on 15 May 1643, following a brief siege, but some of its garrison escaped and held Stafford Castle, with the hope of using it as a bridgehead to recapture the town.
The siege was raised when Colonel Hastings led a relief column which arrived on 5 June. Lady Isobel was eventually persuaded to leave, a small garrison remaining to defend the castle against a renewed siege. In late June, the Royalist garrison fled, having heard of information that a large Parliamentarian army was approaching, complete with a number of siege cannons capable of easily overwhelming the small garrison that remained. The castle then fell into Parliamentarian control in which it stayed until its demolition.
On 22 December, not many months after its capture, the Parliamentarian Committee of Stafford, ordered: "the Castle shall be forthwith demolished."
Reference https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stafford_Castle
● Statfold Hall
● Stourton Castle
● Stretton Hall
● 
Swynnerton Hall
Image by John Preston Neale from the Mechanical Curator collection, a set of over 1 million images scanned from out-of-copyright books and released to Flickr Commons by the British Library. Public Domain, Wiki Commons
Swynnerton, or Swinnerton Hall - 18th-century country mansion house, the home of Lord Stafford, situated at Swynnerton near Stone, Staffordshire. It is a Grade I listed building. The manor of Swynnerton was owned by the Swynnerton family for several centuries before it came to the Fitzherberts when William Fitzherbert, third son of Sir Anthony Fitzherbert of Norbury Hall, married Elizabeth, daughter and co-heir of Humphrey Swynnerton, in 1562. The Fitzherberts, a staunchly Catholic family, were Royalist sympathisers during the English Civil War and the house was irreparably damaged by the Parliamentarian forces. The Norbury and Swynnerton estates were united when in 1649 John Fitzherbert of Norbury bequeathed his estate to his cousin William Fitzherbert of Swynnerton.
T
● 
Tamworth Castle
Image right By Stan, CC BY-SA 2.0, Wiki Commons
A Norman castle overlooking the mouth of the River Anker into the Tame in the town of Tamworth in Staffordshire, England. Before boundary changes in 1889 the castle was within the edge of Warwickshire while most of the town belonged to Staffordshire.
Reference Wiki - Tamworth Castle
Related People
● Teddesley Hall
● The Villas
● The Wodehouse
● Thornbury Hall
● Thorpe Constantine Hall
● Trentham Gardens
● Turnhurst
U-V
W
● Weston Park
● 
Whitmore Hall
Image Geograph © Copyright Stephen Richards and licensed for reuse under Creative Commons Licence.
Home of the Cavenagh-Mainwaring family at Whitmore, Staffordshire. A Grade I listed building, the hall was designated a house of outstanding architectural and historical interest and is a fine example of a small Carolean style manor house. The present owners and residents of the hall are Guy and Christine Mainwaring-Cavenaugh. Guy is a descendant of the original Whitmore family, through several female heiresses, who have owned the property for almost 900 years. See Edward Mainwaring
● Whittington Old Hall
● 
Wolseley Hall linked to Sir William Wolseley of Wolseley Hall
Image from the Mechanical Curator collection, a set of over 1 million images scanned from out-of-copyright books and released to Flickr Commons by the British Library. Public domain
The hall had belonged to the Wolseley family since before the Conquest It was demolished in the mid-20th century. The site, now in use as a nature reserve and headquarters of the Staffordshire Wildlife Trust, shows remnants of a failed business venture of 1990 to create a garden park with pools, shrubs and bamboos. Only the ice house remains.
The land was held by the Wolseley family from the 11th century until the mid-1990s. At one stage the estate contained a medieval deer park.
● Wootton Lodge
● Wrottesley Hall
● Wychnor Hall
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X-Y-Z
References and Sources
Staffordshire Specific
General
- Stravaiging.com
- Secret Scotland
- Canmore
- Historic Scotland
- National Trust
- English Heritage
- WIKI List of country houses in the UK
- Britain's Finest
- Britain Express
- Lankdmark Trust
- Historic Houses Association - represents 1,500 houses in the UK
- Hudson's Historic Houses and Gardens - UK - guidebook of over 2,000 houses open to the public
- The DiCamillo Companion to British & Irish Country Houses - database of over 7,000 houses
- Lost Heritage - A Memorial to the Lost Country Houses of England - list of over 1,700 houses
- National Trust for Historic Preservation - online database of historic houses in the United States
- WIKI Historic Houses Association
- Historic Houses Association
- WIKI Treasure Houses of England
- List of country houses in the United Kingdom
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Other Pages for Historic Buildings of English Counties
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Rutland now East Midlands
Shropshire (Salop)
Historic Buildings of Sussex divided into two projects
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