Sulgrave Manor, Northamptonshire (Now Oxfordshire), England

Sulgrave Manor was built by Lawrence Washington, George Washington’s five times great grandfather, in the mid-1500s.
The entrance porch was completed soon after Queen Elizabeth's accession to the throne and Lawrence Washington displayed his loyalty to the new Queen by depicting her coat of arms and initials in plaster-work upon its gable.

Just above the door you can find the Washington family’s own coat of arms carved in stone – the ‘mullets and bars’ depicted resemble ‘stars and stripes’ and are widely believed to have influenced the design of the American flag.

Tudor House Washington Northamptonshire

The original Tudor features can be visited on one of our house tours, including the Great Hall that was the heart of the house where Lawrence Washington, his wife and eleven children lived. The structure of the room appears much today as it would have done when Lawrence Washington completed it in the mid-1500s and authentic Tudor furnishings fill the room.

Other original elements of the Washington's Tudor house are made up of the entrance porch, the Great Chamber and two smaller rooms on the first floor.

By 1700, when John Hodges built the north wing, parts of the Tudor house had already been destroyed. This north wing runs at right angles to the Tudor section and contains the Oak Parlour and Great Kitchen at ground level and the Chintz and White Bedrooms above.
The western section of the house did not exist when the house was purchased in 1914; today this has been replaced in part by the Director’s quarters that were built in the 1920s, with the porch once again taking its central position at the front of the building.

Historic Sulgrave Manor

It’s not possible to tell how far the house would have originally extended to the east and west of the main porch, but a possible foundation stone was found in 1920, fifty feet to the west of the present house.
Thanks to public donations from both sides of the Atlantic, Sulgrave Manor was restored and opened to the public in 1921 where it was presented to the people of Britain and the USA as a memorial of their common inheritance. Today, it is the job of the Sulgrave Manor Trust to preserve this important heritage site for the public benefit.

George Washington

In 1539 or 1540 the Crown sold three manors, including Sulgrave, to Lawrence Washington, a wool merchant who in 1532 had been Mayor of Northampton Washington's descendants retained the manor until 1659, when one of them sold it. In 1656 a descendant, John Washington of Purleigh, Essex, emigrated to the Colony of Virginia. He is notable for being the great-grandfather of George Washington, who from 1775 commanded the Continental Army in the American Revolutionary War and in 1789 was elected first President of the United States.

George Washington, the first President of the United States was born into the Washington family who had migrated to Virginia, America from Northamptonshire in 1656. His ancestors originated in Washington, Sunderland from the 12th Century. When Lawrence Washington, born in 1500, married widow Elizabeth Gough of Northampton he became owner of various properties including a Northampton townhouse and Church House in Higham Ferrers. He also leased the Manor House in Higham Ferrers in 1530. He was a prosperous wool merchant, became mayor of Northampton in 1532 and 1545, and bought Sulgrave Manor, Northamptonshire in 1539.

The Hodges family

Sulgrave Manor as restored. The west wing (left) is a replica built in the 1920s.
In about 1673 Sulgrave Manor passed to the Rev Moses Hodges, from whom it passed to his son John Hodges. The lands of Sulgrave manor had become divided into three estates, but John Hodges reunited them.Behind the great hall is a staircase with twisted balusters that was added late in the 17th century.In about 1700 John Hodges had the house rebuilt and enlarged by adding a north-east wing at right angles to the original Tudor building.It contains the Great Kitchen and the Oak Parlour, on the ground floor, beneath two sleeping chambers, now called the White Bedroom and the Chintz Bedroom.[citation needed] Hodges also had a separate brewhouse built at the same time. The Hodges family had the west part of the original house demolished in about 1780. The Hodges sold the house in 1840, by which time it was a dilapidated farmhouse.

Restoration and museum

In 1914 the house was bought by public subscription to celebrate a century of peace between the UK and USA since the War of 1812. Under the direction of the architect Sir Reginald Blomfield the house was restored in 1920–30 and a new west wing was added in 1921 in symmetry with the surviving east wing. The house is open to the public and since 1997 has been administered by the Sulgrave Manor Board. It is a Grade I listed building.