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Wootton House, Bedfordshire
England
Wootton House, Bedfordshire, England
- Type of Building: Small country house
- Condition:
- Location: Bedfordshire, England
- Category: Grade II*
- Date Listed: May 1952 by
The listing notes: “Simple interior with some remaining original panelling”. The stables were listed separately in August 1987 as Grade II. They date from the same time as the house and are built in red brick with an old clay tiled roof. They comprise ten bays and two storeys with eight windows in each floor and a central carriageway which has now been blocked. A lean-to was added in the 20th century. The listing comments: “Included for group value with Wootton House”.
- Canmore ID- the former Ministry of Works
- Coordinates: 52.0987°N 0.5319°W
- When Built: 17th century
- Architect:
- Built for/by: Sir Humphrey Monoux
Description
Wootton House comprises eight bays in length by five bays in depth and has two storeys and attics beneath an old clay tiled roof.
“THE WILLIAM AND MARY RESIDENCE is of outstanding architectural merit, being of low elevation and containing a number of characteristic features, including well-proportioned rooms with typical large twelve-pane sash windows and shutters, a quantity of unpolished oak and pine panelling and old brass locks to doors. It has a deep roof of old mellowed tiles”. [AD1147/28] See Bedfordshire.gov.uk -Wootton House for full description of the house.
History
Sir Humphrey Monoux, was made a baronet in 1660. His family had been substantial landowners in the area for over a hundred years - George Monoux, an alderman and citizen of London bought the Manor of Wootton Bosoms in 1514. He also purchased manors in Yorkshire and Nottinghamshire between 1524 and 1526. The first member of the family to live in Wootton was perhaps Lewis, Sir Humphrey's father, who died in 1628. Sir Humphrey purchased Wootton Manor from Lord Carlisle some time between 1639 and 1666 and it is on the land that came with the manor that he built Wootton House, which suggests a date of around the time of the Restoration of King Charles II in 1660.
Over the next century and a half ± the family continued to own Wootton House. They bought more land in Wootton and other parts of Bedfordshire. Sir Humphrey Monoux 4th Baronet, (c. 1703-1757), great grandson of the builder of Wootton House, died without issue in 1757 and a relative, Sir Philip Monoux 5th Baronet (1739-1805) (grandson of a younger son of the original Sir Humphrey) inherited the estates including the house and the baronetcy. He died in 1805 and was succeeded by his son Sir Philip Monoux 6th Baronet who died in 1809 without issue.Philip, 7th Baronet, inherited the baronetcy and on his death in 1814 it became extinct.
Mary, the eldest daughter of Sir Philip (who died in 1805), widow of Tempsford Baronet Sir John Payne received the greater part of the Wootton Estate. She later married Joseph Francis Buckworth. Mary had two sons by her marriage to Sir John Payne: Charles and Coventry.
Charles was a minor when he inherited his father's estates. The Napoleonic wars, assisted by his trustee during his minority, Sir Peter Payne, reduced the family fortunes. Sir Peter Payne claimed the Payne baronetcy because Sir John was illegitimate - the case begun by Sir Peter was not finally resolved until 1870. Sir Charles Payne died in France in 1841 and the estates passed to his brother Coventry' Payne, Vicar of Hatfield Peverell in Essex. Coventry did not live at Wootton House as his mother was still in residence. He died in 1849 and his son Coventry Payne, inherited both baronetcy and estates. When his grandmother died in 1850 he moved to Wootton House.
When Sir Coventry Payne died in 1874 his son Philip Monoux Payne, aged 15, succeeded him and faced a heavily mortgaged estate due to the decline in value of the West Indian sugar plantations the family had owned on Saint Kitts since the 18th century. In 1874 the estate was valued at £1,800; twelve years later it was £1,300. The West Indian estates were sold in 1892. The First World War put further strain on Sir Philip's finances and he sold the entire estate to his daughter Sybil Harriet Doyne-Ditmas in 1923 for £7,776 5s 8d which enabled him to pay off his debts. It left him with a modest annuity of £150 per annum.
In 1927 Bedfordshire was valued under the terms of the Rating Valuation Act of 1925. This involved inspection of every piece of land to determine the rates to be paid on it. The valuer visiting Wootton House [DV1/C50/78] noted that it was "Queen Anne style". At the time it was owned and occupied by Mrs. Doyne-Ditmas.
Mrs. Doyne-Ditmas sold Wootton House in1927, buying Kempston Manor with the proceeds. She lived there until she sold it in 1935, when she returned to Wootton to live at Cause End Cottage.
In 1936 the house was put up for sale and this time the particulars [AD1147/28]
“Wootton House occupies a pleasant rural situation on an eminence at the Western end of the old world village of Wootton, from which it is approached by a carriage drive and also by a back entrance. The principal Rooms have a Southern aspect, and possess delightful views over the park-like land and lakes”.
On 25th July 1939, shortly before the outbreak of World War Two, Wootton House was up for sale again. The sale particulars [Z682/2] stated:
“At bargain upset price only £4,000, with 13½ Acres”. with almost identical particulars to those used in 1936. Unfortunately the copy held by Bedfordshire and Luton Archives and Records Servicedoes not give the name of the buyer.
Directories for Bedfordshire published every few years from the early to mid 19th century until 1940help to build up a picture of the inhabitants of Wootton House in the 19th and early 20th centuries.
These may be summarised as follows:
- 1808: John Davies of Shepherd’s Bush [Middlesex] took out a 21 year lease in this year [BS144]. This lease included the house itself, “with the pew in the church, the coach houses and outhouses; also 15 acres of pasture adjoining; and the royalty or Manor of Wootton (except the courts, perquisites, etc), and the right of hunting, etc. All which premises were late in the tenure of Lord Charles Henry Somerset” [second son of the Duke of Beaufort, MP for Scarborough, then for Monmouth, Governor of Cape Colony from 1814 to 1826]. The annual rent was £80;
- 1811: John Davies was no longer in occupation [F467];
- 1813: Colonel Lake;
- 1838 Joseph Francis Buckworth [HF17/7/5];
- 1847 H. Bolders;
- 1853-1871: Sir Coventry Paine, baronet;
- 1875: John Phillips Thomas [F650];
- 1885 Henry John Conant;
- 1890-1914: Colonel Hon. Robert Villiers Dillon RHA;
- 1920-1927: Major Harold Edward Churton Doyne-Ditmas; (Died Sep Q. 1945 Bedford RD aged 64)
- 1928-1936 Captain Rt. Hon. William George Arthur Ormsby-Gore MP and Lady Beatrice (he was Conservative MP for Denbigh 1910-1918 and Stafford 1918-1938 becoming 4th Baron Harlech in 1938);
- 1940 Lieutenant-Colonel Hon. Thomas George Breadalbane Morgan-Grenville , DSO, MC (High Sheriff in 1951). In the 1950s all of its land were sold off in lots and it ended up losing its 5 or so farms and cottages. It is now surrounded by 8 acres (32,000 m2) of orchard, fields and lawns.