Wanstead Park is the name of a grade II listed municipal park covering an area of about 140 acres (57 hectares), located in Wanstead, in the London Borough of Redbridge. It is bordered to the north by the A12 road, to the east by the River Roding and A406 North Circular Road, to the south by the Aldersbrook Estate and the City of London Cemetery and Crematorium and to the west by Wanstead Golf Course. It is administered as part of Epping Forest by the City of London Corporation, having been purchased by the Corporation in 1880. Today's park once formed part of the deer park of the former manor house of ancient Wanstead Manor, which included much of the urbanised area now known as Wanstead. In order to understand the history of today's municipal park of Wanstead, the history of the ancient manor of Wanstead needs to be examined. For this purpose the modern green spaces of the Park, golf course and Wanstead Flats should be considered as one entity.
History of the Manor of Wanstead
Roman Wanstead
Ordnance Survey maps mark the site of a Roman Villa in present day Wanstead Park. Archaeological excavations carried out in 1985 indicated a Roman presence here from the 1st to the 5th century AD, but did not locate any specific site of a Roman villa.
Saxon Wanstead
The name Wanstead is probably of Saxon origin - indicating a possible continuity of settlement here since Roman times - and is accepted by the English Place-Names Society as derived from Wen, signifying a hill or mound, and Stead, a place. It is said that in Saxon times Abbot Aelfric granted the manor of Wanstead to the monks of Westminster Abbey yet this cannot be substantiated from any documentary evidence. However, the location was clearly a prized site on the east side of London.
Norman Wanstead
In 1086 the Domesday Book states that Wanstead Manor was held from the Bishop of London by one Ralph son of Brian. Wanstead was then densely wooded, being situated within the Forest of Essex. It was part of the forest bailiwick of Becontree during the middle ages and later of the Leyton "Walk".
Tudor Wanstead
The manor house, known as Wanstead Hall, was probably quite a small building until the 14th century, but by 1499 it was large enough to serve as a royal hunting-lodge, when it was acquired by King Henry VII, one of whose favourite resorts it was to become. [1] Henry had developed a taste for privacy towards the end of his reign, and acquired Wanstead as a maison de retraite in the vicinity of Greenwich Palace, laying out considerable sums on it. It was valued by him especially for its park, bringing the King much needed seclusion.[2]It is also interesting to note that Henry VII used Wanstead as a location for receiving payments from what the Tudor historian David Starkey calls his “slush fund” of extra-parliamentary taxation and fines, away from the eyes of the magnates in the formal royal palaces.[3] The young future Henry VIII lived for a while at Wanstead and at the other maison de retraite of Hanworth in enforced proximity to his father Henry VII during the last years of his reign.[4] Both kings hunted within the manor. It was during Henry VIII's reign (1509-1547) that Wanstead Park was inclosed, shortly before 1512, which probably involved the clearance of some wooded areas. At about this time neighbouring Aldersbrook became a separate manor. Wanstead remained a Royal manor for a number of years, its “keeper” being an office awarded to favoured royal courtiers, one after another. Hugh Denys(d.1511) Groom of the Stool to Henry VII was its keeper until 1511, being one of the King's key financial officers who often received the “slush fund” monies there on the King's behalf. On Denys's death in 1511 the keepership passed to Charles Brandon, later Duke of Suffolk. [5] Sir John Heron, another former financial officer within the Privy Chamber, was keeper of the park until his death in 1521. Heron also held lands in Aldersbrook and it is said that he brought heron birds to the area, as an amusing mark of his presence. A heronry is shown on Lincoln Island on an OS map of 1919. Lord Richard Rich, High Chancellor of England, was keeper of the park in 1543, and in 1549 Edward VI granted him the lordship of the manor of Wanstead, complete with the park. In 1577 Rich's son Robert sold it to Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester, who purchased the nearby manor of Stonhall in Ilford at the same time. Thereafter a succession of owners kept the manor of Wanstead combined with Stonehall.
Jacobean Wanstead
In 1619 Sir Henry Mildmay was in possession, but forfeited the manor to the Crown at the end of the Civil War, in which he had fought for Parliament. Charles II granted the estate to his brother, James, Duke of York, who sold it in about 1662 to Sir Robert Brooke(d.1693/4) 1st. Baronet. In 1673-4 the manor was purchased by Sir Josiah Child, Governor of the East India Company. He spent much time and money in developing the estate according to the fashion of the time. When John Evelyn, the diarist, visited Wanstead in March, 1683 he wrote: "I went to see Sir Josiah Child's prodigious cost in planting walnut trees about his seate, and making fish ponds many miles in circuit in Epping Forest, in a barren place." [6] The ponds which he mentioned, although somewhat altered, are those in existence at the present day - a chain of ponds descending from the Shoulder of Mutton Pond, through Heronry Pond, Perch Pond, the Dell and into the Ornamental Waters. Child died in 1699, and was succeeded by his son - also Sir Josiah Child - who leased Wanstead and Stonehall to his half-brother, Richard Child. On Sir Josiah II's death in 1704, Richard became Sir Richard having succeeded to his baronetcy and estates.
Georgian Wanstead
Construction of the Palladian Mansion
In 1715 Sir Richard Child commissioned the Scottish architect Colen Campbell to design a grand mansion in the then fashionable Palladian style, to replace the former house, and to rival contemporary mansions such as Blenheim Palace. When completed it covered an area of 260 ft. by 70 ft., the facade having a portico with six Corinthian columns. The grounds were landscaped by George London, one of the leading garden designers of his day. It is said that the finished building compared in splendour almost with the Palace of Versailles. Child assumed the surname Tylney in lieu of his patronymic and in 1718 was created 1st. Viscount Castlemaine and later in 1731 was created 1st. Earl Tylney. On the death of the Earl in 1750 he was succeeded by his son John Tylney, 2nd Earl Tylney, who continued the plantings, but in the more fashionable natural non-formal style. The 2nd. Earl had no male issue and his estates eventually passed to his sister's infant grandson, Sir James Tylney Long, 8th Baronet, son of Sir James Tylney-Long, 7th Baronet who died in 1805 aged just 11, whereupon and the estate passed to his young sister Catherine Tylney-Long, then the richest heiress in England. Inn 1812 she took the disastrous step of marrying the later-to-be notorious rake, William Wellesley-Pole, nephew of the Duke of Wellington, who thereupon changed his family surname to Pole-Tylney-Long-Wellesley. In 1814 Wellesley started his career of spending his wife's inheritance by inviting the landscaper Humphrey Repton to improve the park, some of whose informal planting remains today.[7]
Demolition of the Palladian Mansion
The Earl led an extravagant lifestyle and ruined his wife's fortune. To meet his debts of more than £250,000, the house, contents and park, that is to say the amenity land surrounding the mansion, were sold at auction in June 1822 - which auction lasted 32 days. No potential resident came forward to take over the palatial house so it was sold for use as building materials for £10,000 and demolished in 1823-4. It had reputedly cost around £360,000 to build. Catherine died the next year in 1825, no doubt a broken woman.
Transformation into Municipal Park
Catherine's remaining lands, to the extent of 1400 acres, in surrounding Wanstead and the adjoining parishes of Woodford, Leyton, Little Ilford and Barking remained in the hands of her husband up to 1840. The remnant of the manor of Wanstead was inherited by his son William, who left it in trust for his father's cousin Henry Wellesley, Earl of Cowley. In 1880 the Earl sold 184 acres of Wanstead Park to the Corporation of London for preservation as a part of Epping Forest, and the resultant new municipal park of Wanstead was officially opened by the City of London Corporation in 1882. The Earl's family sold the remainder to Wanstead Sports Grounds Ltd. in 1920
Site of the former Palladian Mansion
The site can best be studied by reference to a satellite photographic image, combined with the 1745 map of Wanstead House and grounds in Jean Rocque's Environs of London. The Palladian Mansion stood 275 yards to the east of the large almost circular ornamental lake called the "Basin", due south of what is now the golf course club-house, a remnant of the stable block. The present cricket ground would therefore effectively have been the front lawn to the west of the house. The approach was from the entrance gates to the due west, the piers of which still survive standing either side of Overton Drive at its junction with Blake Hall Road. Carriages would have proceeded easterly along Overton Drive, thus skirting the north side of the Basin, and then following the contour of the lake southwards to arrive at the western facade of the house. The distance from the gates to the house was 1/3 a mile, as the crow flies. The extensive fruit and vegetable gardens originally situated to the south-east of the Great House have all gone, these now forming the links of the Golf Course. Two Walnut trees which died in the 1980's, the largest 40 feet high and 7 ft. 6 ins. in girth, probably themselves planted by Sir Josiah Child, stood to the east of the Shoulder of Mutton pond. Thickets of Rhododendron recall the time when part of the Park was laid out as a shrubbery, traversed by the winding paths shown in Rocque's map. The golf course club-house, to the north of the house site, built of brick and weather-boarded timber, is a remnant of the 18th century stable-court. Remains of an impressive avenue of sweet-chestnuts, called Evelyn's Avenue, can still be traced in a south westerly direction from the basin, crossing Wanstead Flats and Bush Wood. It provided a route to London, originally crossing the Basin by a causeway, the lake having been enlarged so that the approach would curve around it to the north.
Wanstead Park Today
The western boundary of the present municipal park, named Wanstead Park, therefore lies some 330 yards east of the site of the mansion house. The park still retains some of its layout as the former grounds of Wanstead House. In 1992 a Management Plan was initiated to try to re-establish something of the formality of the grounds of a "Great House". Apart from the lake system, the most evident survivals are the buildings known as the Temple and the Grotto, both built in about 1760, (now listed buildings) and some “mounts” or artificial mounds. Less obvious, perhaps, is a group of islands known as the Fortifications, an amphitheatre, an ornamental canal and remains of some avenues of trees.
The Fortifications
The Fortifications are situated on the Ornamental Waters about 800 yards east of the site of the mansion, to the south-east of the large Lincoln Island. They consist of eight small islands grouped in a circular pattern around a larger central island on which duck-shooting guns were formerly stored. The bridges by which they were once connected no longer exist. The islands are now somewhat overgrown, providing a sanctuary for water-birds.
Ornamental Canal
The wide Ornamental Canal forms a continuation on the eastern far side of the River Roding, here called the Ornamental Waters, of the broad grassy ride cut through the woodland, known as the Glade, in a direct easterly line from Wanstead House. It therefore would have created a magnificent vista from the house, stretching 2/3rds. of a mile to the east. It was noted by Eric S. Wood F.S.A. (Collins Field Guide to Archaeology, Third Edition 1972) as being a "magnificent canal". (photo)
Gateposts
One third of a mile due west of the site of Wanstead House stand two impressive piers, remnants of the gateway which formed the formal entrance to Wanstead House. These stand either side of Overton Drive at its junction with Blake Hall Road. The view of the house published in 1771 in Spencer's work would have been drawn from this gate.
Access to the Park
The park is approached from Wanstead in the north via Warren Road. The road at the entrance to the Park is not under the management of the local council, and the un-surfaced section of it, which separates the park from the golf course, ends at a well known landmark by the Heron pond called the "Posts". Along the east side of the unmade road there are several entrances to the park. One leads to the Glade, the broad grassy ride noted above, which extends due easterly five hundred yards down to the Ornamental Pond. The other main entrance for pedestrians is at the NE corner of the park from Wanstead Park Road south of Redbridge tube station, the footpath crossing the busy A406 North Circular Road.
Activities and Events
In late April the Chalet Wood is awash with flowering bluebells. The Temple is open every weekend with displays on the history of Wanstead Park including finds excavated from the 18th century grotto and the 'Lost Roman Villa'. Entrance is free and there is also a shop offering free leaflets on Epping Forest, other guides and booklets as well as traditional toys and other attractive items. The City of London Corporation runs a programme of events at the Temple and its surrounds including family craft days, open-air theatre and musical performances. The City of London website provides further details. Another event is Music in Wanstead Park, held at the beginning of summer. The event is organised by the Aldersbrook Families Association. Fishing is permitted on the Ornamental Waters and the Perch Pond, but only in season.
- Winter hours (October to March): 10.00 - 3.00 pm
- Summer hours (April-September): 12.00 - 5.00 pm
Notes
Wanstead Park railway station is a misnomer as it is not in fact located close to Wanstead Park. More accurate names might be either Wanstead Flats or Forest Gate North.
Sources
- Wanstead House and the Parklands - a History, www.wansteadwildlife.org.uk. (June 2010). This article has drawn heavily from this source.
- Cornish, Alan. M.Sc. Wanstead Park - A Chronicle. (Originally published by the Friends of Wanstead Parklands in 1982, updated and republished by Wanstead Parklands Community Project in 2006.)
- Starkey, David. Henry: Virtuous Prince. London, 2008.(Tudor history of Wanstead)
- Ramsey, Winston G. & Fowkes, Reginald L. Epping Forest: Then and Now. Published by Battle of Britain Prints International Ltd., 1986.
References
- ↑ Starkey (2008) p.195
- ↑ Starkey (2008) p.239
- ↑ Starkey (2008) p.247
- ↑ Starkey (2008) p.329
- ↑ L&P H VIII, I, p.340,cf.iii,p.479: appointment of Charles Brandon in succession to Hugh Denys
- ↑ Evelyn, John. Sylva, or a Discourse of Forest Trees, 1664.
- ↑ http://www.wansteadpark.org.uk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=60&Itemid=103
External links
City of London website http://www.cityoflondon.gov.uk/Corporation/LGNL_Services/Environment_and_planning/Parks_and_open_spaces/Epping_Forest/EF_wanstead.htm
For events at The Temple and Epping Forest http://www.cityoflondon.gov.uk/Corporation/LGNL_Services/Environment_and_planning/Parks_and_open_spaces/Epping_Forest/EF_events.htm
- Wren Conservation Group
- Wanstead Parklands Project, a charity promoting the understanding of and concern for the historical and natural heritage of Wanstead Park and its future.
- Follies and Monuments - Wanstead Park