Wanstead House – The Classical Period

The Rise And Fall Of Wanstead House

by Peter Lawrence

Wanstead, Robert Dudley's great centre for hunting and royal entertainment during the Tudor period, continued well into the 17th century with both James I and James II calling on the hospitality of its aristocratic owners. However as the century progressed Wanstead Hall, as it was now called, settled down to being a gentleman's country estate and after the restoration of the Crown in 1660, Charles II granted the estate to Sir Robert Brooke.

At Sir Robert's death in 1667 the estate came up for sale. Samuel Pepys, who had visited Wanstead in 1665 thought that the house was old fashioned and was definitely not amused when his Admiralty colleague, Admiral Sir William Penn considered buying the estate, as he muses in his diary, "He told me that he did intend to pull the house down and build a less, and that he should get £1,500 by the old house and I know not what other fooleries."

Eventually the manorial estates Wanstead and nearby Stonehall were sold in 1673 for £11,500 to a certain Josiah Child. This gentleman had come from comfortable obscurity, born in 1630 the son of a London merchant. At the age of 25 he was furnishing navy stores at Portsmouth where he secured a contract to supply rum. In 1669 he was knocking on the door of the Admiralty. However the Duke of York, High Admiral of England, kept the door firmly closed in the face of this mere merchant, much to the pleasure of the Navy Board secretary, Samuel Pepys. Josiah worked hard outside the Admiralty's inner sanctum and became Deputy Treasurer to the Fleet and a director of the East India Company. Ten years later he became Governor of the East India Company and somewhat despotic ruler. Josiah was then knighted and made a baronet.

John Evelyn, in a diary entry for 16th March 1683 not only noted the fantastic gardens at Wanstead, with its "lines of Walnut trees and fish ponds many miles circuit" but noted that the estate was now worth £200,000. Many believe that Evelyn used his skills to assist Josiah Child create the base for this fabulous baroque garden but no attempt was made during his life to improve or replace the Tudor house as Kip's beautiful 1710 "bird's eye view" engraving of the estate clearly shows. Josiah married three times, his wealth provided his daughter with a dowry of £50,000 and in 1689 he became Sheriff of Essex.

Then in 1698 there was an outbreak of smallpox in the Wanstead household, which took his eldest son Barnard, a black slave and an estate bailiff. Sir Josiah Child himself became ill and died in 1699 and buried in the adjacent medieval St Mary's church, complete with a great baroque memorial. He was succeeded by his son, also Josiah, by his second wife, who leased the estate to his half brother Richard. Josiah junior died in 1704 without children so the estate and the baronacy passed to Richard. Richard Child was further titled as Viscount Castlemain because of his wife's inheritance within her family.

It was Richard Child, with his and his wife's inheritance plus his continuing expanding fortune through the East India Company that allowed him, over a period of years, to turn his estate at Wanstead into a house and garden fit for royalty yet alone a wealthy merchant. By 1706 he was improving the gardens with the help of George London and planned to supplement the water supply from the River Roding to expand the lake system. By 1713 his gardener Adam Holt had tapped into an artesian well at nearby Snaresbrook and brought the water into the estate via a narrow canal that became known as the Holt River. During this period he had decided to replace the Tudor "Wantead Hall" and so he leased a town house at 5 St James's Square London, which still exists, and as an aside bought the manorial rights of the neighbouring parish of Woodford.

In 1714 Richard Child was "ready to build" and he commissioned the Paladian architect Colen Campbell to design a new classical house. Campbell was originally a Scots lawyer but designing houses overtook his practice especially when in 1717 Lord Burlington became his patron and commissioned him to build his house in Piccadilly, now the Royal Academy. Campbell's Paladian or Venetian revival style of architecture was popular with the ruling Whig Party and this was further enhanced when he was commissioned to build at Wanstead. Richard Child had left the Tory party and become a member of the Whigs in 1715 and consequently Walpole rewarded him by making him Baron Newton in 1718. Due of his marriage to a wealthy landowner, by an Act of Parliament in 1731 he and his heirs took the name Tylney and he became the first Earl Tylney of Castlemaine.

Colen Campbell offered two main designs, with variations in both. One included plain windows, side wings for services and guests, the other had flanking towers but neither were chosen. Campbell later published these offerings in his publication "Vitrevieus Brittanica". The final design showed the centre of the house to be in the style of a roman temple. The flat or "unrelieved" elevations either side, broken only by massive keystones and pediments around the windows must have appeared simple in contrast to Vanbrugh's baroque that had been the fashion. These two main features alone made the design totally unique at the time. Sitting on an elevated position this great white Portland stone rendered mansion, its frontage measuring 260 feet and a depth of 70 feet, with the imposing Corinthian columned portico facing towards London, it would have shined like an architectural beacon and amazed travellers for miles around.

It appears the building of the house was completed by 1720 and estimated costs range from £200,000 to £360,000. Over the following twenty years Richard Child spent an additional £100,000 improving the grounds including expanding the lakes, perhaps being assisted by Lancelot (Capability) Brown. In Daniel Defoe's "A Tour Through the Eastern Counties 1722" he refers to southwest Essex when he writes, "….these villages filled with fine seats, most of them built by the citizens of London, as I have observed before, but the lustre of them seems to be entirely swallowed up in the magnificent palace of Lord Castlemain." Wanstead House, at the time architecturally unique in England, had arrived.

Under Richard's stewardship the 300 acre estate continued to flourish. Jeanne Rocque, the Cartographer Royale, was commissioned in 1735 to prepare plans for extensions to the house (not built) and further landscaping to turn Wanstead into an English "Versailles". By 1745 the lakes and parks had reached their height and in 1748 Peter Kalm the renown Swedish botanist, whilst wintering in England on his way to America, was amazed when he visited Wanstead; "My Lord Tylney's magnificent house resembles a royal palace rather than a private man's home…..many rooms furnished in the most costly way….one room was not like another" Kalm's diary also notes that somebody had informed him that Richard had overspent as sections of the garden were incomplete. That comment may indicate the reason why the two pavilions on either side of the house, shown on Roque's map, were not built.

Wanstead House as a structure was undoubtedly very grand. The Gentleman's Magazine commented that it was in the top three in the country. Unique in design, the fact that it had a ballroom and if the two side pavilions had been built it would have been considered number one by far. Had Richard overspent or was he just being politically correct? The house therefore remained during its short life structurally unaltered except for the Ionic pilasters, fixed to the garden front in 1847. They came from Lord Chandos's "Cannons Place" at Stanmore in Middlesex, after that house was demolished due to its owner's mishandling of his personal fortune. A problem we shall return to in this story. Wanstead House, built of brick and faced with Portland stone had a frontage of 260 feet with a depth of 75 feet. There were three storeys plus the servants sub-ground level. Seventy rooms had fifty eight fireplaces, with the family rooms on the ground floor, state and entertaining rooms on the first floor with additional bedrooms on the second floor. Family paintings by William Hogarth (1734) and Joseph Nolekens (1740) clearly show the sumptuous décor of the principle first floor.

In 1750 the estate passes to John, 2nd Earl Tylney who spent most of his term living in Italy, collecting various works of art for display at Wanstead. When at Wanstead he had built the Grotto (now a ruin), the Temple (still with us) and the Great Lake (Lakehouse Estate developed from1900). He also gave fabulous parties. Horace Walpole writes of him in 1755, "One of the most generous creatures in the world." In 1764 King George III and Queen Charlotte, escorted by Light Horse outriders, were guests of John but perhaps the best description of one of these revelries was penned by an Italian nobleman, describing a party on the Ornamental Waters in 1768; "Many lights appear in the trees and on the water. We are off (in boats) and have great excitement fishing up treasure (presents) tied to bladders. His Lordship is hailed from the shore by a knight, who we are told is King Arthur, 'Have you the sacrifice my Lord?', who answers 'No'. 'Then take my sword and smite the water in front of the grotto and see what my wizard has done, take also this dove and when asked, give it to the keeper'.

Off again towards some distance from the Grotto, the lights are small and water still. The giant eagle appears and asks, 'Have you the sacrifice?' 'No' my Lord answers. 'So be it'. And disappears (eagle) in steam. His Lordship smites the water with King Arthur's sword. All the company are still, a rumble sucking noise comes in from of the Grotto, the water as if boiling and to the horror of all the company, both on the water and on the shore, scream with fright, appearing as though from the depths of hell arose a ghastly coffin covered with slime and other things. Silence as though a relief, when suddenly with a creaking and a ghostly groaning, the lid slid off and up sat an apparition with outstretched hand screeching in a hollow voice, 'Give me my gift.' With such violence that some of the company fell into the water and had to be saved and those on the shore scrambled always. Confusion was everywhere. We almost fainted with fright and only stayed from the same fate by his Lordship, who handed the keeper the dove, the keeper shut its hand and with a gurgling noise vanished with a clang of its lid and all went pitch. Then the roof of the Grotto glowed two times, lighting the water and the company a little. Nothing was seen of the keeper or his coffin, as though it did not happen." Some party!

In 1784 John dies and as he had no family the estate passed to his sister's son Sir James Long of Draycott Cerne in Wiltshire. He took the name Tylney-Long. During his ownership the nearby medieval parish church was replaced with a modern building immediately to the north in 1790. The architect, Thomas Hardwick, designed the church to compliment the great house, brick built and faced with Portland stone with a west porch of classical columns. Under the direction of the Rev. Samuel Glasse, former chaplain to the King, the building was completed at a cost of £9,150. Today St Mary's church survives, now protected as a grade I listed building, complete with its stone steps, the first high enough to step onto from a carriage and the beautiful Georgian style railings and gates for the vehicles to drive in and drive out. The monument to the founder of this great classical estate, Sir Josiah Child stands proudly in the chancel. Much of the interior layout of the church has not altered, including the pews and the galleries.

We must not ignore lesser buildings that survive from these heady times. The stables for the estate survive to the east of the church, now housing Wanstead Golf Club. It doesn't take much imagination to see that the site of the front of Wanstead House, now the first fairway, lines up with the arch into the stable yard so that when noble passengers had alighted at the base the flight of 26 stairs up to the principle first floor, their carriage would have been driven away directly across the gravelled courtyard, through the stable arch and out of sight. The stable arch has long been filled in and is now the entrance into the clubhouse.

James and his wife Lady Catherine had a daughter, also named Catherine and a younger son James. When in 1794 James died the children became "Wards in Chancery". The estate passed in principle to his infant son who died in 1805, therefore the fortune passed to the daughter Catherine who also was still a minor. Lady Catherine removed her daughter to Grosvenor Square where Catherine completed her education and was introduced to London society. During her minority Wanstead House was occupied by the Prince de Conde and other French royal exiles during the "Reign of Terror", also in 1806 King George III reviewed 10,000 troops on Wanstead Flats. Was this a display of political will aimed at the French revolutionary leaders? In1809 Catherine legally became an adult and as a London newspaper reported "Lady Catherine Tylney Long commenced her career in the fashionable world on Monday night in Grosvenor Square with a splendid ball. Her Ladyship possesses an immense fortune". An American diplomat writing home in despatches claimed her estates to be valued at £1 million and although she had to pay out annuities to her mother and other relatives, she still had an annual income of £80,000 a year. Suitors for her hand in marriage were closing in. One such suitor apparently was the Duke of Clarence who was an immense embarrassment to the royal family. He sired enough children to have him shipped out to Antigua for several years, just to keep him away from the gossips. His house still looks over Nelson's Harbour today. But what if Catherine had married him? He later became William IV and she would have become Queen. Maybe she would have been better off marrying him rather than the person whom was finally chosen, because as often happens, the prize was won by the least worthy. On the 14th March 1812, in St James's church, Piccadilly Catherine married the Hon. William Pole-Wellesley, elder son of the 3rd Earl of Mornington who was the younger brother of the Duke of Wellington. On the day of the marriage he was penniless and perhaps the writing was on the wall when, as newspapers reported, the bridegroom had forgotten the ring and one was hurriedly purchased from a nearby shop before the ceremony could be completed. A condition of the marriage was that the bridegroom had to adopt the additional surnames of his bride and became William Pole-Tylney-Long-Wellesley, much to the future pleasure of Fleet Street cartoonists and society journalists.

It is worth mentioning the bride's ensemble. A robe of Brussels lace over a satin dress was valued at 700 guineas. Her bonnet and veil, both of Brussels lace, were valued at 150 and 200 guineas respectively. Finally was her necklace valued at 25,000 guineas. So William, his new wife and fortune came to Wanstead with the opportunity to recover himself from his debts but the opposite was to happen, indeed he appears to become even more reckless. Wanstead House had just twelve more years left to grace the Essex countryside.