Horstead Hall was a country house in

Norfolk Norfolk () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in East Anglia in England. It borders Lincolnshire to the north-west, Cambridgeshire to the west and south-west, and Suffolk to the south. Its northern and eastern boundaries are the No ...

that was demolished in the 1950s. The village of Horstead in the county of Norfolk is not short of country houses. Towards Norwich lie Horstead House and Heggatt Hall, while towards Buxton lies the Horstead Hall estate. The house lay in the middle of a substantial park. A seventeenth-century house stood here until 1835, when it was rebuilt in the Tudor style by

Edward Harbord, 3rd Baron Suffield Edward Harbord, 3rd Baron Suffield (10 November 1781 – 6 July 1835), styled The Honourable Edward Harbord between 1786 and 1821, was a British liberal politician, anti-slavery campaigner and prison reformer. Harbord was the second son of Sir Har ...

. The lodges, one at Mayton, the other on the Buxton-Horstead Road, date from this period.

rebuilt the house for his eldest,

Edward Vernon Harbord, 4th Baron Suffield Edward is an English given name. It is derived from the Anglo-Saxon name ''Ēadweard'', composed of the elements '' ēad'' "wealth, fortune; prosperous" and '' weard'' "guardian, protector”. History The name Edward was very popular in Anglo-Sax ...

son on his marriage to Miss Gardiner. However, the third Baron died from injuries sustained in a riding accident on the day of the wedding, and the house was adapted for the use of the dowager baroness.

Charles Harbord, 5th Baron Suffield Charles Harbord, 5th Baron Suffield (2 January 1830 – 9 April 1914), was a British peer, courtier and Liberal politician. A close friend of Edward VII, he served as a Lord of the Bedchamber and Lord-in-waiting to the King. He also held politic ...

was brought up at the hall. Following his inheritance of Gunton Park, the house was let out until it was bought by the Birkbeck family. Owners included the Batcheler family (18th century), the Suffields, who rebuilt the house, and latterly the Birkbecks. Sir

Edward Birkbeck Sir Edward Birkbeck, 1st Baronet (11 October 1838 – 2 September 1908) was a Conservative Party politician in the United Kingdom. Biography Birkbeck was born in 1838 and served as Conservative MP for North Norfolk from 1879 (being returned at ...

entertained Prime Minister

Lord Salisbury Robert Arthur Talbot Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury (; 3 February 183022 August 1903) was a British statesman and Conservative politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom three times for a total of over thirteen y ...

there in 1887. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

the house was requisitioned by the War Office and used by a cipher unit, who put up numerous huts in the grounds, some of which survive. The hall's Italianate watertower, which stood among outbuildings, now derelict, is visible from the roads around the park. A chapel also survives, equally derelict. The estate was sold in 1947 and most of the house came down soon after. Today part of the estate is used for quarrying. Substantial estate buildings survive, and part of the house remains, albeit in derelict condition. A pipe organ from the house is in the church at Ashby St. Mary.

Sources

* Millican, Percy: History of Horstead and Stanninghall.
BBC
* Lord Suffield: My Memories 1830-1913 (London, 1913). * Norfolk Archives Service
Norfolk Council
* Norfolk Online Access to Heritage's entry on Horstead Hal

{{coord, 52.7370, 1.3355, type:landmark_region:GB, display=title Country houses in Norfolk