Stratton Park, in

East Stratton East Stratton is an estate village in the parish of Micheldever at the entrance to the landscaped grounds of Stratton Park, some eight miles northeast of Winchester, Hampshire, England. Both park and village demonstrate the evolution of a landsc ...

Hampshire Hampshire (, ; abbreviated to Hants) is a ceremonial county, ceremonial and non-metropolitan county, non-metropolitan counties of England, county in western South East England on the coast of the English Channel. Home to two major English citi ...

, was an

English country house An English country house is a large house or mansion in the English countryside. Such houses were often owned by individuals who also owned a town house. This allowed them to spend time in the country and in the city—hence, for these peopl ...

, built on the site of a

grange Grange may refer to: Buildings * Grange House, Scotland, built in 1564, and demolished in 1906 * Grange Estate, Pennsylvania, built in 1682 * Monastic grange, a farming estate belonging to a monastery Geography Australia * Grange, South Austral ...

Hyde Abbey Hyde Abbey was a medieval Benedictine monastery just outside the walls of Winchester, Hampshire, England. It was dissolved and demolished in 1538 following various acts passed under King Henry VIII to dissolve monasteries and abbeys (see Diss ...

after the dissolution of the monasteries; it was purchased with the manor of

Micheldever Micheldever is a village in Hampshire, England, situated north of Winchester. It lies upon the River Dever . The river, and village, formerly part of Stratton Park, lie on a Hampshire grass downland, underlain with chalk and flint. Parts of ...

in 1546 by

Thomas Wriothesley, 1st Earl of Southampton Thomas Wriothesley, 1st Earl of Southampton (21 December 1505 – 30 July 1550), KG was an English peer, secretary of state, Lord Chancellor and Lord High Admiral. A naturally skilled but unscrupulous and devious politician who changed with t ...

. The last

earl of Southampton Earl of Southampton was a title that was created three times in the Peerage of England. The first creation came in 1537 in favour of the courtier William FitzWilliam. He was childless and the title became extinct on his death in 1542. The se ...

made Stratton Park one of his chief seats, and his son-in-law, Sir William Russell, pulled down part of the hamlet and added it to his deer park in the 1660s. The Russell heirs eventually sold the estate in 1801 to Sir Francis Baring, Bt, of the Baring banking family. Baring remodeled the manor house in a

neoclassical style Neoclassical architecture is an architectural style produced by the Neoclassicism, Neoclassical movement that began in the mid-18th century in Italy and France. It became one of the most prominent architectural styles in the Western world. The pr ...

, to designs by

George Dance the Younger George Dance the Younger RA (1 April 1741 – 14 January 1825) was an English architect and surveyor as well as a portraitist. The fifth and youngest son of the architect George Dance the Elder, he came from a family of architects, artists a ...

, 1803–06,' including an imposing stone Doric-columned portico and stuccoed brick main block and wings. The pleasure grounds and landscape park were laid out and planted, starting ca 1803 by

Humphry Repton Humphry Repton (21 April 1752 – 24 March 1818) was the last great English landscape designer of the eighteenth century, often regarded as the successor to Capability Brown; he also sowed the seeds of the more intricate and eclectic styles of ...

, and described by

William Cobbett William Cobbett (9 March 1763 – 18 June 1835) was an English pamphleteer, journalist, politician, and farmer born in Farnham, Surrey. He was one of an agrarian faction seeking to reform Parliament, abolish "rotten boroughs", restrain foreign ...

, in ''Rural Rides: in the counties of Surrey, Kent, Sussex, Hants'', when Stratton Park held the living of

and included

Micheldever Wood Micheldever Wood is a wood near the village of Micheldever, in Hampshire, England, about north-east of Winchester. It is managed by Forestry England. There are prehistoric remains from the Bronze Age and other periods in the wood, including a Ro ...

, which Cobbett said "contains a thousand acres km² and which is one of the finest oak-woods in England." In the late nineteenth century

Thomas Baring, 1st Earl of Northbrook Thomas George Baring, 1st Earl of Northbrook, (22 January 182615 November 1904) was a British Liberal statesman. Gladstone appointed him Viceroy of India 1872–1876. His major accomplishments came as an energetic reformer who was dedicated to ...

laid out more formally structured gardens, with hardy plantings by

Gertrude Jekyll Gertrude Jekyll ( ; 29 November 1843 – 8 December 1932) was a British horticulturist, garden designer, craftswoman, photographer, writer and artist. She created over 400 gardens in the United Kingdom, Europe and the United States, and wrote ...

. The park has been Grade II listed since 1984. Most of the Stratton Park house was demolished in 1963 by owner

John Baring, 7th Baron Ashburton John Francis Harcourt Baring, 7th Baron Ashburton (2 November 1928 – 6 October 2020), was a British merchant banker who served as chairman of British Petroleum from 1992 to 1995. Lord Ashburton also sat on the boards of Jaguar Cars, Dunlo ...

, whose involvement in the demolition of the Baring family's architecturally important banking headquarters in London had earned him the nickname "Basher Baring". Today, all that remains is Dance's stone portico, looming up near, but in no stable relation with, a modernist house by

Stephen Gardiner Stephen Gardiner (27 July 1483 – 12 November 1555) was an English Catholic bishop and politician during the English Reformation period who served as Lord Chancellor during the reign of Queen Mary I and King Philip. Early life Gardiner was b ...

and Christopher Knight, 1963-65. The portico is now a

listed structure In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

since 1983. Mature specimen trees from the landscape park tower above the present structure.

References

'Parishes: East Stratton', ''A History of the County of Hampshire'' Volume 3 (1908), pp. 399-400
Date accessed: 17 March 2007.

* Jane Brown, ''Gardens of a Golden Afternoon: The Story of a Partnership: Edward Lutyens and Gertrude Jekyll''. {{Authority control Country houses in Hampshire British country houses destroyed in the 20th century Grade II listed buildings in Hampshire Grade II listed parks and gardens in Hampshire