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Walton Hall is a
country house image:Blenheim - Blenheim Palace - 20210417125239.jpg, 300px, Blenheim Palace - Oxfordshire 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 Townhou ...
in Walton near
Wakefield Wakefield is a cathedral city in West Yorkshire, England located on the River Calder. The city had a population of 109,766 in the 2021 census, up from 99,251 in the 2011 census. The city is the administrative centre of the wider Metropolit ...
in
West Yorkshire West Yorkshire is a Metropolitan counties of England, metropolitan and Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the Yorkshire and the Humber region of England. It borders North Yorkshire to the north and east, South Yorkshire and De ...
, England. It was built on the site of a former moated medieval hall in the
Palladian Palladian architecture is a European architectural style derived from the work of the Venetian architect Andrea Palladio (1508–1580). What is today recognised as Palladian architecture evolved from his concepts of symmetry, perspective and ...
style in 1767 on an island in a lake. It was the ancestral home of the
naturalist Natural history is a domain of inquiry involving organisms, including animals, fungi, and plants, in their natural environment, leaning more towards observational than experimental methods of study. A person who studies natural history is cal ...
and traveller
Charles Waterton Charles Waterton (3 June 1782 – 27 May 1865) was an English naturalist, plantation overseer and explorer best known for his pioneering work regarding conservation. Family and religion Waterton was of a Roman Catholic landed gentry family de ...
, who made Walton Hall into the world's first
wildfowl The Anatidae are the biological family of water birds that includes ducks, geese, and swans. The family has a cosmopolitan distribution, occurring on all the world's continents except Antarctica. These birds are adapted for swimming, floating o ...
and
nature reserve A nature reserve (also known as a wildlife refuge, wildlife sanctuary, biosphere reserve or bioreserve, natural or nature preserve, or nature conservation area) is a protected area of importance for flora, fauna, funga, or features of geologic ...
.


Early history

Walton Hall, and a residence at Cawthorne, were home to the Anglo-Saxon chieftain Ailric, who is mentioned in the
Domesday Book Domesday Book ( ; the Middle English spelling of "Doomsday Book") is a manuscript record of the Great Survey of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086 at the behest of William the Conqueror. The manuscript was originally known by ...
and was the King's Thane for
South Yorkshire South Yorkshire is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the Yorkshire and the Humber region of England. It borders North Yorkshire and West Yorkshire to the north, the East Riding of Yorkshire to the north-east, Lincolnshire ...
. When the
Normans The Normans (Norman language, Norman: ''Normaunds''; ; ) were a population arising in the medieval Duchy of Normandy from the intermingling between Norsemen, Norse Viking settlers and locals of West Francia. The Norse settlements in West Franc ...
came to Yorkshire, Ailric was at Walton and was alerted by a man on horseback that they were coming in force. He amassed his retainers and on horseback they ambushed the mounted Norman knights of Ilbert de Laci, who were moving on the road from Tanshelf to Wakefield. The better armoured and armed knights of Ilbert de Laci resisted the attack. For two to three years Ailric maintained a
guerrilla war Guerrilla warfare is a form of unconventional warfare in which small groups of irregular military, such as rebels, partisans, paramilitary personnel or armed civilians, which may include recruited children, use ambushes, sabotage, terrorism ...
out of his estates in the west of South Yorkshire, until de Laci was forced to come to an accommodation with him, whereby Ailric would communicate with the local people and de Laci would return many of his former estates, including Walton Hall. A descendant of this family, Sara le Neville, married Thomas De Burgh, the Steward of the Countess of Brittany, Duchess of Richmond. Walton Hall was one of six manors, including the manors at
Silkstone Silkstone is a village and civil parish in the Metropolitan Borough of Barnsley in South Yorkshire, England. It is situated in the foothills of the Pennines, between the towns of Barnsley and Penistone. The parish includes the village of Sil ...
and Cawthorne and the De Burgh manors in
North Yorkshire North Yorkshire is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in Northern England.The Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority areas of City of York, York and North Yorkshire (district), North Yorkshire are in Yorkshire and t ...
, that she lived at through the year. In 1333, Sir Philip de Burgh was granted a licence to crenellate his manor house at Walton. The Waterton family acquired the Cawthorne estates and those at Walton including Walton Hall, with the marriage in 1435 of Constance Asshenhull, the heiress of the De Burgh family, to Richard Waterton. In the time of Sir Robert Waterton, who served
Henry VIII Henry VIII (28 June 149128 January 1547) was King of England from 22 April 1509 until his death in 1547. Henry is known for his Wives of Henry VIII, six marriages and his efforts to have his first marriage (to Catherine of Aragon) annulled. ...
, the hall came to the water's edge and was three storeys high. Sir Robert Waterton's father-in-law was Sir Richard Tempest, who was with Henry VIII at the Field of the Cloth of Gold. His father-in-law was Steward of the King's manor of Wakefield and involved in the Tempest–Saville feud. The only part of the old buildings that remain is the old watergate, which is said to be part of an earlier 14th-century structure. At that time it was the only entrance across a drawbridge. The old oak hall referred to by Charles Waterton was on the second storey and was in an L shape. The entrance hall at Walton Hall has armorial shields on the walls representing the ancestors of the Waterton family. The Waterton family intermarried with other prominent Yorkshire families of the medieval age, including the Percys, the Barnbys, the Wentworths, the Hildyards and others.


World's first nature reserve

In 1805,
Charles Waterton Charles Waterton (3 June 1782 – 27 May 1865) was an English naturalist, plantation overseer and explorer best known for his pioneering work regarding conservation. Family and religion Waterton was of a Roman Catholic landed gentry family de ...
inherited the family estate at Walton Hall. He initially returned there in 1813 and settled more permanently in 1821 after returning from exploring and managing his uncle' slave plantations in
British Guiana British Guiana was a British colony, part of the mainland British West Indies. It was located on the northern coast of South America. Since 1966 it has been known as the independent nation of Guyana. The first known Europeans to encounter Guia ...
. Unusually for the time he was committed to nature conservation rather than hunting and game shooting for sport, which caused significant loss of native fauna. Between 1821 and 1826, he turned Waterton Park into a wildlife haven, designed to support and protect native and migratory species, especially birds. He insisted that the park be managed to minimise the disturbance to native wildlife. Keepers and dogs from nearby estates were banned during nesting season, shooting was forbidden and lake fishing was not allowed from autumn to May. He had a high boundary wall built, over 3 miles long and designed to deter foxes and poachers, that took five years to complete. He enjoyed observing wildlife and had watchtowers built so he could birdwatch. He opened the park to the public for free to encourage people to enjoy nature. This included patients from mental asylums whose visits to spend time in nature formed part of their treatments. The parkland is now considered the first wildlife reserve, a landscape designed to protect wildlife.


Later history

Charles Waterton's son,
Edmund Edmund is a masculine given name in the English language. The name is derived from the Old English elements ''ēad'', meaning "prosperity" or "riches", and ''mund'', meaning "protector". Persons named Edmund include: People Kings and nobles *Ed ...
, went bankrupt and sold the estate. The Waterton Collection is in Wakefield Museum. Walton Hall is now part of the Waterton Park Hotel. In the 1940s and again in the early 1950s and early 1960s the Hall was a
maternity home A maternity home, or maternity housing program, is a form of supportive housing provided to pregnant women. Maternity housing programs support a woman in need of a stable home environment to reach her goals in a variety of areas including educatio ...
. Walton Hall is a proposed
UNESCO World Heritage Site World Heritage Sites are landmarks and areas with legal protection under an treaty, international treaty administered by UNESCO for having cultural, historical, or scientific significance. The sites are judged to contain "cultural and natural ...
. Sir David Attenborough has stated that "Walton Hall is an extremely important site in the history of nature conservation worldwide. It is, arguably, the first tract of land anywhere in modern times to be protected, guarded and maintained as a nature reserve." In 2024, Waterton Park, part of the estate, was registered at
Grade II In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Hi ...
by
Historic England Historic England (officially the Historic Buildings and Monuments Commission for England) is an executive non-departmental public body of the British Government sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. It is tasked with prot ...
, to ensure that the landscape considered "the world’s first nature reserve" is given greater protection and recognition.


Walton Hall sundial

There is a sundial located on the island to the rear of Walton Hall. It was made by George Boulby in 1813 and is made out of an
ashlar Ashlar () is a cut and dressed rock (geology), stone, worked using a chisel to achieve a specific form, typically rectangular in shape. The term can also refer to a structure built from such stones. Ashlar is the finest stone masonry unit, a ...
with copper
gnomon A gnomon (; ) is the part of a sundial that casts a shadow. The term is used for a variety of purposes in mathematics and other fields, typically to measure directions, position, or time. History A painted stick dating from 2300 BC that was ...
s. It is a multi-faceted sundial made out of a
polyhedron In geometry, a polyhedron (: polyhedra or polyhedrons; ) is a three-dimensional figure with flat polygonal Face (geometry), faces, straight Edge (geometry), edges and sharp corners or Vertex (geometry), vertices. The term "polyhedron" may refer ...
. It indicates the time in the following cities around the world:
Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , ; ; ) is the capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, largest city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It has a population of 933,680 in June 2024 within the city proper, 1,457,018 in the City Re ...
,
Basel Basel ( ; ), also known as Basle ( ), ; ; ; . is a city in northwestern Switzerland on the river Rhine (at the transition from the High Rhine, High to the Upper Rhine). Basel is Switzerland's List of cities in Switzerland, third-most-populo ...
,
Boston Boston is the capital and most populous city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. The city serves as the cultural and Financial centre, financial center of New England, a region of the Northeas ...
,
Demerara Demerara (; , ) is a historical region in the Guianas, on the north coast of South America, now part of the country of Guyana. It was a colony of the Dutch West India Company between 1745 and 1792 and a colony of the Dutch state from 1792 unti ...
,
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,
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,
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,
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,
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,
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,
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, and
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. It was described by Richard Hobson: :"On the southern side of the mansion, on a slightly elevated mound, stands a most complete and very beautiful sun-dial, deserving of careful observation, inasmuch as it reflects a great credit on the sculptor, the late George Boulby, who was a common mason at the contiguous and rural village of Crofton, in 1813. A work of art, and, especially when it was well known to have been executed by a totally uneducated man – by a common mason, not only devoid of inculcated literary attainments, but by one having had no guiding artistic instruction – by a man having to earn, 'by the sweat of his brow', the few shillings sufficient to enable him to secure some of the works of the philosopher of Athens – by one having to entirely depend upon self counsel so as to elevate him in his financial and social position. I venture to say, considering all these formidable disadvantages and impediments, that this specimen of sculpture is a wonderful development of innate talent, and must be admired and applauded, for generations in futurity, as a relic of the excellence of the scientific execution of the common stone mason. :"This dial is composed of twenty equilateral triangles, which are so disposed as to form a similar number of individual dials, ten of which, whenever the sun shines out, and whatever may be its altitude in the heavens, are always in use, and ever faithful time-keepers. On these separate dials are engraven, severally, the names of cities in all parts of the globe, which are placed in accordance with their different degrees of longitude, by which arrangement, the solar time, at each of the cities recorded on the different dials, can be simultaneously ascertained. :"On one occasion Mr. Waterton, having to pass Boulby's house ... saw this dial in the stonemason's yard, for which Boulby asked a mere trifle. The Squire, delighted with the execution and the ingenuity of this simple-minded man, generously presented Boulby with twenty guineas by way of purchase, when the ingenuous and unaffected mason was infinitely more delighted to have the honour of his own artistic skills exhibited at Walton Hall, under the patronage of the Squire, than with the douceur which the sculptor erroneously considered far beyond its value" :::''Charles Waterton: His Home, Habits and Handiwork. Reminiscences of an Intimate and Most Confiding Personal Association for Nearly Thirty Years'', by Richard Hobson MD. (1866/7)


See also

* Listed buildings in Walton, Wakefield


References


External links


Overtown Miscellany
– Walton & Squire Waterton {{Authority control Country houses in West Yorkshire Buildings and structures in Wakefield Houses completed in 1767 1767 establishments in England
Hall In architecture, a hall is a relatively large space enclosed by a roof and walls. In the Iron Age and the Early Middle Ages in northern Europe, a mead hall was where a lord and his retainers ate and also slept. Later in the Middle Ages, the gre ...
Grade II* listed buildings in West Yorkshire