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Moving Out #29

And so the day arrived a month or so after our wedding when my dad had to leave Hoar Cross Hall. Ten years after moving in he was now moving out, leaving his dream home for my mum to live in alone. Gavin moved with him and Piers was away at school most of the time. It was a mammoth task as he had so much stuff to move, especially from the basement. He had some heavy machinery too that he’d brought with him from his alabaster days, including a band saw which we used to saw up logs for the huge fireplaces in the main rooms. He had bought a house in nearby Burton-on-Trent which had some outbuildings for a workshop and there he moved to start afresh. He carried o...

The origins of the stately home #43

So why are stately homes so called? Stately home actually means 'a large impressive old house with interesting history and usually visited by the public.' Well, I suppose they do look very 'stately' for a start but these houses were also a status symbol for the great families of England, who competed with each other to provide hospitality for the royal household who would travel around England meeting their subjects. Stately homes were huge mansions which were always beautiful and the epitome of perfect architecture, often designed by famous architects of the day. The gardens too would be perfectly landscaped to show balance, variety, sequence and colour. One o...

Hoar Cross History #65

Hoar Cross Hall, where I grew up, is in the village of Hoar Cross, so small that it is almost a hamlet.  The only thing that defines it as a village is the fact that it has a place of worship which is The Church of the Holy Angels, built by Emily Meynell in the 1870s in memory of her husband, Hugo.  The name of the village was first recorded in 1230 and called ‘Horcros’ and may refer to a grey boundary cross which stood as a marker but is now long gone.  No-one is entirely sure if this cross is the point where the four wards of Needwood Forest once met, or whether it indicated the extent of the land owned by Burton Abbey.  Whatever the reason we shall ne...