Woodcote Park

Woodcote was inherited with Horton Manor by Elizabeth, wife of Richard Evelyn who in 1679 built the estate’s main mansion house.[2] The house is mentioned in the diary of Samuel Pepys.[3] Elizabeth Evelyn bequeathed both Horton Manor and Woodcote Park to Charles Calvert, 3rd Baron Baltimore, a remote "connexion" of her family and proprietary governor of the colony of Maryland.[1][2] Lord Baltimore, a Roman Catholic, lost control of the province of Maryland during the Protestant Revolution of 1689.[4]

In around 1712, Woodcote Park was described by Celia Fiennes:

Lord Baltimores in Woodcut Green encompassed with a wall at the entrance, a breast wall with pallisadoes, large courts one within the other, and a back way to the stables where there is a pretty horse pond; the house is old but low, though large run over much ground; as I drove by the side saw broad chimneys on the end and at due distance on the side on both ends the sides of a court which terminated in a building on which there is a lead with railes and barristers.[5]

In 1715 the third Lord Baltimore died, and Woodcote Park was inherited by Benedict Calvert, 4th Baron Baltimore. However he died less than two months after his father, on 16 April 1715.[6][7] On Benedict's death Woodcote was inherited by the fifteen-year-old Charles Calvert, 5th Baron Baltimore, born in 1699.[8] Calvert made many changes to the house, including adding a Palladian facade by John Vardy, though Lord Baltimore's brothers complained that he "pulled down everything" and "finished nothing".[9] On Charles's death in 1751, his son, Frederick Calvert, 6th Baron Baltimore, inherited the estate. According to Horace Walpole, Frederick spent large sums of money making the interior of the house "tawdry" and "ridiculous" in what Calvert called the "French" style.[10] Woodcote was sold to various owners; Mr. Monk, Mr. Nelson, and Arthur Cuthbert, until c. 1788 when it was sold to London merchant Louis Tessier. [1]

Woodcote Park circa 1840 by J H Kernot, published in Edward William Brayley's Topographical History of Surrey, 1842.

In 1828 the house was described in the following terms:

The mansion is situated in a vale, at the foot of a well wooded eminence, which rises rather abruptly to the south. The east or entrance front is represented in the view given, as seen from the opposite eminence. The basement is cased with stone, and the remainder of the building is stuccoed. It consists of a centre with wings extending in a curvilinear form, and presents an extensive and very imposing frontage. A flight of steps, with balustrade, conducts to the hall which is of good dimensions, and is adorned with coupled Corinthian columns supporting a frieze. Amongst the principal apartments, of which five are en-suite, are two withdrawing-rooms; the walls of the smaller were decorated and painted, as also the ceiling, by foreign artists. The library is a very splendid room, being ornamented with a profusion of gilding on a blue ground. On the ceiling is painted Ganymede, by Verrio. An apartment, styled the painted room, has its walls covered with designs illustrative of the Greek romance of Daphnis and Chloe. At the west end of the building an apartment, formerly used as a chapel, has a painted ceiling representing the Resurrection, by Verrio. On the first floor is a room 40 feet by 28, and 18 feet high. The park lies about a mile south of the village of Epsom, and contiguous to the race-course; it contains about 350 acres.[11]

In 1913 the house was purchased by the Royal Automobile Club, which had been seeking a country club with the potential for a golf course for its members.[12] Most of the fine interiors commissioned by the Calverts were then removed by the RAC; the club instructed one Harold G. Lancaster of 55 Conduit St to remove the historic rooms and sell them at auction.[12]

In 1914, during the First World War, the War Office requisitioned Woodcote Park for a military training camp for the Universities and Public School Brigade (18th–21st (Service) Battalians, Royal Fusiliers).[13][14][15] With construction beginning in November 1914, the camp was built in two sections, 'The Farm Camp' and the 'Ridge Camp'.[15][16][17] Built with over 100 huts, to accommodate 5,400 men and 200 officers, the camp was complete with facilities including water, sanitation, roads, mess halls, a recreation hall, chapel, post office and general store.[15][17]

In May 1915, the Fusilier battalions left Woodcote Camp for Clipstone in Nottinghamshire, and Salisbury Plain, for further training before leaving for France.[15][17] In June, 1915, under orders of Southern Command, the camp was converted to a military convalescent hospital.[18][19] Initially, the hospital had 500 beds in Farm Camp section of the site, but this was soon expanded to receive the first patients who were Australian and New Zealand troops from the Gallipoli campaign.[16] In the first year (June 1915 to June 1916), over 20,600 patients were admitted to the Woodcote Park Convalescent Hospital, including British (10,600) soldiers and troops from Imperial territories including Canada (4,500), Australia (4,100), New Zealand (1,400), and South Africa.[19] By July 1916 there were over 3000 convalescents at the hospital, including many Canadian troops from the Battle of the Somme.[15][20] Such were the numbers of Canadian casualties during the Somme offensive that in August 1916 the entire site was handed over to the Canadian Army Medical Corps [15][21][16][17] and was the largest of the eight convalescent hospitals for Canadian personnel during the war with 3,900 beds.[22] On 17 June 1919, up to 800 Canadian soldiers from the camp rioted, attacking Epsom police station and leaving the station sergeant dead.[23] Subsequently, the Canadian hospital was closed on 30 June 1919 and repurposed as Queen Mary's Convalescent Centre for the treatment and training of ex-servicemen.[16]

In 1923, the estate was returned from the War Office to the RAC.[16] In 1927, the interior of one of the mansion's drawing rooms, noted for its excellent carved wood panelling and other decorations in the style of Thomas Chippendale (possibly originally designed for Charles Calvert, 5th Baron Baltimore), was shipped to the United States and installed in the Museum of Fine Arts at Boston, Massachusetts.[24]

In 1934 the house was gutted by fire, leaving very little of the Evelyn mansion and losing works of art by artists including Rubens, Verrio, and Zuccarelli.[25][26] Fortunately the outer pavilions of the house and many agricultural buildings remained intact, as well as the entrance steps, balustrades and colonnades. The architects Mewès and Davis were commissioned to rebuild the house, and the façade of the house was restored as close to the Evelyn original as was possible.[25][27]

During the Battle of Britain a Hawker Hurricane aircraft was forced to land on the club golf course.

During the Second World War, Woodcote Park was again taken over for military use, being pressed into service as a training centre. The ornamental gardens were ploughed up to grow food for the war effort.[27] In the summer of 1940, during the height of the Battle of Britain, a Hawker Hurricane fighter aircraft was forced to land on the golf course of Woodcote Park. The pilot received medical assistance in the RAC clubhouse, having first proved that he was not an enemy airman by waving a packet of Players cigarettes at nearby golfers.[25]

Woodcote Park serves as one of two club houses of the RAC private members club; the other being at 89–91 Pall Mall, London. It is a grade II* listed building[28] and features two 18-hole downland golf courses on its 350 acres (140 ha) estate.[25]