If you have any comments or new information about this record, please email us.

Summary

Houghton House, described by Daniel Defoe in 1720 as a noble and magnificent palace, stands in a prominent position on the greensand ridge overlooking the vale of Bedford. The monument includes the ruined remains of an early 17th century house (which was partly demolished in the late 18th century), the principal carriageway to the south, and part of the surrounding terrace which is considered to retain evidence of contemporary formal courtyards and gardens.
The house (a Listed Building, Grade I) was built to an H plan design, typical of the Jacobean period, with maximum dimensions of c.37m east to west and 25m north to south, It is constructed in Ampthill brick; with quoins, window moulding and other details in limestone quarried at nearby Totternhoe. Plans and illustrations from the late 18th and early 19th century show the building prior to the demolition work, when it stood to three storeys. The building had four corner turrets, the two at the western corners remaining to second storey level. These are considered to be an unusual feature for a house of this period, and were formerly capped by concave pyramidal roofs. The remainder of the roof line terminated in triangular or Dutch-style gables. The main entrance is provided by a porch within a tower in the centre of the south elevation, which in part survives to just below the roof line. The more impressive "show fronts" of the house face north and west, in the centre of which are the remains of ornamental facades. The northern façade consisted of a two storey, three bay, loggia of which only the lower colonnade and the approaching flight of brick steps now remain. The western entrance had a loggia of three colonnades, only the lower section of which remains.
The floors within the house have long since been removed, but most of the internal walls remain, together with fireplaces and flues.
The main approach to the house was from the south; a plan of 1733 shows an avenue of trees flanking the carriageway, and also the layout of rectangular formal gardens and courtyards surrounding the house.

The house and grounds are a Scheduled Monument (NHLE No. 1013522)

Full Description

<1> Department of the Environment, 1972, DoE Urban District of Ampthill 3rd List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest, 774 (Index). SBD11195.

Ruins of the great house built by John Thorpe in 1615, with alterations by Inigo Jones of circa 1620 Subsequent work by Wren and Chambers was dispersed in the neighbourhood, when the house was dismantled in 1794. Oak staircase now in Swan Hotel, Bedford. Under the control of the DOE. See VCH, pages 289-290.

<2> Nikolaus Pevsner, 1968, The Buildings of England: Bedfordshire and the County of Huntingdon and Peterborough, no ref (Bibliographic reference). SBD10533.

It is a mysterious building, and the last word has certainly not been said about its date or dates and its architectural history. It is said that it was begun about 1615. The owner was Mary Countess of Pembroke, sister of Sir Philip Sydney. After she died, about 1630, the house went to Thomas Bruce, first Earl of Elgin. His son was the first Earl of Ailesbury. In 1738 the Duke of Bedford bought the house, and his son, the Marquis of Tavistock, lived there from 1764 till he was killed in an accident in 1767. It was then occupied by the Earl of Upper Ossory, and was finally dismantled by the Duke of Bedford in 1794.
Houghton House is of brick with stone dressings. Basically it belongs to a normal Jacobean type. The plan is H-shaped with two square projections in two re-entrant angles of the s façade. The windows are upright, mullioned and transomed and pedimented. There are two storeys, but owing to the fall of the land to the E there is here a high basement under. This may be left from an older house on the site (buttresses). The N front has two canted bay windows in the projecting wings. The W side also has a recessed centre. A little less normal, but far from unique, are the four square angle turrets. They had at least in the early C19 concave-sided pyramidal roofs. There were then also plenty of shaped gables. So far there is nothing with special architectural comment, but the house is two rooms deep, and has its hall in the middle of the s front, centered in its middle and left towards the room behind also by its middle ,a dn this abandoning of the traditional hall position and arrangement, i.e. of the screens passage ? Would be very early indeed for 1615 (but cf Aston Hall, Birmingham) 1618 and several of John Thorpe's designs). Nor is this all: for the S, N and W fronts all have in their middle prominent decorative features which are impossible for 1615 and point unmistakably to a date about 1635-45 or so. On the s side the porch has very odd details in the doorway and the window above it. The big keystones cannot be overlooked. Those of the doorway carry a segmental pediment. Also, above the inner doorway is a horizontally placed oval. Much more spectacular are the centre pieces or frontispieces of the N and W sides. To the N it is a three-bay arcaded element with Tuscan columns. There were two storeys of this plus a third with an arched window and two arched niches plus a one-bay attic with volutes l and r and a pediment. A comparison. It was in its original complete form of three loggias one on top of the other with columns are Tuscan with a frieze of decorated metopes. The doorway again has a horizontally placed oval. The two lower loggias are of five bays, the top one has three and is crowned by a pediment. In the hall are two chimney pieces. The work here assigned to 1635-45 has been attributed to Inigo Jones, but there is no evidence at all.

<3> Bedfordshire Magazine, Vol 7, p. 283; Letters to the Editor (Serial). SBD10543.

I am told that the interesting Jacobean ruin known as Houghton House does not receive as many visitors as it merits. Its story was well told by Miss Mary George in your first volume and her account is reprinted as a pamphlet that can be purchased from the custodian. Probably the awkward approach to the lane that leads to this ancient monument has something to do with the fact that many travellers miss it; but it is worthwhile negotiating the turn at the top of the hill north of Ampthill on the Bedford Road and following the long lane to the house that even in ruin still retains the romantic atmosphere which it must have had in even greater measure during the 180 years of its occupation.
Includes image of the house.

<4> Cambridge University Collection of Aerial Photographs (CUCAP), Cambridge AP: Index (Aerial Photograph). SBD10593.

FF 46-51 (14/7/1950) Houghton House TL 039 394;
AEF 43 (8/5/1962) Houghton House TL 039 394

<5> Bedfordshire & Luton Archives and Records Service Documents, BLARS: R1/36, Estate plan, 1733 (Unpublished document). SBD10551.

Plan of Houghton House in 1733

<6> Bedfordshire Archaeological Council, 1973, Bedfordshire Archaeological Journal, Volume 8, Vol. 8, 1973, p. 138 (D. H. Kennett) (Article in serial). SBD14118.

Martin Randall has made a preliminary survey of the known historical evidence for Houghton House. He has discussed the problem of its architect and completely discounts the attribution to Thorpe. Inigo Jones is regarded as still possible for part of the work but much of the building exhibits features not found in his mature works. It is concluded that an unknown architect who had visited Italy may be more probable. A series of photographs of the house and a group of prints before its partial demoition have been collected with notes on its history and design. A copy has been placed in the Bedfordshire County Record Office. Research continues.

<7> Bedfordshire & Luton Archives and Records Service Documents, BLARS: 130AMP, A Level History of Art Thesis (Martin Randall) (Unpublished document). SBD10551.

Copy of Martin Randall's thesis as mentioned in Ref (6)

<8> Royal Archaeological Institute, Archaeological Journal, Vol. 139, 1982, pp. 39-42 (Article in serial). SBD10785.

The first sudden sight of Houghton - gaunt, windy and crow-swept - is unforgettable: Thornfield Hall as Jayne Eyre came upon it for the first time after the fire. But Houghton was not burnt, only dismantled (in 1794), and it gradually crumbled until in 1923 Sir Alber Richardson bought the ruins to save what was left. It is largely thanks to him that there is anything for us to see at all. Yet Houghton was once - if tradition is reliable - Bunyan's House Beautiful, which, readers of Pilgrim's Progress will remember, stood on the Hill Difficulty. It is not much of a struggle now to climb the hill, and Houghton's principal difficulty is one for the architectural historian; it is one of the most perplexing houses of its time, whose surviving fragments tell a tantalizingly incomplete story. Luckily an accurate measured survey was made in 1785 by W. Kimpton; his drawings are in the Bedford Archives at Woburn, two are reproduced in the King's Arcadia (Harris et al, 1973, 109-10), and photocopies of redrawn facsimiles may be on show at Houghton itself, if weather and other ravages allow. Recently discovered eighteenth century plans are in the County Record Office in Bedford: it is these which finally disposed of the claims that the Haynes Grange Room (cf. Chicksands) came from Houghton.

James I granted the park of Dame Ellensbury or Houghton to Mary, Countess of Pembroke in 1615 - far too late for there to be anything in the story that her brother's Arcadia was written here. She died in 1621, and it seems - or has seemed - all but certain that the two dates define the period of the building of the house, which, in a crucial position, carries the crests of Dudley and Sidney. Within two years of the countess's death, house and park reverted to the crown and were granted to the Bruce family (later Earls of Ailesbury); it was bought in 1738 by the Duke of Bedford, whose son the Marquess of Tavistock lived there till his accidental death in 1767. For a period Houghton was occupied by the Earl of Upper Ossory, whose own house, Ampthill Park, stands less than a mile to the south-west; at this time Capability Brown incorporated both houses into a continuous landscape, of which very little can now be made out on the Houghton side. The Bedford never reoccupied the house, and in 1794 it was unroofed and dismantled. The staircase, which dated only from 1688 (it is a tough provincial piece, with twisted balusters along a continuous string), went the the Duke's newly built Swan Hotel at Bedford; and external features survive in Ampthill, including the splendid early eighteenth-century gates in Church Street and a wooden temple, bought by John Morris the brewer to adorn the garden of Avenue House, newly extended by Henry Holland who also designed the Swan.

In 1620 or so the general appearance of Houghton would not have excited special comment. The plan is basically the familiar Jacobean H, with a much deeper recess to the south (the entrance side), where the re-entrant angles have extruded towers, as for example at Wimbledon House or Dodington. The elevations showed a silhouette of shaped brick gables as on any big house of the time, though here clasped between corner towers with concave pyramidal caps - less usual features, but known elsewhere, for instance at John Thorpe's Holland House, whose general appearance dominated by canted bays and shaped gables has obvious affinities with Houghton. In plan too there is a noteworthy parallel, for as a Holland House, the central section of the H was two rooms thick, and the hall is entered centrally - not altogether a novelty by this time but still out of the ordinary run; the room behind was likewise centrally placed. In 1606, when James I thought of restoring Amptill Castle, Thorpe was called in and made plans, but the project was dropped. James's interest in the area may, however, be significant of the authorship and date of Houghton.

A closer look atht eh entrance front shows some features which would be at least unexpected at this time. One or two remaining windows have perdiments (though there were apparently none on the show fronts to north and west). The porch moreover is in a projecting three-storey central tower, whose angles are on the upper storeys chamfered in concave quadrants. The door has a gigantic triple keyblock carrying a segmental pediment - a variant form of the mannerist windows of the Plazzo Thiene which, as Inigo Jones noted in his copy of the Four Books of Architecture, were designed not by Palladio himself but by Giulio Romano, (in 1617 Jones tried them out in a form closer to the Italian on his - perhaps forunately abortive - design for the Star Chamber). Above the door is a very large basket-arched opening whose head used to be filled with a semi-octagonal stone panel, at the top of which survives a console carrying what looks like a boldly projecting piece of entablature but was in fact the bottom of a moulded (and possibly engraved) stone block surmounted by a miniature broken segmental pediment - a pile-up of mannerist details yoked together with barbaric vigour, unlikely to be straight provincial work but, though showing some learning, hardly the work of a classical master; they make some mark of their own.

For already there were features at Houghton which set it ahead of almost every other house of its time save Jones's alone; the astonishing frontspieces to the north and west facades. That to the north consisted of a two-storey three-bay arcaded loggia with attached columns. Doric below, Ionic above; a design based (and closely too), as John Harris has pointed out, on the main courtyard elevation of Palladio's Convental della Carità at Venice, which we know Jones to have visited twice. Above the upper loggia at the arcade motif was continued as niches and crowned with a pedimented gable - a design related to an unexecuted draft for the west front of St Paul's cathedral, which Harris dates to c.1620. An interesting and telling feature is that the middle arches are narrower than the outer ones - giving an almost proto-baroque upward thrust through the strong horizontals of the entablatures. Alas, very little of this can now be seen, for the upper storeys have entirely gone and of the lowest, though the three arches survive, only one is complete with its columns and entablature.

Even more remarkable was the loggia on the west front - two open hexastyle colonnades with a pedimented terrastyle attic which may have derived from a Serlian original but is almost a direct transcription of the upper storey of the Gate of Honour at Caius College, Cambridge. The double loggia could itself have been suggested by any of half a dozen Palladian precedents, though the English design is both richer in detail and also - lacking an overall pediment and proportionately a little lower - much more restful. The surviving Doric colonnage has an effortless serentity which could not have been achieved by any but a rare master. A point of particular note is the slight easing of formality in the spacing of the columns: the centre bay is marginally the widest, the outermost are a little narrower, the intervening narrowest of all. The difference is only a matter of an inch or two, but the effect extraordinarily subtle and harmonious. The device was used by Palladio on the Villa Cornaro at Piombino (which has a double loggia) and on the other single-storey porticos as at the Villa Badoer and the Villa Foscari; but it is not perceptible in the elevations in the Four Books. Well-educated and correct classical porches and other features are of course known as addenda to English houses since the 1560s; and Robert Smythson's two-storey screen design for Worksop Manor is in some ways an interior forestaste of the north front loggia at Houghton; but not before - and only rarely for a long time after - have we had anything of such confidence and showing so thorough a knowledge and understanding of classiciam transmitted through the refining hand of Palladio.

Of this great work Pevsner asserts that it is impossible for 1615 and that, though it has been attributed to Inigo Jones, there is no evidence at all (1968, 41). But the frieze of the west colonnade bears the Dudley and Sidney crests and must therefore date from the Countess of Pembroke's time. She was not only the mother of two Earls of Pembrike but the friend of Lord and Lady Arundel: Arundel was Jones's close companion on his second trip to Italy and his leading aristocratic patron: Lady Pembrike cannot have failed to be intimately aware of Jones's pre-eminence, even though we need not assume she fully understood it. As John Harris rightly insists, 'if such classical additions were made to Jacobean houses before 1621 then no one but Jones could have designed them' (Harris et al 1973, 111). It is certain not only that the Houghton frontispieces show a close study of Palladio - and of the buildings at first hand (for the printed woodcuts were not accurate enough to reveal small-scale detail identifiable in the English paraphrases) - but that the Palladian influence comes through the mind of an artist who was also a fully-equipped architect; no amateur could have picked up the significance of those small but vividly telling variations. The evidence of Jones's authorship is irrestistably there even in the fragment that is all we can now see.

There remains, however, the strange anomaly of the appearance of those masterly and learned designs in the context of the conservative Jacobean facades of Houghton. It is impossible to believe that they are the work of the same hand; it must indeed have been hard for the investor of the exquisitely refined classical detail on the west front to tolerate the crowding that resulted and the clash in scales. How then did the collision come about? As Ian Nairn says of Queen Anne's exactly contemporary and equally puzzling Byfleet Manor in Surrey, 'it is very odd that she should simultaneously commission a completely conservative house and a revolutionary one'. At Houghton it is more than odd, it is unthinkable. Pevsner, accepting the conventional dating of the house to c.1615, adds on another twenty to thirty years for the loggias. This we have seen cannot be. It is of course possible that the Countess built the house immediately after 1615 to the designs of a conservative (though, on the evidence of the plan, not very conservative) court architect, and then, very soon afterwards wanting to smarten it up, got Jones to apply what he had learned so lately in Italy. But it seems stylistically more likely that the house had in fact been built a few years earlier: for the main structure Thorpe's seems the most likely hand, and it may be that it was not, as has regularly been asserted, built from the ground by Lady Pembroke, but initially by the king while he was thinking about reconstructing Ampthill Castle and while Thorpe was on the spot. When the royal project fell through and Houghton Park was granted to her, the Countess, well-acquainted with the most advanced classical learning of her time, would in such circumstances turn directly to Jones. (It is of course a commonplace to find stories of houses being 'new built' by so-and-so when in fact they were only altered or added to). 1615, the year of Jones's return from his second and transformatory Italian visit, was just the time for him to take up the opportunity to display the new learning,a nd a challenging frontispiece just the place for it.

<9> English Heritage, SAM Record Form, No. 27114 (Scheduling record). SBD10803.

The remains of a Jacobean Mansion built by John Thorpe about 1615, for May Countess of Pembroke, and altered a few years later by Inigo Jones. Towards end of C18, it fell into decay. [OW819]

Building is on H plan, with four angle turrets, and pedimented cross windows. There are two storeys, but owing to fall of the land to E, there is here a high basement under. The S, N and W front have in their middles prominent decorative features, the latter being of particular grandeur [Pevsner, Beds, p40, 1968]

Some erosion of stone dressings, and a little graffiti and rubbish topping, otherwise in good repair. [H. Paterson, 1984]

Visited 'en passant'. A small elder shrub growing from brickwork above N front to E. Rubbish and stone fall minimal. Perhaps a plan of the hosue might be a welcome interperative addition to the good reproduction of elevations, near the entrance. [H. Paterson, 1987].

<10> Ordnance Survey, Ordnance Survey Archaeology Record Cards, OS: TL 03 NW 2 (Unpublished document). SBD10879.

(TL 03923948) Houghton House (NR) (remains of) (NAT) ( OS 1:10,000 1978 )
The ruins of Houghton House, once one of the finest houses in the country, stand on the top of a hill in Houghton Park in the south of the parish. The house was erected early in the 17th century and is built of red brick with stone quoins and dressings. The house was bought by the Duke of Bedford in 1738 who dismantled and disroofed it after the death of his son in 1767. (VCH Vol III, pp289-90)
The walls only remain (both internal and external) and are in a good state of preservation. (OS Small Scales Reviser June 1951)
See ground photographs. (20/08/1970)
Ruins of Houghton House, Grade I. Built by John Thorpe in 1615 with alterations by Inigo Jones, Wren and Chambers, dismantled 1794.
Houghton House was built by John Thorpe in 1615. Alterations were carried out by Inigo Jones circa 1620 and subsequent work by Wren and Chambers. Scheduled. (Mid Bedfordshire, 16/03/1972; List of ancient monuments in England: Volume 1, Northern England; Volume 2, Southern England; Volume 3, East Anglia and the Midlands, Vol 3, p8)

<11> Council for British Archaeology, 2007, South Midlands Archaeology, Volume 37, Vol. 37, 2007, p. 7 (Serial). SBD14150.

A watching brief was carried out during the excavation of postholes for four new information panels placed both within Houghton House and outside the building. The footings of an internal wall were found within the entrance hall.

<12> English Heritage, National Monuments Record Building Files, BF058175 (Unpublished document). SBD10795.

1 file: - print, photographic - exterior
measured drawing
miscellaneous material

<13> John Preston Neale, 1820-9, Views of the Seats of Noblemen and Gentlemen in England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland, Vol. VI, 1823, p. 17 (Bibliographic reference). SBD12819.

The Old House at Houghton forms a fine picturesque ruin. It was built by Mary, daughter of Sir Henry Sydney, K.G., wife of the second Earl of Pembroke, and was granted, at the Restoration, to Robert, Lord Bruce, who was created Viscount Bruce, of Ampthill, and Earl of Aylesbury, in 1664; he was also made High Steward of the Honor of Ampthill.

<14> Bedfordshire County Council, 1970 - 2000s, HER Photograph Archive, F1299/36a, March 1996 (Photograph). SBD10506.

Colour photo (held with HER 9442).

<15> John Britton & Edward Wedlake Brayley, 1801, The Beauties of England and Wales, Volume 1, Bedfordshire, Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, pp. 65-6, https://archive.org/details/beautiesofenglan01brit/page/64/mode/2up (Bibliographic reference). SBD10810.

"Houghton Park is now united to it [Ampthill Park], by an exchange between the Duke of Bedford and Lord Ossory, and forms all together a very handsome domain. The old house, in the latter park, described and engraved in Pennant’s Journey from Chester, has been pulled down, excepting some of the ornamental parts, which form a picturesque ruin. That house was built by Mary, Countess of Pembroke, (on whom the celebrated epitaph was written,) in her widowhood, and was afterwards the seat of the Earl of Ailesbury. About the site of the ruins are some very fine and extensive prospects over the northern part of the county."

<16> Bedfordshire County Council, 1970 - 2000s, HER Photograph Archive, F1300/0a, 1a, 6a, March 1996 (Photograph). SBD10506.

Three colour photos held with HER 9442

<17> I D Parry, 1827, Select Illustrations Historical and Topographical of Bedfordshire (Bibliographic reference). SBD11243.

Image of Houghton House (complete)

<18> Country Life, June 18th, 1927; p1000 (Article in serial). SBD10720.

Letter to the Editor re appeal to save the ruins of Houghton House - with brief history of the house.

<19> Country Life, June 25th, 1927, p. 1038 (Article in serial). SBD10720.

Letter to the Editor discussing whether Hillesden House in Elstow was actually John Bunyan's 'House Beautfiul'.

<20> Country Life, September 26th, 1947; p. 636 (Article in serial). SBD10720.

And old print of Houghton House, near Ampthill, before it was dismantled and the ruins today

<21> Bedfordshire County Council, 1961, Bedfordshire Heritage, Plate 9 (Bibliographic reference). SBD10579.

Houghton House, built for Mary, Countess of Pembroke, before 1621. Classical detail is applied to this house which is still largely of mediaeval proportions, and which retained mullioned and transomed windows.

<22> Bedfordshire Times, 28/10/1977 (Newspaper Article). SBD10544.

Photograph of Houghton House.

<23> Evening Post/Echo, Damesels keep a welcome no more; March 4, 1980 (Newspaper Article). SBD10611.

When Christian, hero of John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress turned up at the House Beautiful he was met at the door by four gracious damsels.
If you go there today you will be met by a man from the Nation Trust asking you to pay for a ticket - but that's life, I suppose.
House Beautiful, according to some historians, is in fact the ruined Houghton House which stands in solitary splendour on a hill above Ampthill.
It was built in 1615 for Mary, Countess of Pembroke, sister of the famous courtier Sir Philip Sydney. Among the people who entertained there was James I.
The next owner was the staunch Royalist Christina Countess of Devonshire. After the battle of Worcester a troop of Parliamentary Horse was sent to Houghton to arrest her, but she bribed her way to escape.
The house then became the seat of the Bruce family, whose household accounts still exist and show they lived in considerable style.
All beer was home brewed, but the family drank a lot of imported wine such as Rhenish, Canary and Malaga. The housekeeper was responsible for medicines and there were bills for worm seed, leeches and quinine bark.
When chocolate first came to England in the 17th century a member of the Bruce family, Lord Ailesbury, bought his own chocolate mill for grinding it and the family ate 56 pounds in five months.
In 1685 Robert Earl of Ailesbury died and the mourning costs were put down at £160, much of which was used to buy white mourning gloces for the funeral congregation.
Thomas, the second earl was imprisoned in the Tower of London for his royalist sympathies and then exiled to Belgium. He died there and his heart was sent back to be buried at the family mausoleum at Maulden parish church.
The house was sold to the Duke of Bedford in 1738 and was restored for the young Marquis of Tavistock and his bride Lady Elizabeth Keppel. But three years after moving in the marquis died in a hunting accident. The Duke had difficulty in finding tenants for the huge building and he dismantled it in 1794.
In Victorian times the ruined house was a popular picnic spot and many of the picnickers carved their names on the brickwork.
The late Professor Sir Albert Richardson, who lived in Ampthill, was a great admirer of the house and believed the original architect may have been Inigo Jones.
The building was partially restored through his efforts and it was taken over by the National Trust.

<24> Alan Cox, Personal Comments, Prepared for visit by Post Medieval Archaeology Society to Bedford (Observations and Comments). SBD10977.

In the second half of the C17 John Aubrey thought this house "curious".
In 1720 Danie [l?] Defoe described it as "a noble and magnificent palace".
On the other hand later in the C18 Horace Walpole considered "it is the worst contrived dwelling I ever saw".
More recently Sir Nokolaus Pevsner has described Houghton House as "a mysterious building, and the last word has certainly not yet been said about its date or dates and its architectural history."
And who am I to contradict Pevsner - it certainly is mysterious and I'm afraid you're not going to get the last word from me.
There is a complete lack of documentation for the building of the house and this has given endless opportunities for speculation about the architects involved and the possible dates of construction. All I can do is present a resumé of these speculations and leave you to look at the building and make your conclusions.
Houghton House was built as a Jacobean hunting lodge, hence its relatively small size. At the beginning of James I's reign both Ampthill Park and here at Dame Allensbury Park where Houghton stands, were in royal hands. And like his Tudor predecessors James I came to hunt in Ampthill Park.
In 1615 the king granted Dame Ellensbury Park to Mary Herbert, Dowager Countess of Pembroke. She had been a leading light of Queen Elizabeth I's court and a great patron of the arts and was the sister of the poet, Sir Philip Sidney. It's generally believed that she was responsible for building Houghton House but we will consider this in a moment. The Countess died in 1621 and her son soon surrendered the property to the crown.
About 1630 Houghton passed to Thomas Lord Bruce, later Earl of Elgin. His son, Robert, Earl of Ailesbury succeeded him after the restoration and he lived here sumptuously and probably carried out some improvements and this was probably the hey-day of the house's life.
In 1685 Thomas Earl of Ailesbury succeeded his father but he was a staunch supporter of James II and went into exile with the King in 1688 and lived out his days abroad.
His heir who never lived here sold Houghton in 1738 to the 4th Duke of Bedford. The Duke's eldest son, the Marquess of Tavistock, occupied Houghton in 1764 but 3 years later he died tragically in a hunting accident. The Earl of Upper Ossory, who also owned Ampthill Park House across the road, briefly took out the tenancy of Houghton but it then remained empty for about 20 years, one of the drawbacks being that it had virtually no land attached to it. So in 1794 the Duke ordered the house to be unroofed and dismantled.
Various internal fittings were dispersed to other local buildings: for example, the staircase of 1688 with twisted balusters is now in the Swan Hotel, Bedford, then being built for the Duke. The early C18 gates we've seen in Church Street, Ampthill, and there is a garden temple in Avenue House, Ampthill. However, contrary to what appears on the information panels here, the Haynes Grange Room now in the Victoria and Albert Museum did not come from Houghton but almost certainly from another Bedfordshire house, Chicksands Priory.
Houghton became a picturesque ivy covered ruin until in the 1920s it was feared that the owner might pull it down or alternatively the whole building might be shipped off to America. Sir Albert Richardson started a fund in 1927 and 2 years later it was purchased for the public. In 1935 the Ministry of Works took it over and began preservation work. It is now in the core of English Heritage.
Finally I should say that whilst John Bunyan may well have glimpsed this house, there is absolutely no evidence that this is the model for the "House Beautiful" in his Pilgrims Progress. Indeed this so-called tradition only goes back as far as 1891 when the Revd A.J. Foster published a book on the supposed topography of Pilgrims Progress. In fact, Bunyan's book is clearly an imaginative spiritual journey told in allegorical form and based on his own spiritual wrestlings. It has no need to be based on local or indeed any other topography.
Now we turn to the difficult part - the building itself, it's built on a slightly modified H-plan and when complete would have been very tall in comparison with its relatively small ground-plan: 65ft high as compared with 123 feet long and only 75 feet wide. Nevertheless it has other affinities with great Jacobean prodigy houses, in particular Aston Hall, Birmingham [1618-35] and Holland House, London [1606-1607] both believed to be the work of John Thorpe and he seems the most likely candidate as the architect of the main house, particularly as we know he made plans in 1606 for restoring Ampthill Castle for James I.
However, the main decorative features on the north, west and south-fronts have straight joints to the main house indicating there are later additions. Of these Pevsner says that they "are impossible for 1615 and point unmistakably to a date about 1635-45 or so". However apparently what Pevsner didn't notice is that the heraldic symbols still on the west loggia refer to the Dudley and Sidney families and the Countess of Pembroke was a Sidney while her mother was a Dudley. You will remember that she died in 1621 so the assumption is that this loggia and the northern one must date from her time or very shortly after. It seems most unlikely that the Bruces would have adorned one of the most prominent features of the building with the heraldry of a previous owner rather than their own.
If then these 2 loggias date from 1615-21 then as John Harris says such accomplished classical additions at this date could only have been designed by Inigo Jones. And indeed the Countess of Pembroke who was the mother of 2 Earls of Pembroke for whom Jones worked at Wilton House and was also a friend of Lord Arundel who was Jones' close companion on his second trip to Italy and his leading architectural patron. Furthermore, the Houghton loggias show an intimate knowledge of Palladio, of his buildings at first hand rather than his published drawings.
Yet how is that a fairly conservative Jacobean house should have such advanced classical features. It is, of course, possible that the Countess began in 1615 by employing a more conservative court architect and then got Jones in to add some Italianate touches. It has also been suggested that a more likely explanation is that the house was actually begun for King James by Thorpe when he came in 1606 and that when the Countess acquired the property in 1615 she immediately called in Jones, recently returned from his second Italian visit.
Turning to the south entrance front there are a number of features which are unexpected on a Jacobean house. One or two remaining windows have pediments. The porch is a projecting 3-storey central tower. The doorway has a gigantic triple key block carrying a segmental pediment. Altogether the porch is and was very mannerist in style, showing some learning but hardly the work of a classical master. It seems to be the work of the Bruces sometime in the mid C17. The south door leads straight intot eh halla nd the room behind leads straight out to the nrothern loggia, a very early abandonment of the traditional great hall and screams passage arrangement although there are parallels at Aston Hall (1618) and other Thorpe designs.
Incidentally the stone dressings are of Totternhoe stone a very hard form of chalk known as clunch which was quarried at Totternhoe near Dunstable in the south of the county. As you can see it weathers very badly. The dark red brick is typically Jacobean and would have been made here in Ampthill.
On the west front we can see some diaperwork to the south of the central loggia. On the frieze of the loggia you can see the Bear & Ragged Staff, and the Lion Rampant, both heraldic devices of the Dudleys (and also the pheon or arrowhead of the Dudleys). The loggia originally consisted of two open hexastyle colonnades with a pedimented tetrastylic attic. The colonnades being progressively Doric, Ionic and Corinthian. All that survives is the ground-floor Doric colonnade. You'll notice that this is in amuch better state of preservation than the rest of the stonework, it being of better quality limestone than Totternhoe Stone. Notice that very slight difference in the spacing of the columns - the centre ling is marginally the widest the, the outermost are a little narrower and the ones between are narrowest of all. This is a device used by Palladio on several of his villas, but would not be perceptible from studying the elevations illustrated in his Four Books of Architecture. All the signs therefore point to Inigo Jones as the designer.
The north loggia originally consisted of a two-storey 2-bay arcaded loggia with attached columns, the surviving Doric, while those above were Ioninc and the design is based closely on Palladio's Conventa Dalla Canta at Venice which Jones visited twice. The middle arch is narrower than the center ones. The piers and spandrels of the arcade are constructed with very finely ribbed bricks only 2 inches thick with the mortar barely 1/8 inch thick. If the date 1615-21 is correct then this is by far the earliest example of ribbed red brick in England.
I must say this worries me and in spite of all that's been said I have a sneaking suspicion that perhaps at the end of the day old Pevsner isn't so far from the truth and that these are considerably later additions.

<25> Luton News/Gazette, Old house a monument to apathy; 5th December 1985 (Newspaper Article). SBD11109.

As I walked along the drive towards Houghton House I felt an overwhelming sense of loss. Two hundred years of apathy has caused yet another part of our heritage to fall into ruin and decay. Situated some two miles north of Ampthill, this lesser-known property was built for Mary Countess of Pembroke in 1615. It remained in use for just over 180 years and changed hands several times following her death seven years after it was completed.
Over the next century the house was the seat of the Earl of Elgin and his son the Earl of Ailesbury, later becoming the property of the Duke of Bedford. The continual changing of hands did certainly have an effect upon its eventual demise.
The Bedford family, the last owners of the house, used it as a residence for their heir to the Woburn Estate, the then Marquess of Tavistock, and while he was resident, bit by bit, items of value were removed. Wall panelling has since found its way to the Victoria and Albert Museum and a valuable staircase was taken and put into the Swann Inn public house in Bedford.
By 1797 the Bedford family had completely disassociated themselves from the house. Since then the house has not been lived in and a great deal of apathy has meant that one of Britain's better examples between the pragmatic renaissance of the Elizabethans and the classical work inspired by Inigo Jones has been denied a leading place in our heritage.
Despite being so exposed to the elements the house remained fairly well preserved - most of the outer walls are still standing although much of the fine stone work has been destroyed by the weather. The building was neglected until 1923 when a proposal was put forward to sell the ruins piece by piece.
There was such an uproar at this suggestion that a group of preservationists rallied round in an attempt to save the house. The new society included such eminent people as Professor A.E. Richardson, S.H Whitbread, Dr Herbert Fowler and members of the Bedford Arts Club.
The only way to describe their work is to say, well at least they tried. Their efforts were rather uncoordinated and performed in an ad hoc manner. They were not able to raise very much money to put towards restoration and little interest was expressed by the local residents.
However they did manage to prevent the demolition of the remains.
The sad saga of Houghton House then continued for a further ten years. Large parts of masonry continued to fall off and fine examples of plasterwork and cornices mysteriously disappeared. By 1933 a buyer was found and the house was turned over the the then Office of Works. Since then some restoration has been carried out, loose stonework has either been removed or made safe and access to the house has been made a lot easier with road signs and footpaths. Houghton House, such as it is, open to the public, there is no charge, and the visitor is able to walk through and around the ruins.
There is a small garden around the house and what is left of the Jacobean architecture can be taken in, along with a superb view of much of Bedfordshire. The story of Houghton House is certainly a sad one and yet, as if to make it worse, this is just one example of many such cases to be found in the county.

<26> Bedfordshire Times, House Beautiful of Bunyan's Progress; 25th Nov 1994 (Newspaper Article). SBD10544.

The featured building in our Through The Keyhole column this week is one which no longer has a lock to peek through. Houghton House is famous throughout the world as Bunyan's House Beautiful.
Commanding extensive views over the vale of Bedford, the ruins of Houghton House are a famous county fixture.
Isolated on the crown of a hill near Ampthill, this gem of Jacobean architecture has a rich history.
The house was built around the year 1615 for Mary, Countess of Pembroke, the gifted sister of famous poet Sir Philip Sidney, courtier and hero of Zatphen.
It was designed mainly as a nobleman's hunting seat and was not, therefore, of vast size - although it contained many rooms of elegant beauty, they were small.
But barely 180 years after its erection the mansion was unroofed and made a ruin, gutted and abandoned, left to the owls, the choking ivy and the trees that rooted themselves within its crimbling walls.
Now standing as a dramatic ruin, the property is conserved and run by English Heritage.
It had significant connections with John Bunyan 'the Immortal Tinker' who rose from humble origins to become one of the world's most widely read Christian writers.
He lived most of his life in and around Bedford and records show that he visited the house to make and repair cooking utensils.
The ancient monument is the House Beautiful that Christian calls at in the book Pilgrim's Progress. A passage reads: "and many of them meeting him at the threshold of the house said, 'Come in, thou blessed of the lord; this house was built by the Lord of the Hill on purpose to entertain such pilgrims in'."
Looking south from the visitor's car park at Houghton House it is possible, on a clear day, to see the Chilterns. These hills, or Delevtable Mountains, were pointed out to Christina the day he left House Beautiful.
The house's majestic staircase and some of the panelling, which was built for occupant Thomas Bruce, later Earl of Elgin, has been incorporated into the Swan Inn in Bedford.
An inscription above the staircase tells visitors of Houghton's famous occupants. It reads: "As you tread this stairway, you pass where the feet of England's great and fair once trod."
In 1738 the estate was bought by the Duke of Bedford and in 1764 his son, the Marquis of Tavistock lived there with his wife. But three years later tragedy struck the young Marquis who died after a hunting accident.
For a short time the Earl of Upper Ossory occupied the mansion. After his heir's fatal accident the Duke of Bedford could not bring himself to take any further interest in the place, and when the Earl moved into Ampthill Park in the time of the fifth Duke, Houghton House was unroofed and dismantled.

<27> Bedfordshire County Council, 1970 - 2000s, HER Photograph Archive, No refs; 1997 (Photograph). SBD10506.

Two colour images, one of Hougthon Hall from afar, the other of the interior of part of the building.

<28> English Heritage, Notification of Scheduling, or an Affirmation or Revision of Scheduling, 2nd April 1996 (Scheduling record). SBD12102.

Notification of revision to Scheduled area (original map attached)

<29> Discover Bedfordshire, No 11, Winter 2006/07; p. 16; Houghton House repairs complete (Article in serial). SBD11200.

Major repair work to the ruins of Houghton House has been completed, with the early 17th century hunting lodge which overlooks the Vale of Bedford also being provided with new interpretation panels which tell its story.
English Heritage funded the £282,000 scheme, which has been sympathetically carried out to ensure the character of the house is not lost. Jeff Dyer, Projects Manager for English Heritage in the East of England, said: "Houghton House had reached the point where a major overhaul was required to the ruins. Overzealous replacement work can lead to loss of character and yet insufficient works may lead to permanent loss of the historic fabric and thus a significant devaluing of what should be preserved for future generations.
"We believe we have got the balance just about right, and in the process have generated an interesting contrast between the original building fabric and the new."
Houghton House dates from the early 17th century and contains rare examples of early Palladian architecture in Britain. The house was reputed to be the model for the "House Beautiful" in John Bunyan's The Prilgrim's Progress.
By the late 18th century the house was surplus to its owner's requirements and was essentially abandoned until 1923 when it was purchased by the Bedford Arts Club. However, the cost of consolidating the ruin led to Houghton House being taken into guardianship in 1935. It is now maintained by English Heritage.
Drawing on extensive archive material and research undertaken by Olicai Buck, Properties Presentation Assistant for English Heritage, new interpretation panels have been installed providing an up-to-date presentation of the site.
Sarah Tatham, Interpretation Officer for English Heritage, said: "Using 18th-century paintings of the house and a specially commissioned drawing which reconstructs its interior, the panels help visitors to appreciate the elegant design of the hosue, drawing attention to its innovative architecture and the significance of the surrounding landscape.
"The panels explain how the house was commissioend by Mary Herbert, the Dowager Countess of Pembrike, and how James I honoured her with a visit soon after completion; as well as the changes made by subsequent owners."
The new interpretation scheme at Houghton House was undertaken as part of a new project seeking to imprive interpretation at free and unstaffed sites throughout the country. Houghton is one of 50 sites that will benefit from this three-year programme. Houghton House is situated eight miles south of Bedford and is open all year. Admission to the site is free.

<30> Bedfordshire Magazine, Vol 1, pp. 85 (Serial). SBD10543.

Image of Houghton House prior to being dismantled. Reference to the Bruce family living there.

<31> Bedfordshire Magazine, Vol 1, pp. 169-174; The Mansion of the Fair; The story of Houghton House - I (Serial). SBD10543.

About the year 1615, a stately house was built on the heights near Ampthill. Its situation was one of considerable beauty, commanding extensive views over the vale of Bedford in the north and the Icknield Way to the south. Isolated on the crown of the hill, this gem of Jacobean architecture was one of the glories of Bedfordshire. In the valley below lay the village of Houghton Conquest, with its lovely church of All Saints.
But barely a hundred and eighty years after its erection the mansion was unroofed and made a ruin, gutted and abandoned, left to the owls, the choking ivy, and the trees that rooted themselves within its crumbling walls.
The house was built for Mary, Countess of Pembroke, the gifted sister of the famous Sir Philip Sydney, poet, courtier and hero of Zutphen. It was designed mainly as a nobleman's hunting seat and was not, therefore, of vast size; although it contained many rooms of elegant beauty, they were small.
Its plan is of considerable interest in that it illustrates the development from Elizabethan mansions. There is no inner court, usual at that time, although it follows the old arrangement of a hall uniting the living room and service quarters. Altogether it is estimated that there were about forty rooms.
In plan the house was a solid rectangle, some 120 feet by 75 feet, brick built with stone facings, with high square towers at the four corners. The many windows of Elizabethan and Jacobean style provided splendid views of the Bedfordshire countryside in all directions.
There were three storeys with basement quarters in which were spacious cellars and vaults. The steeply pitched roofs, the gilded pinnacles of the towers, and the ornamented chimneys, combined to given an impression of grace and splendour.
The architect is said to have been John Thorpe (working 1570-1618), who was associated with such magnificent mansions as Burleigh House, Montacute, Kirby Hall and Holland House. Certainly, Thorpe was working on Toddinton Manor about that time. Authorities declare, however, that he had not the experience or knowledge to accomplish the fine west front and the centre of the north front. A straight joint which exists between the loggias and the main walls of the building on these fronts suggests that it separated the work of two architects, and it is thought that Lady Pembroke, not finding Thorpe's plain design to her liking, obtained the services of Inigo Jones, the renowned master who brought the first purely classical architecture to England, to embellish the exterior.
Before the time of Inigo Jones, work in the Italian manner had been sprawling and florid, but the great architect had studied Palladio's methods in Italy in 1613-14 and brought to his own designs the refinement and elegance of the best Italian work. The north front shows the influence of the Italian master. Indeed, in 1650, when the house was only thirty-five years old, John Aubrey, the antiquarian, stated that it had been built by Italians. There is a resemblance to Pallasio's Covnent della Carita at Venice, which he built in the manner of an old Roman palace. The pediment, portico and super-structure form a loggia of fine design. The bricks used are unique and unusually small.
The west front was remarkable for the Doric columns and the frieze bearing heraldic devices of the Sydney and Dudley families, including the Porcupine, the Pheon (iron head of a dart), the Ragged staff (knotted stick with short stumps of branches), and the Lion. Some of these devices can still be seen.
The Pheon persists to this day as the broad arrow used to denote government property, a custom which originated when Sir Henry Sydney (1641-1704), who was created Earl of Romney by William III, used his personal crest to stamp property for which he was responsible as Master of the Ordnance.
Inigo Jones may have been employed by Lady Pembrike's son, as he is believed to have completed the house after her death. The Bruces, who came into possession of it between 1623 and 1630, may have employed him too. Some portion of the stabling is attributed to him, but work apparently stopped abruptly for there are only a few stalls fro his supposed design. Their rails, mangers and posts are remarkable; so also is the brick cornice.
The south and east fronts of the house were plainer than the others. In the centre of the south front was a tower and in this was the main entrance. The upper storeys were ornamented by balustrading, with a crown design. The east front looked on to the extensive domestic quarters, now almost entirely demolisdhed, which probably occupied the site of the comparatively modern farm-house nearby. No doubt masonry from the ruins was used to construct the farm house. There still existed a subterranean passage between the cellars of the house and those of the farm-house some fifty years ago.
The principal rooms appear to have faced north, where the vale of Bedford lies outspread for miles. The fireplaces were large, with cupboard spaces beside them, and the walls of amny rooms were broken by niches. There were turret rooms and many other interesting features. The marks of a fine staircase can still be seen on the walls. The floors would have been tiled and the rooms panelled; the ceilings would have been of decorated plaster-work. Pedimented doorways of fine proportions added dignity to the rooms.
The whole demsne was exceptionally well laid out. A long avenue of Spanish chestnut led to the main entrance from the south and avenues of elms stretched down the northern slopes. No traces of the once lovely pleasure gardens remain, but the walled kitchen garden can still be seen to the south and the Elizabethan farm buildings to the east. Many years ago, the late Miss Isabel Barton, of Ampthill, noted that the Cornelian Cherry, the Cornus of the ancients, grew near the ruins in part of an old garden or bower. This tree is native to southern Europe and must have been brought from a foreign land to be planted at Houghton House. Although there is now no sign of the bower, the writer has been assured by the Missed Oldfield, members of the Natural History Society, that the cherry still flourishes and is gay with bloom every year.
Houghton House owes some of its more recent fame to the conjectural identification with John Bunyan's 'House Beautiful' of The Pilgrim's Progress. It has been supposed that Bunyan found his inspiration for the scenes he describes from the Bedfordshire landscape with which he was so familiar. The steep approach to Ampthill was thought to be his 'Hill Difficulty' and Bedfordshire's southern hills the 'Delectable Mountains.' All this can be little more than guess-work, but it makes a pleasant mental diversion, and the appellation 'House Beautiful' has attached itself very firmly to Houghton and vastly intrigues many visitors.
For some years, when close inspection of the crumbling walls became dangerous, the ruins were enclosed by a fence. When, about twenty years ago, the Bedford Arts Club, at the instigation of Professor A. E. Richardson, initiated a fund to acquire and preserve the remains of the house form further deterioration, great interest was aroused. Many generous subscriptions were received and the ruins were purchased. Finally, the Ancient Monuments department of the Ministry of Works took over the property and restoration began in 1936.
The shell of the fine Jacobean country seat now stands cleared of trees and ivy. In spite of encroaching industrialization in the valley below and the distant sight of brickfields and the airfield at Cardington, the atmosphere of past centuries clings to the mellowed walls. Finely-cut turf carpets the floors and the sun shines into the deserted tooms. With imagination we can picture the colourful company which once moved up the great avenue towards the house. Now all is silent, save for the lapwing's plaintive cry and the subdued form of traffic on the main road to Bedford, some distance away.
The story of the rise and fall of Houghton House, and of its notable occupants, will be told in subsequent articles.

<32> Bedfordshire Magazine, Vol 1, pp. 209-216; Proud dwelling desolate; The story of Houghton House - II (Serial). SBD10543.

The demesne of Houghton House lies partly in the parish of Ampthill and partly in Houghton Conquest. The park was fomerly known as Dame Ellensbury Park, after Dame Alianor, second wife of Sir Almaric de St. Amand, whose family were great crusaders. They owned much land in Bedfordshire in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.
It is probable that the Manor of Houghton was divided between two daughters in earlier mediaeval times. The manor owned by the St. Amands would have been the second moiety, later called Dame Ellen's Biry. It has been suggested that Dame Ellen's residence was on the site of Houghton House. She was a courageous woman and ruled her demesne with a firm hand. As a yound widow she petitioned Parliament for redress against Lord Grey de Ruthyn of Wrest, the Lord High Admiral of England, for trespass.
The St. Amands' manor passed to Lord Fanhope of Ampthill Castle in 1430, although it appears that Dame Ellen retained the park until she died in 1467. Eventually the park passed to the Crown, and Sir Edmund Conquest was the keeper when King James I paid a visit to the Conquest Bury in 1605.
In the king's entourage was the young Earl of Pembroke. On the Feast of St James, the king attended Houghton church in state. The rector, Dr. Archer, amused the king and his court by his artful choice of text for his sermon. Guy Faux's Gunpoweder Plot had recently been exposed and the rector preached from the text: 'Take us the foxes, the little foxes that spoil the vines.' The king was very fond of hunting, particularly in such wooded districts as Ampthill Park, a favourite haunt of Henry VIII for the same reason. No doubt yound Pembrike notice dthe king's pleasure in his surroundings and suggested the district to his morther, the gifted Dowager Countess,, as a site for a residence.
It is thought that she tried to persuade James I to rebuild the lodge or capital mansion in Ampthill Park so that she could live there, but although 'Ampthill Old House' was enlarged for the king by John Thorpe (the Exchequer paid his bill for 370 8s. 8d. In 1606), it seems that the keeper of the park and not the Countess became the tenant.
At length, through Sir Edmund Conquest, the Countess obtained Dame Ellensbury Park, holding it under the Crown. The manor, however, remained separate until the Bruces united it with the park in 1630. Here, on a magnificent site, she built Houghton House - described in our first article - a superb example fo Jacobean architecture and one of Bedfordshire's glories. The architect is thought to have been John Thorpe, but the Palladian influence and masterly skill of the north and west fronts suggests the work of Inigo Jones, the renowned architect who brought the first pure classical architecture to this country.
The Countess of Pembrike intended that her younger son, the Earl of Montgomery, should succeed to the desmesne she had planned so wonderfully, but he took little interest in it and after her death surrendered it to the king.
He granted it to the Bruces, then living at Abbots Langley in Hertfordshire, who had been great supporters of his claim to the English throne. The hey-day of Houghton was during its occupation by this famous family, when it was known as Ampthill House. The portrait of the first wife of Thomas Bruce, later Earl of Elgin, may show the the interior of Houghton - if so, it is the only known representation.
An inventory of the mansion made in 1728 discloses that there were two halls at that time, one a 'boarded hall' - the reference is no doubt to panelling. A long gallery containing thirty-nine pictures is mentioned. Such galleries, often running the whole length og one side of the house, were customary in mansions of the period and were often the setting for such formal dances as the Sir Roger the Coverley.
The Bruces added another staircase which has been attributed to Sir Christopher Wren, whose assistant, Hawksmoor, is known to have vistied Ampthill.
In 1738 the estate was bough tby the Duke of Bedford and in 1764 his son, the Marquis of Tavistock, took up residence there with his bride. Sir William Chambers (1729-1796) had been engaged to supervise the alterations and renovations and he beautified the west wing.
Three years later tragedy came upon the young Marquis, who died after a hunting accident. For a short time the Earl of Upper Ossory occupied the mansion, which in 1784 was described as a noble and venerable pile, furnished with great elegance, and having gardens laid out with taste and magnificence.
After his heir's fatal accident the Duke of Bedford could not bring himself to take any further interest in the place, and when the Earl moved to Ampthill Park in the time of the fifth Duke, Houghton House was unroofed and dismantled. The Hon. John Byng, in his famous diary, gives an eye-witness account of the destruction:
'For thee - poor Houghton House - I must lament,' he writes. 'Herein were labourers employed to level thy strong built walls: Down go the floors: Crash fell the rafters; the overseer came forth to wonder at my overseeing - but he felt the delight of a butcher at killing a sheep. (B) So I see you are hard at work here? (O) Yes Sir, it is hard work for it is so strongly built. (B) Did you find anything curious? (O) Some coins Sir - and much painting upon the wall when we ripp'd off the wainscot. (B) That of course you attempted to preserve? And before that the D. of B. had accurate drawings taken from them? (O) No. They were beaten to pieces. (B) I remember a room wainscoted with cedar. What became of that? (O) Thrown amongst the other rubbish. (B) I see that his Grace is felling all the old timber. (O) Yes, his Grace is making a fine fall, and this avenue, Sir, a mile in length, will come down in the autumn. F. grinn'd anger and contempt.'

But Byng did not like the Duke of Bedford and it is possible that those in charge sold material and fittings without the knowledge of the Duke. Scattered about Bedfordshire - and elsewhere - are many items which are said to have once contributed to the grace and beauty of Houghton House.
The magnificent Bruce staircase and some of the panelling were incorporated into the Swan Inn at Bedford as rebuilt by the Duke, who is said to have employed Holland for the work. An inscription above the staircase tells visitors of Houghton's famous occupants:
'As you tread this stairway, you pass where the feet of England's great and fair once trod.'

It is generally believed that the interior as well as the exterior bore evidence fo the hand of Inigo Jones. For instance, the lovely panelled 'Haynes Grange Room' at the Victoria and Albert Museum has been claimed not only as originating from the hand of Inigo Jones but also from Houghton House. Its story is interesting. According to local tradition, a recluse member of the Carteret family of Haynes Park had a special room prepared for his own use in Haynes Grange, an ancient H-shaped farmhouse not many miles from Houghton, noted for its fine staircase. Little was known of this chamber, beautifully panelled in fine classical style, until Sir Algernon Osborn, of Chicksands, decided to sell it in 1908. It was bought by a dealer and two years later installed in a house at Notting Hill. In 1928 the rom was again offered for sale and Professor A. E Richardson made an appeal to purchase it for the nation. £4,000 was raised ina few weeks and the room was presented ot the Victoria and Albert Museum.
Mr Clifford Smith, in the Museum's handbook to the room, attributes it to Jones because of its masterly design and classical detail in the manner of Palladio and Serlio. The ceiling differs from any known English plaster-work. It is decorated in relief with pigeon in flight, their feathers blue and their bills and feet picked out in red. The lovely amber pinewood panelling is unpainted, and consequently unspoiled.
Above the mantelpiece is a Latin verse, its sentiment unusual for elegaic verse, carved in relief in Roman lettering. As translated in Mr Smith's book it reads:
Live thou for others, to thyself be dead
And let they Life be by the spirit fed.
Let house and home and body be thy vaults
Lest from them strength be given to thy faults.
So daily dying, Life shall endless be,
And Death, that others dread, be kind to thee.

The order used is pure Corinthian, except for the frieze, and the room has some affinities with Jones' Double Cube Room at Wilton, the home of the Earls of Pembroke. Local craftsmen are supposed to have been responsible for the strapwork, surprising in combination with purely classical moulding.
The attribution of the room to Houghton Park House before its erection at Haynes Grange is open to some doubt . There are other houses from which it might have come - for example, the Hillersdon mansion at Elstow; it is also worth noting that pine, not at all common in England, is a feature of the Jacobean panelling at Culross, the Scottish home fo the Bruces. The unusual design of the ceiling seems to point to foreign workmansip. It has not been possible to relate its dimensions with certainty to any room at Houghton although some authorities have suggested that the room was in the eastern part of the house, now almost entirely demolished; but it is unlikely that so fine a room would have been installed in the front that looked directly on the domestic offices.
Byng speaks of a room 'wainscotted with cedar'. It is on record that there was a second 'Ceadar closet' also in the time of the Bruce family, bit it is unlikely that either is connected with the Haynes Grange Room.The 1728 inventory notes 'My Lord's Studdy in ye Garden,' where the Earls of Ailesbury pursued their studies and wrote their memoirs in the seventeenth century. In the grounds of Avenue House, Ampthill, the home of Professor Richardson, stands a beautiful panelled garden temple which may have come from the same site. It is said to have been purchased for Lord Tavistock. Scratched on one of the windowpanes are the initials 'J.W.S.' and the date '69'. The design of the temple is attributed to Sir William Chambers, who is also though to be responsible for a gateway and screen of exceptional merit, flanked by elegant pillars and vases, which front a small Georgian house in Church Street. These, too, are considered to have come from Houghton. Inside the house are finely carved mantelpieces, possibly from the same source.
Some twenty years ago, a quantity of Jacobean panelling was discovered in the lumber room of an old Ampthill inn. This, again, was assumed to have come from Houghton House.
But much of this is conjecture - perhaps too little has been allowed for the taste of the wealthier inhabitants of the little town and the skill of the craftsmen they empliyed.
The overseer Byng interviewed was not strictly truthful, for an undoubted relic from Houghton was a mural painting of James I as an archer, which was skilfully removed from the walls and mounted on canvas; it was to be seen at Ampthill Park in the time of Lord Holland.
A large 'Act of Parliament' or tavern clock, said to have belonged to the Bruces, is to be seen in Ampthill today. The clock that the famous Thomas Tompion is known to have repaired for the Bruces when they were at Houghton was probably a more elaborate example.
A Jacobean chair from the dining hall, the property of Col. Wingfield, was shown with many sketches and prints of Houghton House, both in its pride and in its ruin, at an exhibition at Ampthill House some years ago.
A reconstruction form a sketch by R. C. Stratfold, from elevations in the possession of Lord Holland, admirably reproduces the seventeenth century atmosphere. Perhaps the finest painting of the ruins, show in many features which later crumbled away, was made by David Cox in the early years of the nineteenth century.

<33> Bedfordshire Magazine, Vol 1, pp. 261-266; A noble company; The story of Houghton House - III (Serial). SBD10543.

The rise and fall of Houghton House, the lovely Jacobean Mansion erected in a splendid position on the hills near Ampthill, Mary, Countess of Pembroke, has told in two earlier articles. This account of its notable occupants begins with its builder.

Mary, Countess of Pembroke: Mary Sydney was the daughter of Sir Henry Sydney, Lord Deputy of Ireland and later President of the Welsh Marches. Her mother was Lady Mary Dudley, daughter of the Duke of Northumberland, sister of Robert, Earl of Leicester, and sister-in-law of the ill-fated Lady Jane Grey. She was born at Tickenhill Palace in Worcestershire in 1561. The Sydneys had been granted Penshurst Palace, in Kent, by Edward VI, and they also resided at Ludlow Castle. The family were great favourites of Queen Elizabeth, who called Philip, Mary's brother, the brightest jewel in her crown. Both brother and sister were often at court.
At sixteen, Mary Sydney married the wealthy and powerful Henry Herbert, Earl of Pembrike, some thirty years her senior. Her married life was said to be unhappy and, with her brilliant and charming brother as frequent companion at Wilton, she turned her attention to intellectual pursuits. After Sir Philip's death at Zurphen in 1585 she published his works. Learned, beautiful and good, the Countess befriended many struggling poets, and Shakespeare himself, who was her son's friend, is supposed to have referred to her in his sonnets. Inscribed on the notable portrait of her attributed to Gheeraedts are the words 'No Spring till now,' which may allude to the Sonnets and 'The lovely April of her prime.'
The Sydneys had formed a gifted circle around themselves at Penshurst, and Lord Pembrike, unpleasant character though he was, was intensely interested in the arts. He helped young Inigo Jones, the clothweaver's sone who later became famous as a classical architect and to whom many authorities attribute the embellishments of Houghton House. Perhaps Lady Pembrike wished Houghton to resemble on eof the dream-palaces in her beloved brother's Arcadia, and engaged the brilliant Inigo Jones to accomplish her desire.
The many portraits of her which exist show her to have been charming in appearance; as a young woman her amber-coloured hair framed her face in a auriole of rich gold.
In 1621 she entertained James I at Houghton, and in that year also, at her London home, she died. Her works are in the British Musuem. With her brother she translated the Psalms into 'Divers and Sundry Kindes of Verse.'
There is no monument over her resting-place in Salisbury Cathedral, but for her Ben Jonson wrote the famous epitaph quoted at the head of this account, to which William Browne added a second stanze:
Marble piles let no man raise
To her name for after days;
Some kind woman, born, as she
Reading this, like Biobe
Shall turn marble and become
Both her mourner and her tomb.

The Bruces: This renowned Scottish family, who followed the Countess of Pembrike at Houghton House, were great favourites of James I.
Descended from a de Brus who came over with the Conqueror and was granted land at Whorlton and Tanfield in Yorkshire, they eventually became lords of Annandate in Scotland. Edward Bruce conquered Ulster and became King of Ireland in 1316. Robert Bruce claimed the Scottish crown; his son reigned as David II and his grandson as Robert II of Scotland. Edward, Lord Bruce of Kinloss, was granted the dissolved Abbey of Culross after he had helped James VI of Scotland to secure the English throne. He also became Master of the Rolls. The park of Houghton was given to the Bruces between 1623 and 1627 and in 1630 they obtained the Manor also. In 1633 the Earldom of Elgin was conferred upin Thomas Bruce; he had held the crown lease of Ampthill Park and was Seneschal of the Royal Manor of Ampthill, an hereditary office the family held for a hundred years. Lord Elgin's son became also Earl of Ailesbury and Viscount Bruce of Ampthill. He was the Lord Lieutenant of Bedfordshire and Member of Parliament fo the county.
The first Lord Elgin's sister, Christian, who married William Cavendish, Earl of Devonshire, gained fame for her unswerving devotion to the king's cause. After the Battle of Worcester she retired to Houghton House, but never ceased her activities. Cromwell ordered her arrest but she managed to evade capture. In her charm and strength of character she resembled the Countess of Pembroke, whose son, inheriting some of the Sydney talent, composed a book of verse in her praise. There are remains of a fine monument to her memory in the Cathedral Church at Derby.
Her nephew, Robert Bruce, Earl of Ailesbury and Elgin, who was a learned and cultured man, was one of the member deputed to invite King Charles to return in 1660. He was instrumental in conveying the regranted charter to the Bedford Corporation on 1684, and for his services they made him Recorder, Steward and Town Clerk! Shortly before his death in 1685 he was Lord Chamberlain to the King.
His son, Thomas Bruce, Earl of Ailesbury and Elgin, was Lord Lieutenant of Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire, a high Tory and an ardent supporter of James II. He must have been very mortified when Lord Asburnham, a great Whig and a promoter of the Revolution and supporter of the claims fo William of Orange, took up residence at Ampthill Park. They were immediately at loggerheads and Ashburnham went so far as to erect a gallery pew over the Bruce manor pew in Ampthill Church. A furious dispute tool place and in 1696, after his wife's death, the Jacobine Earl went into self-exile abroad. He married again in Brussels to a young girl of the hosue of Argenteau. But he never returned to 'that beautiful habitationw with all its appurtenances, that I doated on,' and died in Brussels in 1741. Other Bruces succeeded him at Houghton until the mansion was sold to the Duke of Bedford in 1738.
In 1837 the second Marquis of Ailesbury married Lady Mary Herbert, daughter of the eleventh Earl of Pembroke and thus united a direct descendent of the Bruces with a descendent of the gracious lady for whom Houghton House was built.

The Marquis of Tavistock: This favoured young man, heir to the fourth Duke of Bedford, was born in 1729. On leaving Cambridge he took up many country interests - the Militia, farming and country pursuits - and became M.P. for Bedfordshire at the age of 23. In 1764 he married Lady Elizabeth Keppel, daughter of the Earl of Albermarle, and the young couple began an ideal married life at Houghton House.
Barely three years later came tragedy. Lord Tavistock died as the result of an accident whilst out with the Redbourn Hunt. His widow was inconsolable; a younger son was born to her after her husband's death, but gradually she pined away and died in 1768.

The Earl of Upper Ossory: For a short time, the famous sporting peer, John Fitzpatrick, Earl of Upper Osspry, occupied Houghton House - the last person to live there before it was dismantled in 1794. He had been a friend of Francis Russell, Lord Tavistock, and was a patron of the arts and a minor poet. Sir Joshua Reynolds visited him at Ampthill and painted his portrait and when the famous artist died he was one of the bearers at the funeral. Horace Walpole was a frequent visitor after the Earl moved from Houghton to Ampthill Park. He was Member of Parliament for the county for twenty-eight years and Lord Lieutenant for fotry-eight years.

The last days: Rumour has it that, as a ruin, the mansion was used to house sufferers during the severe smallpox epidemic during the nineteenth century.
Some years afo the eleventh Duke of Bedford presented the Lordship fo the Manor of Houghton Conquest, including Dame Ellensbury Manor and the Houghton Ruins, to Sir Anthony Wingfield, of Ampthill House. And by a curious coincidence, Sir Anthony's ancester, another Sir Anthony Wingfield, was the executor of the will of Sir Philip Sydney, the famous brother of Mary, Countess of Pembroke.

'All houses wherein men have lived are haunted houses.' Those who contemplate the ruined mansion may well pause and consider the parts its occupants played on the stage of history, not only in the county matters of Bedfordshire but in great affairs of state also.

<34> Correspondence, Letter from Luton Borough Council (Unpublished document). SBD10802.

A list of Watercolours in the Luton Museum collection of the House:
Artist: unknown
Title of works: south front of Houghton House
South Front (distant view) Houghton House
North Front Houghton House
North Front Houghton House
store: watercolour
dimension: width of all paintings; 56cm
dimension: length of all paintings; 42cm

Source: purchased

<35> Bedfordshire & Luton Archives and Records Service Documents (Unpublished document). SBD10551.

List of all illustrations of Houghton House held at the Record Office

<36> Bedfordshire & Luton Archives and Records Service Documents, Estate Map (Unpublished document). SBD10551.

Annotated by Angela Simco to show location of various features. Undated.

<37> Bedfordshire County Council, 1970 - 2000s, HER Photograph Archive, F903/34A-36A, 9th September 1992 (Photograph). SBD10506.

Colour images of exterior of building

<38> Bedfordshire County Council, HER Slide Archive, 1241-4; 2556; 3962; 5108; 6527-6543; 7060; 7371-7381; 7715-7718 (Slide). SBD10508.

Colour images of exterior of building

<39> Bedfordshire & Luton Archives and Records Service Documents, BLARS: X373/560 (Unpublished document). SBD10551.

Photo, 1930

<40> Country Life, 1922, 2nd Dec, pp. 744-747 (Article in serial). SBD10720.

[No info]

<41> Country Life, 1934, 8th Dec, pp. 614-819 (Article in serial). SBD10720.

[No info]

<42> Bedfordshire Magazine, Vol. 2, p. 282 (Serial). SBD10543.

[No info]

<43> Bedfordshire Magazine, Vol. 3, p. 175 (Serial). SBD10543.

David Cox's drawing of ruined Houghton House, Thomas Bruce's home at Ampthill. From 'The Life and Loyalties of Thomas Bruce' (Routledge and Kegan Paul)

<44> Bedfordshire Magazine, Vol 8, p. 276 (Serial). SBD10543.

[No info]

<45> Bedfordshire Magazine, Vol 11, p. 220 (Serial). SBD10543.

[No info]

<46> Bedfordshire Magazine, Vol 11, p. 337 (Serial). SBD10543.

Image of 'The Tuscan columns of Houghton House form the vale of Bedford. Probably built by Thomas Bruce, First Earl of Elgin soon after 1630, it was partly dismantled and allowed to fall into ruins 160 years later. The site is open to the public.

<47> Bedfordshire Magazine, Vol 13, pp. 73- 74 (Serial). SBD10543.

Image of the ruins of Houghton House. Also includes very brief history of Houghton House

<48> Bedfordshire Magazine, Vol 15, pp. 25 - 27; Preservation in the 1970s (Serial). SBD10543.

Article about local preservation scoieties, focussing on the efforts during the early 20th century to preserve Houghton House. Includes image of the west front of Houghton House from about 1920.

<49> Bedfordshire Magazine, Vol 16, p. 110 (Serial). SBD10543.

Image of the portico of Houghton House

<50> English Heritage, Plans, 1991 (Plan). SBD14255.

Houghton House - Information from a map of 1733. Originally produced for a tree planting proposal.

<51> Architectural History, Vol. 24, 1981, p. 21, note 60 (Bibliographic reference). SBD10596.

Mentions that John Newman drew the author's attention to use of ribbed brickwork on the north portico of Houghton House c1616-20, whereas Bomskill & Clifton Taylor 'English Brickwork' (1977) p 26 cite The Dutch House, Kew as first use of gauged (ribbed) brickwork in this country.

<52> Bedfordshire & Luton Archives and Records Service Documents, CRO: R1/36 (Unpublished document). SBD10551.

A Survey of part of Houghton Park in the Parishes of Ampthill & Houghton in the County of Bedford belonging to The Right Hon Charles Lord Bruce, Baron of Whorleton. By William Gardiner land surveyor, 1733

<53> Alan Cox, Personal Comments, ? From Beds Magazine Vol I, No 6, Autumn 1948 (Observations and Comments). SBD10977.

West front originally 3 superimposed open loggias with colonnades of 3 orders Doric, Ionic and Corinthian. Not Totternhoe stone but much better quality. North façade had a double arcaded loggia of 3 bays. Ground floor comprises recessed portico with 4 engaged Doric columns flanking arches and 2 more in return angles.
Thorpe enlarged Ampthill Old House for James I in 1606 and had something to do with Toddington Manor built in 1615.
Horace Walpole said of it "It is a bad and an inconvenient house within" and "it is the worst contrived dwelling I ever saw"
In 1711 he wrote "some say…that the two best fronts were improved by Inigo Jones."
Mary's son had close contact with Inigo Jones and he worked for the Earl of Pembroke at Woburn House.
Sometime after 1650 of Houghton John Aubrey wrote that "the architects were sent for from Italie".
Doubtful if Wren to whom staircase now in Swan Hotel is assigned or Chambers actually worked here.
4 plans in uncat. Russell Collection.
In 1720 Defoe described as a whole and magnificent palace. In late C17 John Aubrey thought it curious. The idea of the "House Beautiful" in Bunyans' Pilgrim's Progress only originates from Revd A. J. Fisher "Bunyan's Country: Studies in the Topography of Pilgrim's Progress" 1891.

Bear & Ragged Staff also Dudleys
Dudley - Or, a lion rampart, double queued vert
Sydney - Or, a pheon azure (arrowhead)
Herbert - Per pale azure and gules, three lions rampart, argent, a border, companée, or, and of the 2nd Bezantée.
M Randall Houghton House CRO: 130 Amp

In 1615 Mary Herbert, Dowager Countess of Pembroke granted Dame Ellensbury Park for life by James I. An outstanding number of Queen Elizabeth's court and great patron of the arts. Sister of Sir Philip Sydney and mother of 4th Earl of Pembroke. In September 1621, 2 months after entertaining the King at Houghton she died. Her son surrendered it to the crown.
Thomas Lord Bruce, later Earl of Elgin, next occupant. Son, Robert, Earl of Ailesbury succeeded him after. Restoration and from then until 1669 finest days of Houghton House where he lived sumptuously. Thomas succeeded his father in 1685 but went into exile in 1688 with James II. In 1738 his heir sold Houghton to 4th Duke of Bedford. Marquess of Tavistock occupied it in 1764 but 3 years later died tragically in a hunting accident. The Earl of Upper Ossory tenant for short time. Then remained empty for c. 20 years. Had no land with it and in 1794 Duke ordered house to be unroofed and dismantled. Then became a picturesque ruin. In 1920s feared that would be pulled down or shipped to America. Sir Albert Richardson started a fund in 1927 and 2 years later purchased for public. In 1935 Ministry of Works took it over and preservation work started the following year.
Built on modified H plan, when complete would have been very high in comparison with its width - 65 ft high, 123 feet long, 75 feet wide. Main building has affinities Blickling (1616-24), Aston Hall (1618-35) and Holland House (1606-07).
The turrets were surmounted by concave-sided pyramidal roofs which are similar to designs by John Thorpe, e.g. Wimbledon and Hooland House. Same range of brick but mainly deep red with some diaper decoration.
Piers and spandrels of N front arcade are constructed with very finely gauged orange bricks on 2ins high with mortar barely one eighth of an inch thick. Earliest example of ribbed brick in England.
Totternhoe clunch used for quoins, window and door surrounds, parapets, string-courses and tracery. Inside some unhewn local green sandstone.
Heraldry must fix completion or near completion to 1621 but clearly the deorative features of north, west and south fronts are straight-joints indicating addition to original.
So begun early 1600s with additions c.1619. South porch and towe above has unusual large keystone above the doorway crowned by segmental pediment exceptional for its date so is squared and of window opening above.

<54> Unknown, Photograph of unknown origin, Image No 9 (Photograph). SBD10631.

Black & white image captioned: Houghton House, built for Mary, Countess of Pembroke, before 1621. Classical detail is applied to this house which is still largely of medieval proportions, and which retains mullioned and transomed windows.

<55> Simon Houfe, 1975, Old Bedfordshire: a collection of 145 photographs, p. 10; image 3 (Bibliographic reference). SBD11507.

Houghton House, Ampthill, about 1860. The ruins of this traditional mansion of 1615 were a favourite picnic spot for the Victorians, its decay was rapid between this date and 1900.

<56> NMR/AMIE, HE NRHE Monument Inventory, 360024 (Index). SBD12367.

The ruined remains of Houghton House are located in the parish of Ampthill, Bedfordshire. It was constructed in around 1615 for Mary, Dowager Countess of Pembroke, to the designs of John Thorpe, comprising a mixture of Jacobean and Classical styles. The house was built to an H-plan design in Ampthill brick with quoins, and window moulding and other details in limestone. It stood to three storeys and although the roofs and most of the upper storey walls have since been removed, the remaining elevations provide a clear impression of its former appearance. It also had four corner turrets, which are considered to be an unusual feature for a house of this period. The remainder of the roof line terminated in triangular or Dutch-style gables. The main entrance to the house is via a porch within a tower in the centre of the south elevation, which in part survives to just below the roof line. The most impressive elevations, however, are to the north and west, with their open arcades of classical columns and, on the western façade, a carved frieze.

Alterations were carried out by Inigo Jones circa 1620 and subsequent work was by Wren and Chambers. In 1794 the Duke of Bedford ordered the house to be un-roofed and partially dismantled, with some items taken for reuse elsewhere. The main staircase was placed in the duke's new Swan Hotel in Bedford. The remaining structure was abandoned until 1923, when it was purchased with a view to preservation by the Bedford Arts Club. The necessary consolidation work proved to be extensive and in 1935 the ruin was taken into Guardianship by the Commissioners for His Majesty's Works and Public Buildings. Repairs and maintenance were begun by the Ministry of Works in 1938, and have since been continued by its successors, the Department of the Environment and English Heritage.
Viewfinder entry: DP070588 & PC08013

<57> English Heritage, Notification of Scheduling, or an Affirmation or Revision of Scheduling, 22/01/1996 (Scheduling record). SBD12102.

Houghton House was built to an H-plan design in Ampthill brick with quoins, window moulding and other details in limestone. Plans and illustrations from the late 18th and early 19th century show the building prior to the demolition work, when it stood to three storeys. Although the roofs and most of the third storey walls have since been removed, the remaining elevations provide a clear impression of its former appearance. The building had four corner turrets, which are considered to be an unusual feature for a house of this period. The remainder of the roof line terminated in triangular or Dutch-style gables. The main entrance is via a porch within a tower in the centre of the south elevation, which in part survives to just below the roof line. The most impressive elevations, however, are to the north and west, with their open arcades of classical columns and, on the western façade, a carved frieze.

In 1794 the Duke of Bedford ordered the house to be un-roofed and partially dismantled, with some items taken for reuse elsewhere. The main staircase was placed in the duke's new Swan Hotel in Bedford. The remaining structure was abandoned until 1923, when it was purchased with a view to preservation by the Bedford Arts Club. The necessary consolidation work proved to be extensive and in 1935 the ruin was taken into Guardianship by the Commissioners for His Majesty's Works and Public Buildings. Repairs and maintenance were begun by the Ministry of Works in 1938, and have since been continued by its successors, the Department of the Environment and English Heritage.

<58> English Heritage, various, The English Heritage visitors' handbook 1998 onwards, p. 115 (Bibliographic reference). SBD13269.

[No info]

<59> English Heritage, English Heritage website, http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/daysout/properties/houghton-house/> [accessed 22-DEC-2010] (Website). SBD13270.

Houghton House was built in around 1615 for Mary, Dowager Countess of Pembroke in a mixture of Jacobean and Classical styles. Please see website for more information on the history of Houghton House.

Protected Status:

• Archaeological Notification Area
• Archaeological Notification Area (AI) HER729: Houghton House (ruins of): Ampthill
• Listed Building (I) 600/3/1: Ruins of Houghton House, Houghton Park
• Scheduled Monument 1013522: Houghton House: a 17th century mansion and associated courtyard and formal garden remains

Monument Type(s):

• BUILDING (17th Century - 1600 AD to 1699 AD)

Associated Finds: None recorded

Associated Events

• EBD172 - An archaeological watching brief at Houghton House (Ref: 08/148)

Sources and Further Reading

Search results generated by the HBSMR Gateway from exeGesIS SDM Ltd.