Wollaton Hall, Nottingham

Before the milonga at Beeston I decided to visit Wollaton Hall, 15 minutes drive away. You can park in the deer park (£2 for up to 3 hours and £4 for the day).

I had done no research before visiting. Approaching the hall I thought it was a nineteenth century mock-up but it is an Elizabethan mansion, a “prodigy house” and apparently one of the most important Elizabethan mansions in England. 

On my way from the car to the hall I wandered into the stable block housing the cafe, shop and Nottingham Industrial Museum. I had skipped breakfast and it was lunchtime. The cafe was very family friendly but relaxed, serving good soup. The staff everywhere - in the cafe, in the shop particularly and in the museum were warm and informative. I wondered if that was the working culture of the hall or if it was a reflection of the local people more generally. The pleasant, helpful lady in the shop told me about the Lazy Daisy tea room (reservations only apparently) inside the hall. 

It seemed busy with many families and I did not have long. Someone at reception manually clicking in the numbers reckoned there would be about 2000 people that early Bank Holiday Monday in May which was probably busier than on a Sunday, but I had the sense not necessarily by much.

Entrance (in modern times)

Graham was one of the staff on reception. In response to his question I said I was interested in social, economic and political history. In fact Wollaton Hall is Nottingham’s natural history museum (free), with the Industrial museum (£2) in the grounds. 

Notwithstanding that the hall is not really a museum of any of the things that most interest me historically and I was there a scant two hours, the history of the building and the story of the early Willoughby family of some three to four hundred years ago quite captivated me. This despite that - the natural history collection apart - I felt more might have been made of the building itself, even largely stripped as it is. The interesting Siberechts painting, for instance showing the gardens in their golden age is wedged behind a glass cabinet with a life-size model of a former housekeeper. 

The Great Hall (and reception) was the most striking room I saw and is largely structurally unchanged since the hall was completed in 1588.  At that time a different entrance was used, I think a fireplace has moved and the heraldic shields were added in the nineteenth century but that is about all.

Great Hall

By John Whitehurst (1713-88)

Graham was experienced.  He captivated me immediately with a tale of the 6th Lord Middleton who had a pre-occupation with defending his property, which was justified - the hall was attacked by rioters in the 1830s. He told me at that time Nottingham was biggest slum in the Empire outside Calcutta. People came to work in the town, particularly lace workers. They were predominately women which reminded me of the women jute workers in Dundee (See the excellent Verdant Works).

As the numbers increased in the town there was no room to expand. The people could see the land around the town but it was not their land. Enclosure had emphasised to whom it belonged and reduced the common land. When the 1831 Reform Act failed to extend the vote to working class men angry rioters rose up across the country. Nottingham castle was burnt down and the next day Wollaton hall was attacked but the rioters were repulsed by Lord Middleton’s private militia. See People's Histreh: Nottingham Radical History Group - this entry.

There is some information in the hall about the life of the building before it became the museum but I was advised the better way to learn about this aspect is the tour which takes you to parts of the house closed to visitors such as the kitchens. It takes 40 minutes and costs £5. I had just missed one and did not have time to wait for the next so I walked around the hall briefly.

For much of its history the hall was not inhabited - only ten years according to this claim. Despite being modern in design and drainage the Sir Francis Willoughby who built it used the hall only for special occasions yet lived in old Wollaton Hall in Wollaton village, possibly for reasons of expense. A fire in 1642 rendered it uninhabitable for forty years and in the late 19th century the town was thought to have encroached upon it, the hall was let, then vacant, then sold in the early 1920s to Nottingham council whereupon it opened as a museum. Summary of the Hall’s history on Wikipedia.

I wondered why the building was home to a natural history museum specifically. Initially I thought it was created because of the link with Francis Willughby, ornithologist and ichthyologist. He was revolutionary in thought in that the taxonomical system he and his tutor John Ray developed forms the basis of current classification of plants and animals directly influencing the more famous later work of Carl Linnaeus. They challenged some ornithological inaccuracies of Aristotle and Francis wrote a scientific study of games.  More about Francis here. 

In fact, the natural history museum started life as an interest group of the Nottingham Mechanics Institute - one of the remarkable nineteenth century institutions for the "improvement" of ordinary people; a bit like In Our Time, I suppose today.  The Mechanics Institutes, as an aside became an internationally popular concept, with hundreds of branches across the Empire.  It was co-founded by George Birkbeck, its first President who also founded Birkbeck college in London which offers part-time tuition for working people and is where I studied for a philosophy degree some ten or twelve years ago, until in the third year of four my first son was born.

One of the most captivating stories of the house for me was of Willughby’s three children.

Francis Willughby the naturalist who, though often ill travelled extensively in Europe with his tutor. At the time of his death of pleurisy aged 36 in 1672 he was planning to travel to America to study further. He left behind three children. His eldest son, also Francis ran away at twelve from his stepfather. He seems to have had a similar independence of mind to his father and after taking his stepfather to court over his inheritance moved into the abandoned, fire damaged property aged 19, inviting Cassandra (later, Duchess of Chandos) aged 17 and his younger brother Thomas to join him. These dauntless three must have had great plans but Francis the instigator died only two years later. Biography.  Thomas and Cassandra remained at the hall. She seems to have been a fairly remarkable woman. Together they did restore the hall, creating apparently magnificent gardens. The eighteenth century was the glorious age of British gardens.  Note in that last link the Jan Siberechts painting of the hall gardens she revived, which hangs in the hall - one of three he painted.   The Camellia House (installed later in 1823) is reputedly the earliest cast iron glasshouse in Europe.  Cassandra also wrote a history of her family and catalogued her father’s works

Cassandra Willoughby

She married her widowed cousin at 43, moved away and looked after his children. Her husband employed Handel for some two years and if you are interested in such things you can see the organ he may have played at the Hall, now restored and used for recitals. 

Thomas, her surviving brother married, had many children, became a notable man of the county - JP, Sheriff,  other county offices, also MP and was later raised to the peerage becoming second baron Middleton.

There are various sources of good information about the hall:

Background to the family prior to building the hall (Section: “Historic development “) 

Design and architecture: The house is brick built, encased in stone from Ancaster, Lincolnshire and one of the first great homes to look spectacular rather than being primarily defensive, with an upstairs and downstairs having separate purposes, and no clear front or back, being impressive to see from all sides. It was built by Robert Smythson who had been master mason on Longleat and who became the first person to have the title architect. John Thorpe here is claimed to have been the designer, with Smythson perhaps in charge of the build (architect apparently had a wider meaning than now).  Architectural detail in again, the useful Historic England entry.

Other sources of information about the hall:  Nottinghamshire History.

There is superb children’s guide and activity sheet (for older children) - one of the best for a historic attraction that I have seen.