… we thought we’d feature this as Green Park (80 acres of woodland surrounding the house) is where our office is now based!
Aston Clinton House (Buckinghamshire Archeological Society)
Waddesdon Manor is probably the best known country house in Buckinghamshire but did you know there also used to be a Rothschild mansion in Aston Clinton where the Green Park activity centre is now situated? The mansion was demolished in the 1950s but old photographs show a sprawling neo-Georgian/Italianate house.
Aston Clinton House (Buckinghamshire Archeological Society)
The original house was built at some point in the late 18th century and by 1793 was owned by General Gerald Lake, an MP for Aylesbury and later 1st Viscount of Delhi, Leswarree and Aston Clinton. It remained with the Lake family until 1838 when it was purchased by the Duke of Buckingham. His son put it up for sale ten years later when it was described as a “most desirable brick-built and stuccoed sporting residence suited for a family of respectability”. It was eventually purchased in 1851 by Anthony Nathan de Rothschild. His wife Louisa apparently found the house too small so architect George Henry Stokes, son-in-law of Sir Joseph Paxton (best known for designing the Crystal Palace), was employed to extend it and a ‘Billiard Room building’, a new dining room, new offices and a new conservatory were added. Architect George Devey who worked on a number of other Rothschild properties including Ascott House near Wing made further improvements and also designed many estate cottages in the village and also the school and village hall, ‘Anthony Hall’ built as a memorial to Anthony by his widow Louisa following his death in 1876.
After Louisa’s death in 1910 her daughters Constance and Annie maintained the estate, spending a few weeks there each summer until the 1st World War, when it was lent to the War Office and became the HQ of the 21st Infantry Division who trained on the estate and the adjoining Halton estate which was owned by Anthony’s nephew Alfred de Rothschild. After the war, executors for the Rothschilds sold the estate in 1923 for £15,000. At the time it was advertised as a classical mansion with numerous reception rooms and bedrooms.
ASTON CLINTON HOUSE - School dining room (from an article by Diana Gulland in ‘Records of Buckinghamshire,’ 2008, where the photo appears courtesy of Hilda Isabel Marriott)
It was purchased by Dr Crawford, a schoolmaster who used the house as a boys’ school. Evelyn Waugh was a teacher for a short period but he was not enamoured with the house referring to it as “an unconceivably ugly house but a lovely park”. The school was not a success and, following a brief period as the Aston Clinton Country Club, it was once again put on the market and in 1933 opened as the Howard Park Hotel, ‘a first-class country hotel’ complete with a landing strip for aeroplanes. This too failed and it re-emerged as the Green Park Hotel in 1938, under new management.
ASTON CLINTON HOUSE - Ball Room (from 1923 Sale Catalogue of Mansion and Estate. By courtesy of Buckinghamshire Archaeological Society. From an article by Diana Gulland in Records of Buckinghamshire, 2008)
During World War Two the stables were used by the EKCO Radio Company as offices for the development of radar whilst the main house was used as a hospital for war wounded. Buckinghamshire County Council subsequently acquired the house and park in three lots from 1959 to 1967 with the proviso that it would be used for educational purposes. The house was demolished and the Green Park Training Centre built in its place. Today the only remnants of its existence are the balustrade, which once encircled the garden at the front of the house, the lodge in Stablebridge Road, the stables (used as part of the training centre) and the wooded parkland.
Plan of Lot 1 - from 1923 sale Catalogue of mansion and estate - Buckinghamshire Archaeological Society (from article, ‘Aston Clinton House 1923-32’ by Diana Gulland, Records of Buckinghamshire, volume 48)