"Bosworth Hall, the Seat of Sir Wolstan Dixie, Bart", 1791
Bosworth Hall is a former stately home which belonged to the once wealthy Dixie family, whose strong connections with Market Bosworth date back to the 12th century. At the time of the Restoration of King Charles II in 1660, the head of the family was created a baronet, of Bosworth, a title which became extinct with the death of Sir Wolstan Dixie, 13th and last Baronet, in 1975.
The parkland of the present house was bought by Sir Wolstan Dixie, Lord Mayor of London, in 1589, and the main house was built during the reign of William III and Mary II by his brother's descendant Sir Beaumont Dixie, 2nd Baronet, who had inherited the estate in 1682. The Dixie family fortune was lost in the 19th century, and the house and estate were sold in the 1880s to pay gambling debts.
In the eighteenth century Sir Wolstan Dixie, the 4th baronet, had a reputation for being a pugnacious bully, with a penchant for using his fists to settle any dispute, which often set him at odds with his neighbours and even ex-employees.[2] As the chief trustee of the local school he "had complete control" [3] over the appointment of tutors at the establishment. In March 1732 he appointed the young and impoverished Samuel Johnson (1709–1784) to a position of usher at the school, even though he did not have the required university degree.
Another stipulation of the school statutes that Dixie ignored was that the master be provided with a house of his own. Instead, Johnson was lodged at Bosworth Hall and, in the words of Johnson's biographer James Boswell (who had it from Johnson's lifelong friend, and near neighbour of Dixie, John Taylor of Ashbourne), Johnson became "a kind of domestick chaplain, so far at least, as to say grace at table, but was treated with what he represented as intolerable harshness; and, after suffering for a few months such complicated misery, he relinquished a situation for which all his life afterwards he recollected with the strongest aversion, and even a degree of horrour".[4]
As Dixie was also "legendary for his ignorance" [5] there is an amusing anecdote told about his violent encounter with a neighbouring squire who objected to Dixie barring access to a footpath across his land. The ensuing fight must have been memorable, for Dixie at least: when he was presented to the Germanic King George II at a levee as Sir Wolstan Dixie "of Bosworth Park", the king, wanting perhaps to show some knowledge of important English battles, said, "'Bosworth-Bosworth! Big battle at Bosworth, wasn't it?' 'Yes, Sire. But I thrashed him', replied Sir Wolstan, oblivious of any other fight than his own".[6]
The last Dixie of Bosworth Hall, Sir Alexander Beaumont Churchill Dixie, 11th Baronet (1851–1924), who was known as "Sir A.B.C.D." or "Beau", was High Sheriff of Leicestershire for 1876.[7] In 1875, he married Florence Douglas (1855–1905), who in her lifetime was well known as a writer, feminist, big game hunter, war correspondent, and suffragette. While still living at Bosworth she wrote the best-seller Across Patagonia (1880). She was a sister of the Marquess of Queensberry who gave his name to the Marquess of Queensberry rules and an aunt of Oscar Wilde's close friend Lord Alfred Douglas. Sir Alexander and Lady Florence left Bosworth in the early 1880s and went to live at Glen Stuart House on Lord Queensberry's Kinmount estate in Dumfriesshire, Scotland. However, the Dixies maintained connections with Bosworth, serving as governors of its grammar school, and the 13th and last Baronet had a home in Bosworth Park at the time of his death in 1975.
The Bosworth estate was purchased in 1885 by Charles Tollemache Scott, who made numerous improvements to the building and added his initials to some of the iron guttering, which can still be seen to this day. Among other changes Tollemache Scott made, the cellar gates were replaced with cell doors from the Newgate Prison in London. The gate is still there, situated at the entrance to the Newgate bar.
Tollemache Scott's daughter, Wenefryde, sold the Bosworth Hall estate in 1913. It changed hands twice more before being sold to Leicestershire County Council in 1931. It became a hospital, which it remained until the 1980s.
Conversion into a hotel
Bosworth Hall and Park, c. 1725
After the hospital at Bosworth Hall was closed, the property was bought by a construction firm for conversion into a hotel. Although the firm went bankrupt, the conversion was completed by the Britannia Hotels chain, which bought the property.
The present hotel has 210 bedrooms, a health and leisure club, restaurants and a bar. It also has conference and banqueting facilities.[8]
Samuel Johnson, often referred to as Dr Johnson, was an English writer who made lasting contributions to English literature as a poet, playwright, essayist, moralist, literary critic, biographer, editor, and lexicographer. Religiously, he was a devout Anglican, and politically a committed Tory. The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography describes Johnson as "arguably the most distinguished man of letters in English history". He is the subject of James Boswell's The Life of Samuel Johnson, described by Walter Jackson Bate as "the most famous single work of biographical art in the whole of literature".
Market Bosworth is a small market town and civil parish in western Leicestershire, England. At the 2001 Census, it had a population of 1,906, increasing to 2,097 at the 2011 census. It is most famously near to the site of the decisive final battle of the Wars of the Roses.
Buckminster is a village and civil parish within the Melton district of Leicestershire, England, which includes the two villages of Buckminster and Sewstern. The total population of the civil parish was 356 at the 2011 census. It is on the B676 road, 10 miles east of Melton Mowbray and 4 miles west of the A1 at Colsterworth.
William Manners Tollemache, Lord Huntingtower, known as Sir William Manners, Bt, between 1793 and 1821, was a British nobleman and Tory politician.
The Tollemache family is an English noble family, originally from Suffolk. The family's surname is pronounced TOL-mash.
Lady Florence Caroline Dixie was a Scottish writer, war correspondent, and feminist. Her account of travelling Across Patagonia, her children's books The Young Castaways and Aniwee; or, The Warrior Queen, and her feminist utopia Gloriana; or, The Revolution of 1900 all deal with feminist themes related to girls, women, and their positions in society.
Edwyn Sherard Burnaby was a major-general and Conservative Party Member of Parliament (MP) for Leicestershire North from 1880 until his death. He served in the Crimean War.
This is a list of Sheriffs and High Sheriffs of Leicestershire, United Kingdom. The Sheriff is the oldest secular office under the Crown. Formerly the High Sheriff was the principal law enforcement officer in the county but over the centuries most of the responsibilities associated with the post have been transferred elsewhere or are now defunct, so that its functions are now largely ceremonial. Under the provisions of the Local Government Act 1972, on 1 April 1974 the office previously known as Sheriff was retitled High Sheriff. The High Sheriff changes every March.
Sir Wolstan Dixie, was an English merchant and administrator, and Lord Mayor of London in 1585.
Lockerbie is a small town in Dumfries and Galloway, south-western Scotland. It lies approximately 120 kilometres from Glasgow, and 25 km (16 mi) from the border with England. It had a population of 4,009 at the 2001 census. The town came to international attention in December 1988 when the wreckage of Pan Am Flight 103 crashed there following a terrorist bomb attack aboard the flight.
The Dixie Baronetcy was created in the Baronetage of England at the time of the Restoration of the Monarchy in 1660 for Sir Wolstan Dixie (1602–1682), a supporter of King Charles I during the English Civil War and afterwards. He was descended from a brother of Sir Wolstan Dixie, the sixteenth century Lord Mayor of London who founded the Dixie Professorship of Ecclesiastical History in the University of Cambridge. Their home was Bosworth Hall near Market Bosworth in Leicestershire. The title became extinct with the death of the thirteenth Baronet, another Sir Wolstan Dixie, in 1975.
Sir George Douglas Dixie, 12th Baronet, known as Sir Douglas Dixie, was the second to last of the Dixie baronets. He served in the Royal Navy and the King's Own Scottish Borderers.
Wrightson Mundy was High Sheriff of Derbyshire in 1737 and MP for Leicestershire in 1747.
Samuel Johnson was an English author born in Lichfield, Staffordshire. He was a sickly infant who early on began to exhibit the tics that would influence how people viewed him in his later years. From childhood he displayed great intelligence and an eagerness for learning, but his early years were dominated by his family's financial strain and his efforts to establish himself as a school teacher.
Dixie Grammar School is an independent school in Market Bosworth, Leicestershire.
Sir Wolstan Dixie, 4th Baronet (1700–1767) was among the most colourful of the 13 Dixie baronets of Market Bosworth, descended from the second Sir Wolstan Dixie, knighted by James I in 1604, and Sheriff of Leicester.
Sir Wolstan Dixie of Appleby Magna and then Market Bosworth was the founder of the Dixie Grammar School in Market Bosworth.
Sir William Douglas, 4th Baronet Kelhead was a British Member of Parliament.
Sir Lionel Tollemache, 2nd Baronet PC, of Helmingham Hall in Suffolk, was twice elected as a Member of Parliament for Orford in Suffolk, in 1621 and 1628. He had a considerable reputation as a surgeon, but is said to have made many enemies due to his "immoderate temper".
Wenefryde Agatha Scott, 10th Countess of Dysart was a Scottish noblewoman.
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