Oatlands Palace is a former Tudor and Stuart royal palace which took the place of the former manor of the village of Oatlands near Weybridge, Surrey. Little remains of the original building, so excavations of the palace took place in 1964 to rediscover its extent.
Much of the foundation stone for the palace came from Chertsey Abbey, which was abandoned and fell into ruins after the Dissolution of the Monasteries during the Protestant Reformation in England. [1]
Henry VIII came to Oatlands on a progress in September 1514 and hunted stags on Chertsey Meads. [3] He acquired the house in 1538, and rebuilt it for Anne of Cleves.
The palace was built around three main adjoining quadrangular courtyards covering fourteen hectares and using an existing 15th-century moated manor house. [4]
A bed made for Anne of Cleves was described in an inventory of Oatlands: Queen Anne's bed" had curtains of crimson cloth of gold and cloth of silver decorated with borders of purple velvet on the seams. It featured 108 embroidered badges of Anne and Henry and their crowned arms on the tester and ceeler. [5]
Henry VIII married Catherine Howard in the palace on 28 July 1540. [6] Henry's subsequent wife, Catherine Parr, spent time at the Palace as well. Records of her writings include a letter sent from Oatlands to her brother, William, Lord Parr, shortly after her marriage to the King in July 1543. [7] Henry VIII was less mobile in his later years and a special ramp was built for him at Oatlands so he could mount his hunting horses. [8]
Oatlands subsequently became the residence, at various times, of Mary I, Elizabeth I, James I and Charles I.
Mary Tudor retreated to Oatlands after the end of her anticipated pregnancy. Her previous residence, Hampton Court Palace, had housed the nursery staff that was assembled for the birth of the child. The announcement of the move to Oatlands (which was considerably smaller than Hampton) ended any hope at court of a happy outcome to the Queen's pregnancy.
Elizabeth I employed her Sergeant Painter Leonard Fryer to decorate the long gallery with a woodgrain pattern in 1598. After priming the panelling with white lead paint, he painted imitation "flotherwoode", with gold and silver highlights on the mouldings, and arabesque patterns and paintwork of "markatree", perhaps resembling marquetry. Fryer used "sweet varnish" to finish his work, chosen for its scent. [9]
Prince Henry and Princess Elizabeth were in residence in August 1603. [10] Prince Charles came from Dunfermline Palace to Oatlands in September 1604. [11]
The palace belonged to James I's wife Anne of Denmark from 1610. [12] She built a silkworm house and a vineyard, and employed Inigo Jones to design an ornamental gateway from the Privy Garden to the Park. [13] Work on site was supervised by Robert Stickells and John Trevor. [14] The gardener John Bonnall planted "new and rare fruits, flowers, herbs, and trees". [15]
Her art collection at Oatlands included portraits of her Danish nephews, her courtiers Jean Drummond, Mary Middlemore, and Tom Durie. Her own portrait was painted by Paul van Somer, showing her with her horse, held by an African servant, hunting dogs around her feet, and the new gateway and the palace in the background. [16]
The queen's bed was "laced with parchment lace of gold and silver spaingled", and the bedchamber was lined with panels of satin laced with coloured silks. [17] Furnishing included painted and gilt Italian style chairs, and other seating was upholstered in red velvet with her initials. [18] Despite this luxury, Anne of Denmark was sometimes bored or melancholy, and wrote to King James that she was "weary of Oatlands, of my mares, of my deer, of my dogs, and of my vineyard". [19]
The ambassador of Savoy, Antonio Scanese, Count of Scarnafes, arrived to visit Anne of Denmark at Oatlands on 3 October 1614. [20] She provided a grand reception for the Venetian ambassador Piero Contarini at Oatlands on 30 August 1618. He was welcomed and entertained by her Lord Chamberlain, the Earl of Leicester, while they waited for the arrival of several noblewomen, including Margaret Howard, Countess of Nottingham and the Countess of Arundel. The Queen had planned a hunt, but it was rained off. At the end of the dinner there were sweetmeats, then they stood and toasted Elizabeth, Electress Palatine and Frederick V. [21] For such occasions, the under-keeper Ralph Dison borrowed furnishings from other palaces. [22]
Oatlands was one of the properties settled upon Henrietta Maria on her marriage to Charles I. She used it as a country retreat, installing part of her art collection on site, and employing John Tradescant the elder for its gardens. In August 1637 it was rumoured she was sickening with consumption (tuberculosis, which was frequently fatal as penicillin was not yet discovered). At Oatlands she was drinking asses' (donkeys) milk as a remedy. [23]
In 1646 Oatlands was a temporary home of the infant Princess Henrietta of England, daughter of Charles I of England and later Duchess of Orleans, sister-in-law of Louis XIV. Her governess Lady Dalkeith smuggled her into France in the summer of 1646 during the English Civil War. After the King was executed, the Commonwealth Government sold Oatlands and some other Royal residences to help pay Parliamentary debts.
Robert Turbridge bought Oatlands Palace and its contents for about £4,000. He demolished it and sold the bricks to Sir Richard Weston of Sutton Place. [24] A single house – remote from the site of the palace itself – may have originally functioned as a hunting lodge.
After the Restoration, during the 1660s, the house was the residence of William Boteler. He had supported the Commonwealth and served as one of the ten major-generals during the Rule of the Major-Generals (1656). He was noted as being harsh on Roman Catholics, Quakers and Cavaliers. [25]
The house was later occupied and extended by Sir Edward Herbert, the Lord Chief Justice. He forfeited it to the Crown when he followed James II into exile. It was awarded to his brother, Arthur Herbert, 1st Earl of Torrington, who was later the admiral in command of the English and Dutch Fleets at the Battle of Beachy Head. [26]
The house was again enlarged by the Duke of Newcastle, Henry Clinton, who also laid out formal gardens.
In 1790, Oatlands was leased from the Crown by the Prince Frederick, Duke of York and Albany, the second son of George III. (He was the subject of the nursery rhyme "The Grand Old Duke of York"). [27] His architect was Henry Holland.
In his second London notebook, composer Joseph Haydn recorded a two-day visit to Oatlands in November 1791:
The little castle, 18 miles from London, lies on a slope and commands the most glorious view. Among its many beauties is a most remarkable grotto which cost £25 000 sterling, and which was 11 years in the building. It is very large and contains many diversions, inter alia actual water that flows in from various sides, a beautiful English garden, various entrances and exits, besides a most charming bath. [28]
He was the guest of the Prince of Wales and the Duke of York, playing music for four hours each evening. [29]
In 1794 the mansion was burnt down and was quickly rebuilt in the Gothic style of the period. After the death of the Duchess of York in 1820, the whole property was sold. It was bought by Edward Hughes Ball Hughes in 1824 (although it was not until after the Duke's death in 1827 that the sale was finally concluded) and again remodelled in 1830. Hughes had tried to dispose of the estate by public auction in 1829 but this part did not sell.
In 1832 he leased the mansion and adjoining parkland to Lord Francis Egerton for a seven-year period, and renewed the term in 1839. The arrival of the London and South Western Railway in 1838 made it possible for residents to commute daily to London. In 1846 the estate was broken up into lots for building development and sold at three public auctions in May, August and September of that year. Following a period of private ownership by James Watts Peppercorne, the house was adapted and operated as a hotel in 1856, known as the South Western (later Oatlands Park) Hotel.
From 1916 to 1918, during World War I, the British government used the hotel as a hospital for New Zealand troops injured in France. [30] Subsequently, one of the main streets in Walton-on-Thames was renamed New Zealand Avenue [31] in honour of those men.
The four-star Oatlands Park Hotel now occupies the site where the Oatlands mansion (Oatlands House) once stood. Within the core of the building are some surviving details for earlier stages of its existence. The former site of Oatlands Palace is down the hill towards the centre of Weybridge. This was once part of the same estate in land.
Hampton Court Palace is a Grade I listed royal palace in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames, 12 miles southwest and upstream of central London on the River Thames. Opened to the public, the palace is managed by Historic Royal Palaces, a charity set up to preserve several unoccupied royal properties.
Woodstock Palace was a royal residence in the English town of Woodstock, Oxfordshire.
Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales,, was the eldest son and heir apparent of James VI and I, King of England and Scotland; and his wife Anne of Denmark. His name derives from his grandfathers: Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley; and Frederick II of Denmark. Prince Henry was widely seen as a bright and promising heir to his father's thrones. However, at the age of 18, he predeceased his father, dying of typhoid fever. His younger brother Charles succeeded him as heir apparent to the English, Irish, and Scottish thrones.
Margaret Douglas, Countess of Lennox, was the daughter of the Scottish queen dowager Margaret Tudor and her second husband Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus, and thus the granddaughter of Henry VII of England. She was the grandmother of James VI and I.
Oatlands is a village in the north of the English county of Surrey on low, verdant ridges partially overlooking the River Thames. Oatlands acquired its name from the Royal Tudor and Stuart Oatlands Palace, which was built for Henry VIII to the north of Weybridge town centre. Before acquiring its first place of worship it was part of Walton on Thames, and shortly after thereby becoming a village did not qualify for post town status and instead its post town became Weybridge. The towns it adjoins have their centres 1 mile (1.6 km) away. Oatlands has a park, parade of shops, one pub, one Working Men's Club, and three schools.
Weybridge is a town in the Elmbridge district in Surrey, England, around 17 mi (27 km) southwest of central London. The settlement is recorded as Waigebrugge and Weibrugge in the 7th century and the name derives from a crossing point of the River Wey, which flows into the River Thames to the north of the town centre. The earliest evidence of human activity is from the Bronze Age. During the Anglo-Saxon and medieval periods, Weybridge was held by Chertsey Abbey. In 2011 it had a population of 15,449.
The Palace of Placentia, also known as Greenwich Palace, was an English royal residence that was initially built by Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, in 1443. The palace was a place designed for pleasure, entertainment and an escape from the city. It was located at Greenwich on the south bank of the River Thames, downstream from London. On a hill behind the palace he built Duke Humphrey's Tower, later known as Greenwich Castle; it was subsequently demolished to make way for the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, which survives. The original river-side residence was extensively rebuilt around 1500 by Henry VII. A detached residence, the Queen's House, was built on the estate in the early 1600s and also survives. In 1660, the main palace was demolished by Charles II to make way for a proposed new palace, which was never constructed. Nearly forty years later, the Greenwich Hospital was built on the site.
Dunfermline Palace is a ruined former Scottish royal palace and important tourist attraction in Dunfermline, Fife, Scotland. It is currently, along with other buildings of the adjacent Dunfermline Abbey, under the care of Historic Environment Scotland as a scheduled monument.
In common parlance, the wives of Henry VIII were the six queens consort of King Henry VIII of England between 1509 and his death in 1547. In legal terms, Henry had only three wives, because three of his marriages were annulled by the Church of England. He was never granted an annulment by the Pope, as he desired, however, for Catherine of Aragon, his first wife. Annulments declare that a true marriage never took place, unlike a divorce, in which a married couple end their union. Along with his six wives, Henry took several mistresses.
Theobalds House in the parish of Cheshunt in the English county of Hertfordshire, north of London, was a significant stately home and (later) royal palace of the 16th and early 17th centuries.
Worksop Manor is a Grade I listed 18th-century country house in Bassetlaw, Nottinghamshire. It stands in one of the four contiguous estates in the Dukeries area of Nottinghamshire. Traditionally, the Lord of the Manor of Worksop may assist a British monarch at his or her coronation by providing a glove and putting it on the monarch's right hand and supporting his or her right arm. Worksop Manor was the seat of the ancient Lords of Worksop.
Woking Palace is a former manor house of the Royal Manor of Woking on the outskirts of Woking, near the village of Old Woking, Surrey.
Events from the 1540s in England.
Elizabeth Trevannion, Countess of Monmouth, was an English aristocrat and keeper of Prince Charles.
Prince Ulrik John of Denmark, was a son of King Frederick II of Denmark and his consort, Sophie of Mecklenburg-Güstrow. As the second-born son he bore the merely titular rank of Duke of Holstein and Schleswig, Stormarn and Ditmarsh and had no share in the royal-ducal condominial rule of Holstein and Schleswig, wielded by the heads of the houses of Oldenburg (royal) and its cadet branch Holstein-Gottorp (ducal). Since 1602 he held the religiously defunct position of Bishop of Schleswig, enjoying the revenues of the implied estates and manor. The year after he succeeded his grandfather as Administrator of the Prince-Bishopric of Schwerin, holding both posts until his death.
Mary Stuart was the third daughter and sixth child of James VI and I by Anne of Denmark. Her birth was much anticipated. She developed pneumonia at 17 months and died the following year.
Sir Edward Zouch of Woking was a courtier to English kings James and Charles I, a masque actor, and Knight Marshal of the King's Household.
Giovanni Carlo Scaramelli (1550-1608) was a Venetian diplomat based in London at the end of the reign of Elizabeth I and the beginning of the reign of James VI and I.
Piero or Pietro Contarini (1578–1632) was a Venetian aristocrat and ambassador to Turin, Paris, London, Madrid and Rome.
Sophia Stuart was the fourth daughter and last of nine children of James VI and I and Anne of Denmark.
