Greyfriars, Puttenham
| Greyfrars | |
| Surrey | |
|---|---|
 Greyfriars | |
| Location | |
| Grid reference: | SU94594831 |
| Location: | 51°13’34"N, -0°38’48"W |
| Village: | Puttenham |
| History | |
| Built 1896 | |
| For: | Julian Sturgis by C F A Voysey |
| Country house | |
| Arts and crafts | |
| Information | |
Greyfriars is house on the Hog's Back near the village of Puttenham, in Surrey. It was built in 1896 for the novelist and playwright Julian Sturgis and was designed by the arts and crafts architect C.F.A. Voysey.[1] The house was initially called Merleshanger, and later Wancote.[2]
The house is a Grade II* listed building.[3]
In 1913-1914, the house was extended on its western end by Herbert Baker.[3] Twenty drawings of the design and detail of Greyfriars are held in the collection of the Royal Institute of British Architects. Howard Gaye's watercolour of Greyfriars was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1897.[4] Voysey's distinctive heart shaped motif is on Greyfriar's letter box, hinges and door handles.[5]
The house was put up for sale with its staff cottages in 2003 for £3 million.[5]
The Sturgis family
Julian Russell Sturgis (1848-1904) who built Greyfriars House was a notable Victorian novelist, poet and musical composer. He was born in Boston in the United States in 1848, the son of Russell Sturgis (1805–1887), the famed merchant and later head of Baring Bank. Julian came to Britain at an early age, studied at Eton and Oxford and became a barrister. However in 1878 he embarked on a career as a novelist.[6]
In 1883, the year his father died and left him his fortune, Sturgis married Mary Maud, daughter of Colonel Marcus de la Poer Beresford. In 1896 he commissioned the famous architect Charles Voysey to build Greyfriars House. It is still considered to be one of Voysey’s best designs. Nikolaus Pevsner wrote of it:
Greyfriars is one of Voysey’s best houses built in 1896 for Julian Sturgis. Superb position facing just under the brow of Hog’s Back. The long, low roughcast house ties itself self-effacingly into the landscape and the pleasure to be got from walking around it is that of a continuous interchange between building and landscape without any single view that can be analysed in detail.[7]
Several renowned literaray figures visited Sturgis at Wancote. In 1904, Henry James sent a letter to Julian’s recently widowed wife mentioning his long friendship with her husband.[8] He continued to occasionally visit her at the house after Julian’s death.[9] A. C. Benson was another friend who often visited Wancote.[10]
When Julian died in 1904, his widow Mary and their son Sir Mark Beresford Russell Grant-Sturgis (1884-1949) continued to live at the house. Sir Mark was assistant private secretary to H. H. Asquith when Chancellor of the Exchequer (1906–8), and private secretary to him as Prime Minister (1908–10). He later became Assistant Under Secretary for Ireland between 1920 and 1922. During this time he wrote five volumes of diaries on the Irish uprising.[11]
In 1920 the Sturgis family put Greyfriars House on the market and it was sold to Philip Lyle
Other residents
Philip Lyle who bought the house in the 1920s lived there for the next 15 years. He was a Director in the Tate & Lyle sugar refining company. In 1926 he invited the magazine “Garden Life” to the house and they wrote an article describing the property at this time.[12] He sold the house in 1936 and it was bought by Robert Heap Turner (1900-1986), the wealthy industrialist. He lived there for the next 50 years and after his death in 1986 the house was sold.
Outside links
References
- ↑ Cole, 2015 pg. 117
- ↑ Cole, 2015 pg. 117
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 National Heritage List 1029612: Greyfriars
- ↑ Cole, 2015 pg. 117
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 Kathleen Hennessy (19 January 2003). "Dream home: Greyfriars". The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/money/2003/jan/19/observercashsection.theobserver9. Retrieved 12 October 2017.
- ↑ Lee, Elizabeth “Sturgis, Julian Russell, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.
- ↑ [https://books.google.com.au/books?id=5b6dCBlfCLUC&pg=PA267&dq=sturgis+greyfriars&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiYicT32cvgAhVGOSsKHTKQAq4Q6AEISjAG#v=onepage&q=sturgis%20greyfriars&f=false Nikolaus Pevsner: The Buildings of England: Surrey, 1962; 1971 Penguin Books ISBN 978-0-300-09675-0page 267
- ↑ Letters of Henry James Vol 2
- ↑ Gunter, S. e. 2004 “'Dearly Beloved Friends: Henry James's Letters to Younger Men”, p 162
- ↑ Edwardian excursions: from the diaries of A.C. Benson, 1898-1904, p. 44
- ↑ Seedorf, M. F. “Sturgis, Sir Mark Beresford Russell Grant”, Oxford Dictionary of Biography.
- ↑ “Garden Life”, Vol 50, 1926. Online reference
- Cole, David: 'The Art and Architecture of C.F.A Voysey: English Pioneer Modernist Architect and Designer' (Images Publishing, 2015) ISBN 9781864706048