Park and Garden

The last few days have been wild and windy here.  Plant pots, bird feeders, bits of fence, wheel barrows  and wheelie bins have been on various trips around the garden.  They are all safely back in their places - for now.

In the garden the Grape Hyacinth (Muscari) have flowered. I love their bright blue colour. 

When I ordered bird nibbles on line I also treated myself to some Sweet Pea seeds.  They came with wool twine called Twool with which to tie the flowers and stems to the wigwam canes.

The seeds were planted a few days ago, there were ten in all and three of them are showing little shoots.

Also growing well are the little tomato shoots.  There are several varieties, all labelled, including Gardener's Delight, Tigrella and Mini Munch.

On Tuesday morning we walked down to the local park.  it was quite warm and sunny.  Spring hasn't quite sprung there yet but there were a few encouraging signs.

Blue Skies

Hellebore

Crocus

 

Daphne

 

 

I was also spotting things as we walked towards the park.

N

I liked all the chimneys on these houses.

A little cat hiding behind the railings in the park.

The gold tops of the railings were glinting in the sun.

The terraced houses above were built for pottery workers to live in, just as the public parks were built for their leisure.  There were lots of pottery factories in the area around here.  Many of which still stand others have been demolished.

 Writing this has reminded me that this Sunday is the final of   'The Great Pottery Throwdown' filmed at the nearby Gladstone Pottery Museum.  I've been enjoying watching this series as much if not more than the previous three which were filmed further North in the city at Middleport Pottery.  We've also been enjoying 'The Great British Dig' and 'Grayson Perry's Art Club.'  I've been enjoying the new series of 'Unforgotten' and am looking forward to the return of 'Line of Duty' next week.

Tomorrow I will have been writing this blog for sixteen years. It doesn't seem possible for it to have been that long ago - Monday 14th March 2005 - when I wrote my first post.

More about the 'Old House'

As so many of you were interested in the last post I've been trying to find out more about Dovleys Manor and especially about the people who lived there. As you know from my Family Matters blog I've been 'doing' Family History for a very long time - since before the internet provided so much information, in fact in some cases even before parish registers had been put on microfiche. In those days you looked at the actual registers sitting at a desk with the manuscript on a book-rest or cushion and in some cases wearing white cotton gloves. In the last few years it has become quite easy to find lots of information from your home PC or laptop instead of making appointments and travelling miles to record offices. So it has been quite a simple task to find out a bit more of the Heywood family of Doveleys using the on-line resources I use when researching my own family history.

When I wrote the last post I'd looked up the family on the 1871 census and found what a big household it was. For those who were interested in the friend of the family her name was Maria Roberts, age 29 and her birthplace was given as Landau, Germany; her occupation was governess. I think this is really interesting! Was she a friend staying with them who was a governess? Or was she a governess to the children of the family and considered as a friend rather than an employee?

I moved on to 1881 and the household is even grander - obviously in it's heyday. There is now a french lady's maid in the house called Irina Landreux, age 30, her birthplace, Paris. There are more servants including a maid called Sarah Tortoishell who was born locally in Rocester - what a lovely name! The girls are Isabella, Etheldred, Hilda and Mary, aged 29, 24, 22 and 18 respectively- the boys, Bertam and Gerald were not at home on census day - probably at boarding school or university. In fact I found a Bertam Heywood a boarder and scholar in Winchester so perhaps the boys went to the famous boarding school there. Thomas Heywood is recorded as being a Baronet, Magistrate and Farmer of 100 acres of his own land. Of course, only the household servants lived in the house, many of the farm labourers and estate workers would live locally possibly in estate property or tied cottages.

By 1891 the household had decreased in size and only Etheldred is at home on census day with some of the servants. Thomas, Margaret, Isabella and Mary are at their London home, 39 Lourdes Square, Chelsea, Hilda isn't at Doveleys or in Chelsea and Bertam and Gerald were probably at University or living elsewhere.

I hope you have enjoyed this 'snapshot' of a wealthy family in the late 19th century.

The Old House

I've always been fascinated by this house. It is called Doveleys Manor and stands just off the main road from Rocester to Ashbourne. We have visited Doveleys Garden Centre quite a few times and peered at the house and wondered about it.

Yesterday we dropped in after our walk around the lake at the JCB Factory and saw a notice that I'm sure I hadn't seen before inviting people to walk around the grounds. Well, we didn't have to be invited twice so off we went through the grounds to the woodland walk.

The house is empty at the moment but it isn't by any means derelict. It looks as if some work has been going on on one side, the other side is still in need of attention and there were plenty of house martins dipping and swooping and popping to their nests under the eaves.

The house was built in 1831 and added to in later years hence the date above of 1875. From the White's Directory of Staffordshire of 1851 I found that the house was the seat of T P Heywood, esq and that it was known as Dove Leys. I assumed that T P Heywood is the TPH of the initials in the second photo, that M H was probably his wife and that they were responsible for the later additions to the house. In order to verify this I looked at the Census returns for 1871 and found living at Doveleys Thomas Heywood and his wife Margaret, 4 daughters, 2 sons and a family friend. There were 10 servants including a valet, a general servant, a laundry woman, a cook, a scullery maid, 2 nurses and 2 housemaids. At the back of the house lived a butler and his wife their three sons and two lodgers who were the coachman and his wife. It was a large household; no wonder the Heywoods made extensions to the house.

The morning was warm and sunny and the short walk through the cool woods took us close by the River Dove which was flowing quite rapidly through the fields at the side of the house and garden centre on its way down through Rocester and past the old cotton factory there. When we got back lots of people had arrived and were setting up umbrellas and small gazebos on the lawn in the coach turning circle at the front of the house. As there were huge bowls of water, plenty of shade and lots of beautiful dogs around we asumed that a dog show would be taking place at some point in the afternoon.

I thought you would like to see a photo of the sculpture in the lake at JCB, if you look closely you can see a heron perched on the gull on the left and a black swan underneath the one on the right. There are many water birds here, including the black swans, herons, egyptian geese, barnack and barnacle geese. We also spotted a runner duck. It is a popular place for both locals and visitors to stop and take a walk and for children to feed the ducks.

Selling Houses

Ever since we reduced the asking price on the house we have had several viewings and lots of encouraging feed back from the estate agents. The last two couples to view have both expressed an interest. Couple one have to sell their house first, they really want this house because it is on the same street as the girl's sister and they have their son's name down at the local school. Couple two have sold and are in rented accommodation. Couple one walked by on Sunday just to have a look - I was on next door's drive chatting to my neighbour when I saw them - and have phoned the estate agents a couple of times to see if we have had any interest or offers yet. In the meantime couple two are sorting out their finances and coming back for a second view. My heart says that I would like couple one to buy the house but my head says that if couple two make an offer then we have to accept it as we need to lose our mortgage as soon as possible. We are venturing out to look at some houses at the weekend because if couple two do make an offer I'm guessing they will want to move pretty quickly. I don't really enjoy all this.

Scenes from a Garden - Part Two

The second garden we visited was at Brodsworth Hall near Doncaster. Luckily the Hall was open as well as the gardens. Inside the Hall was really interesting; many of the upstairs rooms, like at Calke Abbey, had been left just as they had been found and not restored, so you could see what the old carpets, wallpaper, painted friezes and etc were like. There was one bedroom, complete with a huge French boat-style bed, that had wisteria painted all around the top of the walls; this would have been so pretty when originally done. It was, of course, a huge country estate, so animals including horses and dogs were venerated here, hence there were two of the dogs below at the bottom of every set of stone steps in the garden.



After a very tasty lunch we wandered around the gardens. There were some interesting features including, below, the Summer House, on its grassy mound.



I particularly liked the target house, now used for an exhibition on the history and development of the gardens, it was built originally for storing archery equipment for the ladies of the house to use for target practice on the lawns outside. You can see the practice area through the window.