THE STORY OF WHITTINGTON HALL

Whittington Hall 1979, SW view

Strictly speaking a "hall" was a Lord of the Manor's residence. Whittington Hall was never this. Before the Norman Conquest Whittington township was the 'capital' of a large lordship which included Whittington, Newton, Arkholme, Gressingham, Hutton Roof, Cantsfield, Ireby, Burrow, Leck, Burton-in-Lonsdale, Barnoldswick, Ingleton, Casterton, Barbon, Sebergh and Thirnby, recorded in the Domesday Book of 1086 as having formerly been part of a large lordship belonging to Earl Tostig. It subsequently passed into the ownership of King William I.

Various places are suggested as having been the Manor House of Whittington over the centuries. The manor was centered on Sellet Mill, with Holme House as its 'hall' in the twelfth century when the county of Westmorland was created. By 1554 the manor hall was named Garney Garth. By the end of the 1600's the hall was in the possession of one Henry Brabin in who's will, of 1612, named the hall as 'Whittington Hall', the first known use of this place title. This is probably the building which later became known as Low Hall. By 1698 Whittington Hall and its estates where in the possession of John Rawlinson.

From a watercolour by Thomas Sunderland 1744-1823

The Rawlinsons and related families - the Sunderlands and Thorntons - owned or occupied Whittington estate from 1698 to 1821. The family was involved in the iron mining and working which had taken place in the Furness area from ancient times. John Rawlinson however was not an ironmaster, he was a barrister-at-law of Gray's Inn. The local historian Chippindall argues that it was probably the Rawlinsons who abandoned Low Hall and built a new house where Whittington Hall now stands. No records of these buildings have been traced but it must have been substantial as an indenture of 1779 spoke of the 'mansion house called Whittington Hall'. In 1803 the hall was sold by auction. And in 1821 it was sold to Thomas Greene of Slyne, between these dates the ownership is unclear although Edward Thornton had occupation up to his death in June 1821 less than two months before the sale to Greene.

Speak with anyone in Whittington about the history of our current Whittington Hall and the immediate response is "it's not old you know". Maybe 1830, when the hall in its present form was started, does not count as old but it is certainly not post modern. The following story of the hall has been gleaned from a number of sources, and will be extended as more information comes to hand. Initially we have to acknowledge the recent work on "The Websters of Kendal" by Angus Taylor and Janet Martin (Cumberland & Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaeological Society, Record Series Volume XVII 2004) together with a work which must have influenced them greatly, "The Buildings of England - North Lancashire" by Nikolaus Pevsner. Finally the work by B. M Copeland for the Greenwoods has provided much valuable input.

Underley Hall - Kirkby Lonsdale

Born in 1797 George Webster was the son of mason turned architect Francis Webster of Kendal.

In 1818, at the age of 21, George Webster designed his first independent country house, Read Hall in Lancashire and work commenced on his design for Underley Hall in 1825. Six years later he was commissioned by Thomas Greene to rebuild Whittington Hall.

He was a pupil of William Atkinson who had a large country house practice in the north of England and on whose designs he elaborated.

George Webster designed a country house for William Wordsworth which was strongly influenced by the Atkinson design for Scone Palace, Perthshire (1803-12), which stands on a terrace with strongly battered walls having square and circular bastions. Webster used this design concept in his work at Thurland Castle, Tunstall (1826), Whittington Hall (1831) and in other work at Settle and Ambleside.

In the early nineteenth century, when Webster began to practice, most new houses were built in a classical style based on the architecture of Italy and Greece; others were gothic, derived from medieval buildings.

There was a brief vogue for Egyptian and a longer one for towered Italianate. National styles were resurrected and brought into use again, the Elizabethan/Jacobean revival being sometimes conveniently referred to as Jacobethan.

George Webster was a pioneer in this style. Webster favoured symmetry, reserving gothic for churches. Horace Walpole, praising his friend Lord Dacre's house, improved in the gothic style in 1745, described the genuine Jacobean work as 'Good King James's Gothic', an expression which Nikolaus Pevsner adopted as the title of his important essay on the style in 1950. He saw it as a symptom of the coming Victorian age.

Thomas Greene was buying land at Whittington from c. 1822 and purchased the hall in c.1830 from Thomas Sunderland, immediately instructing Webster to rebuild, retaining what he could of the structure.

This amounted to keeping some masonry at the east end.

Webster's designs moved closer to the Elizabethan, even to the medieval. For the first time he placed a major house, a house 'of great ambition' on a semi-medieval terrace like those at Wordsworth's house (1826) and Thurland Castle (1828). He went further, placing a powerful 'Pele' tower behind the gables, a tower Nicholas Pevsner thought most unlikely in 1831. It seems that this was intended to suggest continuity of building over a long period. It is not known whether this idea was Webster's or Greene's. Inside there was Jacobean decoration and chimney pieces. Some of which was damaged or removed in later interior work.

Pevsner observed that some Gothic extravaganzas of 1820 and after with castellated and sometimes machicolated towers and usually asymmetrical compositions are grander, heavier, and much bigger than earlier work.

A narrow-gauge railway brought the golden freestone from a quarry at Docker, about a mile away; lead came from Liverpool via the canal to Burton Wharf. No other house by Webster has such complete accounts - details of craftsmen, lists of stoves required, all the sizes of plaster roses needed for one room. Who should make the bookcases? The unidentified 'man from Skipton who made those for Underley' is suggested.

Webster tendered his ill-health as his excuse for slow work, or played one employer against another, assuring Greene that he was 'at present fully engaged designing for Lord Burlington at Holker'.

He also designed the stables and two lodges, and the so-called 'Old Hall' in the village seems to have been tidied up at the same time.

Whittington Hall Staircase and ornate plasterwork

So who was Thomas Greene, the influence behind the present Whittington Hall?

Thomas Greene 1794-1872

Thomas Greene was born in 1794. At the age of eight he was sent to Eton and later he must have had legal training because he was called to the bar in 1819, although he never practiced. He was elected Member of Parliament for Lancaster in 1824 and, with only one break of four years, continued to represent the constituency until 1856. He was regarded as a bulwark of the establishment at a time when the Napoleonic War depression, and consequent unrest, were common throughout the country. His portrait still hangs in Lancaster Castle. He was made Sheriff of Lancaster in 1823 and was buried in the yard of Bolton-le-Sands church on his death in 1872.

In 1820 when he married Henrietta, the fourth daughter of the Right Honourable Sir Henry Russell, Thomas Greene lived in the Manor House at Slyne. This was on the highway which had become the main route north from Lancaster, and consequently made the manor house noisy, and unsuitable for his bride. As Whittington Estate came on the market the year after his marriage this seemed the solution to his problem.

The painting on the left, by Lonsdale c. 1840 depicts the Drawing Room showing Thomas Greene's wife Henrietta, daughter Henrietta, aunt Miss Russell and daughter Rose Alice Clothilde. On the right a photograph taken from approximately the same position in 1979 shows some of the changes which have been made in the intervening 140 years. Mrs Greene, through her friendship with Rector Carus Wilson, played an active role in secular and religious schooling. In the early 1840s she herself founded a girls' school at Whittington and also assisted as she brought the girls into this Whittington Hall drawing room to teach them sewing and singing.

And so to the 20th Century

The photo on the left was definitely taken by the Rev. John Hodgkin, about whom there is a separate web page on this site. It is of beaters on the croquet lawn below the library. On this occasion the beaters are preparing for a pheasant shoot. On the right we must attribute the photo to Hodgkin because of the subject matter and pose. On this occasion however the beaters are of carpets, in the era before vacuum cleaners. Below left is how this side of the hall looks in the present day.

On the right, the South West view of the Hall taken in 1979 for B. M. Copeland's work entitled "Whittington The story of a country estate" clearly shows the so called Pele Tower. Pele Towers do of course exist in the area, one forms a key part of the structure of Borwick Hall, now used as an Outdoor Pursuit Centre by Lancashire Outdoor Education, and a more famous one exists at Arnside. Below left is the present day view of the SW aspect of the hall.

The Dining Room is shown as it was redesigned in the 1930's by Thomas Howarth. Furniture by Gillows formed an important part of the furnishings and an oil painting still hangs in the Judges Chambers in Lancaster depicting the Dining Room with Gillows furniture.

Top of Page