Michael Heath-Caldwell M.Arch
Brisbane, Queensland
ph: 0412-78-70-74
alt: m_heath_caldwell@hotmail.com
Ebernoe House
Link to the video of Admiral Sir Herbert Heath and Ahmad Shah Qajar, the Shah of Persia - London, 1919.
Admiral Sir Herbert Heath and the Shah of Persia, London 1919.
Admiral Sir Herbert Heath and Sir Thomas Lane Devitt at Pangbourne, 1917 - link to video on the internet, which may work by hitting on the photo.
Rosamond Heath getting into a car.
Rosamond Heath in a family group photo
Rosamond Heath's Jamboree crowd at Petworth House, England in the 1930s
Jamboree or Scout and Girl Guide camp at Petworth, near Ebernoe House. 1930s.
Scout and Guide camp at Petworth House, 1930s.
Historic Houses of Sussex - by Viscountess Wolseley
No. 30 Ebernoe House, Near Petworth
This house is a very perfect well-preserved late Georgian one that we connect mostly with the well-known Peachey family who lived here, apparently, until some thirteen years ago. There was a far earlier building here, said to be about four hundred years old, and some of the garden walls of this earlier home still remain.
It is said that the Peachey who built the present house selected the site because of the two fine Spanish chestnuts that still stand like sentinels upon either side of the tall Georgian front door, some short distance to the south of the house. This front door which is painted white, shows in the classic moulding of its portico and the delicacy of design of its fan-light somewhat of the formality of style that we expect to find in the hall-door of a stately town house. In fact, the whole of this two-storeyed square, imposing red-brick mansion impresses us with a feeling that much time, thought and expense must have been lavished upon its erection, for all the details of the interior are so carefully finished, so perfect in design.
The first room on the right-hand side of the corridor hall is square in shape and although comparatively small it gives a feeling of spaciousness because the walls are high and the tall windows admit much light. A bank of scarlet geraniums, massed together in an adjoining conservatory cast, through the open door, a pleasing bit of vivid colour into this room, the walls of which are white. The mantelpiece, delicate in design and of similar date to that of the front door, is made more beautiful by the yellow marble that is inset beneath the white egg and tongue decoration. The beauty of the steel firearms and grate and of very small etcetca of the fittings of the fireplace make it a most perfect example of the skilled workmanship of this rather late Georgian date.
This careful thought for the combination of beauty with practical need is carried throughout all the rooms - even to such small things as the door-handles - and so, we gain in this house something that is absolutely complete and very beautiful of its era. There is a dignity, a stateliness about such a house, that is especially pleasing in these days when homes spring up like mushrooms in a night and the main idea is to make them labour-saving and throw in only that amount of beauty that can be combined with ease of housework.
At the time when Ebernoe House was built, a contented, well-trained staff was in attendance to interest themselves and take real joy in the general upkeep of these rooms, and so it was worth while having even door-plates and shutter-knobs well designed, for their high polish was the pride of the housekeeper and her assistants. These days of skill in housework, of glory in a profession that is after all one of the noblest and healthiest for womenfolk are rapidly passing, and that is why in our modern homes we have to resort to plain utilitiy and there is a dimunition of elegance in finish and detail.
From a small room behind the drawing-room it is possible to gain a view, on the east side of a charming grass vista leading the eye to where a tall pergola forms the end of a fine herbaceous border. It is gay with Golden Elder, scrarlet poppies and other bright colouring and tempts us to go further where the old garden wall of the original house remains and in it, two openings, looking rather like windows in their arched red-brick outline, are upon either side of a wide recessed shadow-house. It is said that bees were formerly kept within the hollow of the wall behind these openings and this recalled to me the places for bee-hives that are still to be seen in the old garden wall of Packwood in Warwickshire.
From the recessed loggia in the old wall, a peasling view of the house is obtained: a pretty sunk water-garden and then the high pergola making a foreground and frame to this picture.
On the outer wall of the house, on this east side, there hangs a ponderous-looking bell, used probably in old days to summon the household to their meals, and beside it, a lead rain-water pipe appears to have the emblem of a Dolphin's head.
On the west side of the house, near where a climbing Hydrangea flourishes, an ancient insurance sign, wrought in iron, bears the date of 1697 upon it. This, presumably, belonged to a part of the earlier building and the date on the stable weather-vane, which is 1765, can probably be taken as approximately the time when this present red-brick house was added to the old one.
The views of the wooded distant Blackdown Beacon from the west side ofr the house are lovely and especially so when the sun comes out fitfully and the cloud shadows, passing over the hills, make them appear deep cobalt in colour and even darker still, for the hills near Surrey always seem to me darker and richer than our Sussex South Downs - and then, as the sun lights up some little patch of light that contrasts well with the sombre quiet beyond. In the foreground are great stretches of heather and gorse, the home of many bees, for a large industry connected with them is carried on in this part of the country.
Close to the Spanish chestnuts on the south side of the house is a wonderful rhodedendron that has been trained in such a way that its branches form a roofed-in shadow-house. The woods and commons that adjoin this formal looking house are particularly attractive in their wide glades of open grass between the fine trees wher red and pink foxgloves and young bracken, just beginning to push through, carpet the ground between tall bushes of wild roses and honeysuckle. A veritable jungle of beauty, in short, is this neighbourhood where the celebrated Ebernoe Horned Fair is held, the original intention of which seems lost in the mist of ages. A short account of this festivity held on St.James's Day, July 25, was given not long ago in this Magazine, and we were then reminded of the horned sheep that is roasted whole in a brick fireplace on the Fair ground.
In regard to the story of the Manor of Ebernowe, alias Ibernoew, also Hibernowe, we find it mostly related in vol.xix. of the Sussex Record Society and the following is a brief resume of it. The Manor was attached to the Honour of Arundel and in 1542, the King severed it fropm that Honour but, in 1565, it was again included in it. It was purchased in 1570, by John Brown and Thomas Smythe. This latter family appear to have retained an interest in it until 1646, when it was quit-claimed to Thomas Peachey, gen. In 1704-5, we find John Peachey and Thomas Thornton as plaintiff and William Peachey and his wife, Susan, as deforciants. The Manor was then granted to the plaintiffws for a term of 99 years, for which they had to render annually one pepercorn at the Feast of St.Michael. If William and Susan, or either of them lived so long.
This family had as their arms, we are told by Berry, "Azure, a lion rampant, ermine, ducally crowned or, a canton ofr the last, charged with a mullet, pierced gules."
It is through the kindness of Admiral Sir Herbert L. and Lady Heath, that I have been allowed to show you Ebernoe House, and in looking back at the many old houses that have been represented in this magazine during the course of nearly three years, we shall find that they mostly belong to Tudor and Jacobean times, so that Ebernoe House stands out as one of special interest. Moreover, it hold much that the architect of to-day will value. We find space, light and a simplicity of design in the matter of the wall-panels that might well serve are a model. They are so well proportioned that they hardly call for pictures, and so they should satisfy the taste of to-day when pictures are, I grieve to say, at a discount. Perhaps a happier time will come, when the architect and artist will work together unitedly so that a room is planned to hold a few really fine works of art in order that those who have to earn their living by means of brush and canvas will not find themselves ousted to another art.
The rooms of a Georgian house are always somewhat limited in number because all are fairly spacious and the house would be on too large a scale if they were numerous. They were planned for the wide hoops of the ladies' dresses, for the low bows and deep curtseys of a stately age. We have not here the low-ceilinged rooms on many different levels, the treacherous little steps up and down that so often bewilder us in Tudor houses. The art of building had progressed and was 'elegant' as we can hear Fanny Burney saying to her own Georgian days. In fact, this little quite person wiht her observant eyes seems to fit in well with Ebernoe, and we can picture her and Mrs Thrale or even Mrs Delany and her Duchess halting here in their chariots to partake of a dish of tea on their way back to town from a brief sojourn at Brighthelmstone with dear Dr. Johnson.
Photo portrait of Admiral Sir Herbert L Heath from the book on the Heath family. About 1920. Sir Herbert had rather an adventurous life, including surviving a sea disaster when Portsmouth was rammed and sunk in 1887. More videos of Sir Herbert in 1917 at Pangbourne are on the internet.
Admiral Sir Herbert Heath out the front of Admiralty House, Portsmouth.
Lady Elizabeth Heath and her daughters Madeline Marion de Salis and Rosamond Heath at Admiralty House, Portsmouth. Madeline may be the 'Shilly' who was running a hospital in Bangkok when the Japanese invaded and was interned during WWII.
Elizabeth and Herbert.
Admiral Sir Herbert Heath
Elizabeth and Herbert Heath with Rosamond behind and Madeline to the right, about 1920
Heath-Caldwell All rights reserved.
Michael Heath-Caldwell M.Arch
Brisbane, Queensland
ph: 0412-78-70-74
alt: m_heath_caldwell@hotmail.com