Red Rice, Hampshire
Red Rice is a hamlet and country house in the civil parish of Upper Clatford, south-west of Andover in the English county of Hampshire. Etymology. The name originates from: Red Rice House and park. Red Rice has a house built in an early Georgian park probably built around 1740. The outside is faced with Clipsham stone. It has a slate roof and arched windows. There are 13 bays and a porte cochere of 4 Tuscan columns. The stables areas include a clock tower and an arch of rubbed bricks. The park was extended by the diversion  of a local road and the building has been extended. William Burn re-modelled the house in the mid 19th century. More buildings were added when the site became a school in 1961. The gate lodge and gatepiers are designated English Heritage Listed Building Designation Grade II. Historical significance. Red Rice was home of the family, associated with the Prince of Wales (later King George IV), in a secret and illegal marriage to the Roman Catholic mistress, Maria Anne Fitzherbert. The building was used during World War II by American forces and used for various secret and high level planning . This included the reserve headquarters of the D Day Landings, should the primary location become unserviceable. Early history. The current House was built around 1740 with red brick. A water-supply system was installed during the period, but it is not clear where the supply originated. The parts examined in 1960 by Mr Wilfred Carpenter Turner, an expert on older buildings, were found to be still operating and in very good condition. Lords Berwick. At times before 1913, the external walls were rendered with cement. Creepers were planted. There were Flemish gables and sashes of cavernous plate-glass. The road  at the front was diverted. A stable block (with a mounting block) and archway was built of red brick. A wide variety of trees were planted. It is not clear who was living in the House after 1819. It probably remained to be owned by Thomas, the childless 2nd Baron Berwick. Thomas died in 1832, leaving his estate to his brother, the new Baron. Best family. Three generations of Thomas Best lived there. Rev Thomas Best (1796-1880) purchased it in late 1845 or early 1846. He was a Magistrate, a Clerk in Holy Orders and Lord of the Manor . His son Thomas Best Esq, Magistrate (1828-1886) was the second generation, and his son Captain Thomas George Best of the Royal Horse Artillery (1861-1926), the third generation, became the new Lord of the Manor; and then sold it. In 1844, they planned to divert the road that ran in front of the park (to make a more imposing drive leading to the house), build stables, start an arboretum, create pleasure grounds and develop a large, productive kitchen garden. The legacy of those early trees provided sequoias, mighty green and copper beeches, cedars, a rare weeping beech (outside Errington  House) and innumerable elms. At the back of the house a great variety of trees were planted in such a way that a large number of different species of tree could be seen individually from the house. Grantley family. Lord Grantley's son suggests his father purchased Red Rice for shooting, rather than hunting. The family removed a number of rooms on two floors to construct a very fine Great Hall with plasterwork in a coved ceiling and pillared entrance. A new ceiling, in the style of Adam, was added to the dining-room. Several marble fireplaces were installed. General  Edwardian alterations included plaster cherubs in the morning-room. More trees were added. Miller Mundy family. The family made many changes and repairs to the building. Outbuildings were built to accommodate estate workers involved in the family's interests in sport, shooting and rearing pheasants and livestock. Four tennis courts and a secluded Japanese water-garden, trees and a path leading to two discreet rose-gardens, each containing a fountain, were built. In 1933 there were major renovations. The old, decaying, grey rendering was removed and the red brick walls were encased in honey-coloured Clipsham stone with the ground  floor boldly rusticated and a beetling cornice at the top. All windows replaced by chain-hung sashes with proportioned panes. The roof was renewed and drains re-designed. Fire hydrants and static water-tanks were built around the house, fed from the original Regency water-supply system. Almost all internal timber was replaced due to damage from death-watch beetle and woodworm. Rooms were grouped into suites, plumbing and bathrooms improved, electrical outlets were added. They built some form of early oil-fired central heating. The interior was decorated throughout with a durable paint of beige colour. A nursery wing  was built onto the main House, linking it to the stables. The new floorspace was used for a 'studio and a boudoir', and working and living areas for the senior house servants. After the war. With the departure in 1961 of Major Miller Mundy, the main entity of Redrice was divided into two main parts, the house and immediate grounds, and Home Farm. Redrice School. The H-shaped estate workshop buildings and most of the stable block perimeter wall were removed. The stable yard was reconstructed to provide three classrooms and two day-rooms, together with changing rooms, ablutions and  a housemaster's study below, and upstairs dormitories for 28 and studies for 30, as well as bathrooms and three master's rooms. The courtyard was floored with paving and chippings. A refectory area was created and roofed in over the old backyard of the house, between the kitchen and the house's 1933 wing. Trees were cleared for playing fields. After 1982, several new buildings have been added for Farleigh School. Paintings and photographs. Until the House became a School in 1961, the House contained many portraits. In 1893, a local history society reported there was a portrait of  General Pitt in Thomas Best's house. When Eisenhower visited during the war, it was noted that the mansion was "hung with ancient paintings". A photograph of the Great Hall (now a Chapel) in 1945 shows the original "Cupid & Psyche" by John Hoppner hanging with many other paintings. In 1960, purchasers saw many family portraits and engravings of ladies, which were not part of the sale; and taken by the vendor; and some were sold by Auction at Christies. In the 1920s the sale of the property is believed to have included a printed prospectus which included photographs. The earliest  known existing photograph is an aerial photograph; probably taken between 1933 and 1960. Home Farm. On 28 April 1961, the farming side of the hamlet (approximately 850 acres) was purchased by the Scott family. This was farmed with their relatives the Barnes-Gorell family. This included the parkland to the south east of the main house, 16 farm workers cottages, the market garden, farm buildings, outlying barns and woodland. Over the years, the houses were improved and modernized. Several were knocked into larger accommodation to increase the quality of the homes. The farm infrastructure was improved and in 1967 the  dairy herd was sold and the output switched solely to arable crops. Unusually the farm retained extensive soil, climate and other key data from every growing season. This enabled it to be competitive by specializing in growing seed crops for the major seed producers. Before the First World War, the farm employed 40 men and about 80 horses. There were required for all aspects of the farming process. The introduction of traction engines did little to reduce their numbers. When they were being used, up to 8 horses were required to pull the water bowsers from the Pill Hill Brook , a tributary of the River Anton that runs through the Clatfords, to Red Rice to keep their boilers supplied. The introduction of modern tractors reduced the number of horses required. In 1963, the Scott family built their family home in the Horse Meadow field. It was aptly named Horse Meadow. Mary Scott was an internationally acclaimed sculptress, whose work includes the plaque commemorating the battle at Gallipoli during the First World War which is found in the Crypt of St Paul's Cathedral, London. Her husband, Edward Scott was part of the small photographic unit that recorded the devastation from  Britain's atomic weapons test in Montebello in 1952. The family sold the majority of the farm land and Home Farm in 2004, and retained their home, a cottage and surrounding lands of 40 acres around the family home, and a small paddock and 18 acres of woodland to the south of Redrice House called Home Covert. Legends and associated stories. A local legend about the avenue tells of a ghostly coach and horses on the road between Red Rice and Abbotts Ann. This is almost certainly a reference to a Roman mosaic unearthed in the nearby field by "Squire  Errington, depicting a coach and a pair of galloping horses". In the house itself, one boy who used to practise on the chapel organ was sure he had seen a 'Grey Lady' walking up the aisle. Two of the school staff, accommodated in the upper floor of the stable courtyard, (previously occupied by grooms and domestic servants of the estate), told of overwhelming feelings of terror at night experienced in one particular corner. Three stories could account for this. One tells of a drunken fight between two grooms, which ended with one of them killed by a fall down a  steep staircase. The second relates to a shooting episode in 1886. The third is told by Lord Grantley in his autobiography 'A Silver-plated Spoon'; One evening the butler, appropriately named Butler, came in and announced that he intended to 'do himself in,' but that he had made arrangements for his duties to be taken over by the senior footman. The family's reaction was 'Poor old Butler, drunk again,' but they found him dead next day. Popular culture. Eliza Carthy named her 1998 Mercury Music Prize nominated album "Red Rice" after travelling in the area. Red Rice, Hampshire Red