A HISTORY OF SURREY 



John Reed to come to Weybridge to attend his father's 

 month-mind. There was to be 'a great assembly of 

 his kin,' and Isabel Reed, John's stepmother, thought 

 it right for him to be present." Mistress Isabel was 

 a thorn in Cromwell's side ; she continued to live at 

 Oatlands for a time as his tenant, and made various 

 efforts to get possession of her stepson's property. 43 

 However, in 1537 John Reed and his guardian con- 

 veyed the manor of Oatlands to Henry VIII, who 

 wished to annex it to the honour of Hampton Court, 44 

 receiving in exchange the house, lands, &c., of the 

 suppressed monastery of Tandridge. 45 In December 

 1537 the king spent a fortnight at Oatlands in the 

 Reed's old house 46a ; and he set on foot repairs there 

 as well as at Hampton Court and Nonsuch. 46 The 

 building of the new palace began in 1538. During the 

 next few years he paid frequent short visits to his new 

 palace, and was there married to Katherine Howard. 4 ' 

 Queen Elizabeth visited Oatlands on several occasions, 48 

 for the last time in August, 1602, when she is said to 

 have shot with a crossbow in the paddock. 49 James I, 

 with the queen and prince, was at Oatlands for some 

 time before his coronation. 60 In 1611 he granted 

 the manor, house, and park to the queen for eighty 

 years. 51 



Charles I stayed several times at Oatlands, partly 

 for the sake of the stag-hunting, 51 though he found 

 the accommodation insufficient for his retinue. 63 In 

 1640 his fourth son, Henry Duke of Gloucester, was 

 born there." The head-quarters of the royal army 

 were there after the advance to London had been 

 stopped at Turnham Green in 1 642." Charles him- 

 self was taken to Oatlands on his journey from 

 Holdenby House in August, i647, 66 and apparently 

 spent some days there in the charge of the Commis- 

 sioners, as Lord Montagu wrote from here to the 

 Commons requesting more money for the king's privy 

 purse, and that his clothes, table-linen, &c. might be 

 sent there. 57 



Most of the buildings were destroyed and the land 

 was disparked during the Interregnum, a quantity of 

 timber being felled in the park for the use of the 

 navy ; M but after the Restoration the queen-dowager 

 regained possession of Oatlands. 59 The estate was 

 subsequently leased to Henry Jermyn, Earl of 

 St. Albans (traditionally the second husband of Queen 

 Henrietta Maria), who sold his interest in it to Sir 

 Edward Herbert, who lived in the Reeds' old house. 60 

 Sir Edward was a faithful servant of James II, 

 and was attainted in consequence of having taken 

 part in that king's invasion of Ireland ; his estates 

 were confiscated, and Oatlands reverted to the Crown. 

 In 1696 Arthur Herbert, Earl of Torrington, his 

 elder brother, obtained from William III a grant in 



CLINTON. Argent six 

 crosslets ftchy table and 

 a chief azure ivith tivo 

 moltn or pierced gules 

 therein. 



fee-simple of Oatlands, which he bequeathed in 1716 

 to Henry Clinton, Earl of Lincoln. The latter 

 formed the gardens at Oatlands about 1725, and 

 rebuilt the house on the terrace, 

 which was burnt down in 

 1793." He died in 1728, 

 and was succeeded by his son 

 George, who only lived eigh- 

 teen months after his father's 

 death. The second son, Henry, 

 came into the property, which 

 he held for many years. He 

 altered the garden, built the 

 grotto, and made the Broad 

 Water. He became Duke of 

 Newcastle in 1768 ; and some 

 time before his death in 1794 

 sold Oatlands to Frederick 



Duke of York. 6 * The Duke of York died in 1827, 

 and Oatlands was then sold to Mr. Edward Ball 

 Hughes. The estate has since been broken up ; 

 much of it was bought by Lord Francis Egerton 

 and the Hon. John Locke-King. The house of the 

 Duke of York, rebuilt after the fire of 1793, has been 

 mostly pulled down, but part is incorporated in the 

 Oatlands Park Hotel. A great part of the park, in the 

 two parishes of Weybridge and Walton on Thames, is 

 covered with villa residences. 



The site of the palace is in the grounds of Oatlands 

 Lodge, Mr. Justice Swinfen Eady's estate. In the 

 garden walls are two gateways, bricked up, surmounted 

 by fine flat pointed arches of moulded brickwork, and 

 the traces of two blocked windows. These belonged 

 to the small building shown in views on the north- 

 west side of the courtyard of the palace. There is 

 much old brickwork in the garden walls. There 

 also remains what is known as the Subterranean Passage, 

 along the line of the west side of the main build- 

 ing. It is in places loft, wide, but has been nar- 

 rowed by party walls in others. It is covered by a 

 pointed arch of brickwork, and a cellar opening from 

 it has a good arched entrance of moulded brick. It 

 apparently extended beyond the palace at both ends. 

 It has been interrupted, and its length is not exactly 

 known. Though rather puzzling from its length, it 

 probably was a basement to keep the house dry. 

 There is a well in it, still used to supply a pump in 

 the gardens, and as the cellar opens from it, it was 

 clearly not a sewer. Tradition says that it reached at 

 the north-west to Dorney House, in Weybridge. In 

 the grounds of the same estate is the well-known 

 grotto, built of tufa, quartz, shells and spars, with 

 winding passages, imitation stalactites, and a marble 

 bath, now dry. It was made for the Duke of New- 



<*L. and P. Hen, fill, vii, 1246. 

 48 Ibid, vii, 1247 ; ix, 1151 ; x, 106. 



44 Manning and Bray, Hist, of Surr. ii, 

 786 ; see L. and P. Hen. fill, xii (2), 

 1209. 



4 >Ibid. xiii (i), 190 (2); Hart. MS. 

 4786. 



45 The old house was on the site of the 

 Earl of Lincoln's later house. It was 

 (till standing in Walton parish when 

 the Commonwealth Survey (q.v.) was 

 made. 



*L. and P. Hen. VIII, xiii (2), 1280 ; 

 xiv(i), 904 (20) i xiv (2), 236, &c. 

 4 7Ibid. xvi, 1470, &c. 



tmt MSS. (Hist MSS. Com.), i 



(i), 21 j Hiit. MSS. Com. Rep. iv, App. i, 

 336. 



"Hist. MSS. Cam. Ref. xi, App. vii, 

 123 ; Manning and Bray, Hist, of Surr. ii, 

 786. 



60 Hist. MSS. Com. Ref. xiii, App. iv, 

 128. 



61 Pat. 9 Jas. I, pt. xxvii. 



^Hist. MSS. Com. Ref. iv, App. i, 

 294. 



68 Ibid, xi, App. vii, 148. 



H Weybridge Par. Reg. The duke was 

 often called ' Henry of Oatlands.' 



"Journ. of Prince Rupert's Marches, 

 Engl. Hist. Rev. no. 52, p. 731. 



47 8 



58 Lords' Journ. ix, 199 ; Com. Journ. v, 

 284. 



6 ' Hist. MSS. Com. Ref. xiii, App. i, 43 3. 



68 Ibid. App. i, xiii, 577. 



" Lansd. MS. 252. 



60 Manning and Bray, Hist, of Surr. ii, 

 387 ; see Hist. MSS. Com. Ref. xiii, 

 App. v, 241-6 ; Evelyn's Diary, 20 Dec. 

 1687, where Bray's editorial note is 

 wrong. 



81 ' Probably,' Manning and Bray write. 

 But a contemporary print fixes the date of 

 the building before his death. 



64 Manning and Bray, ut supra j see Hist. 

 MSS. Com. Ref. xv, App. vi, 546. 



