Glasshayes

Glasshayes
Glasshayes in the early 20th century
General information
Status	Scheduled for demolition
Address	78 High Street, Lyndhurst, Hampshire, SO43 7NL
Coordinates	50°52′19″N 1°34′19″W / 50.87202°N 1.57206°W / 50.87202; -1.57206
Opened	early 19th century (retaining material from earlier building)
Owner	PegasusLife

Glasshayes is a historic country house in Lyndhurst, in The New Forest, Hampshire. Used in the 20th century as the Grand Hotel, then the Lyndhurst Park Hotel, the building and estate was purchased in 2014 by developers and is now scheduled for demolition.

Glasshayes is first mentioned by name a conveyance document of 1728. At this stage in its history the land is mainly agricultural, with a cluster of smaller 17th and 18th century vernacular properties in the location of the current house. In 1763 the estate was purchased by Arthur Phillip, along with Black Acre and Vernalls, and he lived in the area with his first wife Charlotte, farming the land until 1769 when Phillip returned to service in Australia.

The present Glasshayes House was built sometime between 1806 and 1816 by George Buck (esquire), utilising material from the earlier buildings, as a countryside retreat for he and his wife (who died at the house in 1826, and supposedly still haunts it).

In the 1840s Glasshayes "consisted of a house, offices, garden and pleasure ground on six acres and four acres of adjoining fields, three of which was pasture"; in 1846 it had become the English seat of Richard Fitzgeorge de Stacpoole, 1st Duc de Stacpoole, who made considerable extensions to the house (though retained the "Gothick" aesthetic and octagonal tower of George Buck). From the house the Duc ran a local smuggling ring, and lived openly with his married mistress, Mrs Louisa Graves. He died there on the 7 July 1848, and according to local tradition his ghost can still be sighted.

On the Duc's death the house was inherited by Louisa Graves, who later sold the house to a Mr and Mrs Fussell (who do not appear to hav taken residence). The land was later purchased by a local grocer and draper, William Beale Bugden, who farmed the land but did not take residence at the house. During this period of dereliction the house was in regular use by smugglers.

In 1862 Charles Castleman moved to Glasshayes with his third wife Isabel Swinburne, and whilst in residence gifted the clock to the clocktower of the newly built local St. Michael and All Angels church, in exchange for the closing of an insalubrious public road which ran directly behind the house.