Loughtor

Newnham Park (before circa 1718Loughtor) is an historic estate in the civil parish of Sparkwell, Devon. It was known as Loughtor until about 1700 when the ancient Strode family, long seated at Newnham, about 1 mile south-east of the manor house of Loughtor, abandoned Newnham and moved their residence to Loughtor (which they had inherited by a marriage in the 16th century) where they built a new mansion house which they renamed "Newnham Park". In 2014 the mansion house with an estate of about 1,550 acres is still owned by a descendant (via various female lines) of the Courtenay and Strode families which held the estate from the 15th century, and which were well established in the county of Devon long before that time. In 2014 part of the estate is operated as a commercial clay-pigeon shooting ground.

Sir William Pole (d.1635) relates the early holders of Loughtorre as follows:

The first recorded holders of Loughtor was the family of Le Abbé (alias Le Abbe, le Abby)

The de Radford family (formerly known as Le Abbé) continued to hold Loughtor, apparently until the 15th century, when the next known holder was William Courtenay, a younger son of Sir Philip Courtenay (d.1488) of Molland in North Devon.

The next recorded holder following the de Radford tenure was a younger son of the Courtenay family of Molland in North Devon. It is not clear how this family acquired Loughtor, but the feudal barony of Plympton had certainly been held by Hugh Courtenay, 2nd Earl of Devon (1303-1377), seated at Tiverton Castle and Okehampton Castle, from whom the Courtenay family of Molland was descended.

For the descent of Loughtor in the Strode family until 1718 see Newnham (Old).

Until 1718 it is not clear what use, if any, was made by the Strode family of the old manor house of the Courtenays at Loughtor, as they appear to have continued to reside chiefly at "Old Newnham". The first of the Strodes to live at Loughtor was:

In 1955 Judith Eileen Strode Valle-Pope (born 1934) married Michael Maurice Cobbold (1931-2002), descended from an old Suffolk brewing dynasty, a professional soldier, engineer, publisher, preserver of ancient buildings and sheep-farmer. In 1969 Judith Cobbold (née Valle-Pope) inherited Newnham Park with its 1,550 acre estate, and with her husband developed the estate as a corporate entertainment business including shooting, archery, carriage-driving and off-road vehicles and moto-cross. Her son David Michael Strode Cobbold (born 1961) is the owner of Newnham Park in 2014.

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