Wilton Park Estate
Wilton Park at Beaconsfield in 1888
General information
LocationBeaconsfield, Buckinghamshire
CountryEngland, United Kingdom
Coordinates51°36′09″N 0°37′43″W / 51.60252°N 0.62859°W / 51.60252; -0.62859
Completed1779
Demolished1968
ClientJosias Du Pre, Governor of Madras
Design and construction
Architect(s)Richard Jupp

The Wilton Park Estate is located in Beaconsfield in Buckinghamshire.

History

The Wilton park estate once belonged to the monks of Burnham Abbey. It is mentioned in 1412, with John Amond as farmer.[1]

In 1702 it was acquired by the Basill family, who built a house on the estate. Sometime between 1760 and 1770 they sold the estate to Josias Du Pré, the future Governor of Madras.[2] He commissioned the building of a mansion house on the estate, also known as the "White House", from Richard Jupp which was completed in 1779.[3]

In 1939 the house was taken over by the War Office and used as an interrogation centre for Nazi prisoners of war: German refugees working for the Allies would listen in secret into prisoners' conversations.[4] After the Second World War the house was used by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office to re-educate prisoners of war into the British way of life: between January 1946 and June 1948 approx 4,500 Germans were made to attend re-education classes there.[5] The house went on to become the home of the Army School of Administration from 1949 and also the home of the Army School of Education from 1950.[3] The Foreign Office "re-education" facility, still known as Wilton Park and still organising conferences, moved out in 1951 and is now based at Wiston House in West Sussex.[3]

A single-storey blockhouse was constructed in the grounds of Wilton Park in 1954, to provide a protected wartime headquarters for the senior Army officers of Eastern Command and London District. From 1957, alternative provision was made for the General Officer Commanding-in-Chief, Eastern Command and his staff as part of the Regional Seats of Government planning; but the blockhouse was retained and remained available for use by London District until the end of the Cold War.[6]

In the 1960s a Defence School of Languages was established on the site (Colonel Gaddafi of Libya studied there at that time).[6] Although the house was demolished in 1968, the school remained on the site until April 2014.[7] In September 2014 a single story building known as the "Shean Block" was demolished.[8]

Standing sets for filming the ITV TV series Endeavour were built at Wilton Park in 2016.[9]

In December 2019, Inland Homes was granted planning permission to develop the site and create 146 new homes.[10] In April 2022 a relief road, providing improved access to the site was opened up to the public.[11]

In September 2020, the historian, Helen Fry, published a book titled "MI9: A History of the Secret Service for Escape and Evasion in World War Two" describing what went on at Wilton Park during the Second World War and its subsequent use up to and including the 21st century.[12]

The aftermath of the fire in March 2022

In March 2022, a fire broke out at Wilton Park. It took three hours to get the fire under control: a building in between the fifteen story tower block and Defence School of languages was destroyed but nobody was hurt.[13]

In May 2022, Inland Homes sold part of the site to another developer, Beechcroft Developments, for £19 million.[14]

References

  1. ↑ "Anglo-American Legal Tradition". University of Houston. Retrieved 27 January 2020.
  2. ↑ "Wilton Park". Beaconsfield and District Historical Society. Retrieved 19 May 2019.
  3. 1 2 3 "Wilton Park Development Brief". South Buckinghamshire Council. January 2014. p. 7. Archived from the original on 2014-07-14. Retrieved 9 July 2014.
  4. ↑ "The Nazi prisoners bugged by Germans". BBC. 18 January 2013. Retrieved 9 July 2014.
  5. ↑ Arthur Lee Smith. The war for the German mind: re-educating Hitler's soldiers. p. 50.
  6. 1 2 "Wilton Park". Subterranea Britannica. Retrieved 28 November 2014.
  7. ↑ "The Defence Centre for Languages and Culture (DCLC)". Defence Academy of the United Kingdom. British Ministry of Defence. Archived from the original on 1 June 2014. Retrieved 17 November 2014.
  8. ↑ "A Husband's Most Secret War in MI9 IS9". MI9. Retrieved 30 October 2022.
  9. ↑ "Exclusive Endeavour Series 5 Set Report". Damian Michael Barcroft. Retrieved 5 March 2018.
  10. ↑ Sketchley, Elisha (2019-12-02). "£350m Wilton Park development gets the green light". Planning, BIM & Construction Today. Retrieved 2022-10-28.
  11. ↑ "Beaconsfield 'road to nowhere' OPENS for traffic". Bucks Free Press. Retrieved 2022-10-28.
  12. ↑ Fry, Helen (2020). MI9: A History of the Secret Service for Escape and Evasion in World War Two. Yale University Press. doi:10.2307/j.ctv15pjxb4. ISBN 978-0300260939. JSTOR j.ctv15pjxb4.
  13. ↑ "13 fire crews tackle huge blaze in Beaconsfield last night". Bucks Free Press. Retrieved 2022-10-30.
  14. ↑ "Developer sells part of major new housing estate for £19m". Bucks Free Press. Retrieved 2022-10-28.
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