Marden Hill is a Grade II* listed country house close to the village of

Tewin Tewin is an English village and civil parish in Hertfordshire, England between the towns of Welwyn Garden City, Stevenage, Welwyn (village) and the county town Hertford, it is within commuting distance of London. Tewin Wood is a very affluent re ...

, Hertfordshire. The house, originally Jacobean but substantially rebuilt in the 18th-century and modified in the 19th, is built in two storeys with attics of yellow brick with Portland stone dressings. The floor plan is square with five bays and a two-storey Ionic entrance porch at the front.

History

In 1550, the Manor of Marden paid a rent of of honey to the abbey of St Alban. Marden was held by the abbey until the dissolution, and in 1539 it was granted to William Cavendish. It came to Edward North, Master of the Harriers to

Edward VI Edward VI (12 October 1537 – 6 July 1553) was King of England and Ireland from 28 January 1547 until his death in 1553. He was crowned on 20 February 1547 at the age of nine. Edward was the son of Henry VIII and Jane Seymour and the first E ...

. In 1653 his grandson demolished the Elizabethan building and built a new house on the site, Marden Hill, high above the

Mimram The River Mimram is a river in Hertfordshire, England. Geography The river valley known locally as the Mimram Valley is named after the River Mimram, which rises from a spring to the north-west of Whitwell, in North Hertfordshire, England, an ...

. After several owners, Robert Mackay demolished all but the present north wing in 1789 and it was redesigned in 1790-94 by Francis Carter retaining Jacobean fragments of the house. It was bought by Richard Flower (the father of

Edward Fordham Flower Edward Fordham Flower (1805–1883) was an English brewer and author who campaigned for a Shakespeare memorial theatre and against cruelty to animals. Origins Born at Marden Hill in Hertfordshire on 31 January 1805, he was the younger surviving ...

) and became the meeting place of many men of 'radical and dissenting opinion' including

William Cobbett William Cobbett (9 March 1763 – 18 June 1835) was an English pamphleteer, journalist, politician, and farmer born in Farnham, Surrey. He was one of an agrarian faction seeking to reform Parliament, abolish "rotten boroughs", restrain foreign ...

. Flower emigrated to the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

in 1817, hiring two ships at Liverpool to transport all his belongings. Flower subsequently helped found Albion, Illinois, and wrote on the English Settlement in the state. The house was sold to Charles G. Thornton, who served as

Governor of the Bank of England The governor of the Bank of England is the most senior position in the Bank of England. It is nominally a civil service post, but the appointment tends to be from within the bank, with the incumbent grooming their successor. The governor of the Ba ...

in the 1790s. Through his connection with the bank, Thornton knew the architect Sir

John Soane Sir John Soane (; né Soan; 10 September 1753 – 20 January 1837) was an English architect who specialised in the Neo-Classical style. The son of a bricklayer, he rose to the top of his profession, becoming professor of architecture at the R ...

, surveyor of the Bank of England since 1788, and commissioned him to extend the house. Soane's work for the Bank of England is largely destroyed but elements of that building were used in his designs for Marden Hill and still exist, particularly the Aztec-style cornices and the Ionic columns. He designed a vestibule and staircase, and also added the Ionic-columned two-storey

porch A porch (from Old French ''porche'', from Latin ''porticus'' "colonnade", from ''porta'' "passage") is a room or gallery located in front of an entrance of a building. A porch is placed in front of the facade of a building it commands, and form ...

that is a notable feature of the building. In 1903 it came, at last, to be owned by the Cowper estate, and was leased. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

, it was occupied by a boarding school. The building was listed in 1952. In 1957 it was owned by a gravel extraction company, which was unable to demolish the building, and leased it to two architects, who signed a 21-year lease. A co-ownership company was formed, which now owns the freehold of Marden Hill. Nine families live there today. Marden Hill house from Panshanger poppy field 1

Marden Hill house from Panshanger poppy field 1

References

{{coord, 51.8099, -0.1456, type:landmark_region:GB, display=title Country houses in Hertfordshire Grade II* listed buildings in Hertfordshire John Soane buildings