Issue 37 Spring 23 WEB - Flipbook - Page 34
Woodborough Hall
ruined the last Strelleys. George Lacock was a Nottingham solicitor who probably acquired the mortgage when
the family needed money.
The early history of the Hall
A feature of the history of Woodborough Hall is that
ownership of the land can be traced back to William the
Conqueror.
George's third son, Philip Lacock, pulled down whatever
house was on the site in the 1660's and built a two storey
house with a gabled and tiled roof. Philip died in 1668 and
the house later passed via a daughter of the family to the
Bainbridge's of whom Elizabeth (1716-1797) who never
married seems to have been the best remembered. When
Elizabeth died in 1798 the Manor House passed to another name, Story. The Rev’d Philip Story was a cousin,
second son of her aunt, Ann Lacock who married John
Story.
The first record of land holding in Woodborough is in the
Domesday Book completed in 1086. This showed that
Woodborough was included in a very large estate given
to William the Conqueror's son William Peveril. It is
probable that the site of Woodborough Hall would have
been part of Ulchel's manor of four and one half carucates
(540 acres).
Soon after it seems that William dispossessed them since
the land was taken over by Ralf, a Norman who took
the name de Wodeburg. The Manor stayed in the de
Wodeburg family until 1336 when it passed to Richard de
Strelley, son of Sampson de Strelley who built St Swithun’s
church chancel. It remained in his family until 1622 when
it passed to Isabel Bold, whose grandson Strelley Bold
finally sold the lands to George Lacock in 1640.
During the Story's occupation, the old gable and tiled roof
was removed and another storey added, with a new slate
roof. These alterations may have been to a design by the
noted Nottingham architect T C Hine. It appears that
the Story's mostly lived elsewhere and the Hall was let to
Captain Fenwick, Mr Worth and Colonel Hancock. After
being empty for seven years it was sold in 1842, with 53
acres of land to John Ingall Werg and this was only the
second sale of land since the Norman Conquest
The Manor of Woodborough Hall had therefore belonged
to the de Wodeburg’s and de Strelley's for 600 years, but
being on the Royalist side in the Civil Wars had probably
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