Monument record 8331/1/1 - Park View House, London Road

Country house, built circa 1833, but demolished by the late 20th century. The lodge and stables still survive

{1} In December 1875 the ex-King and Queen of Naples came to England for fox-hunting and took up residence in “Park View” where she would be in the heart of the Grafton Hunt district. Park View was on the south side of Towcester, Northamptonshire near the Folly public house on the Watling Street. The lodge house and the stables are still in existence.

The Bishop, Francis Kerrill Amhurst, wrote in his memoirs that in 1875 the King and Queen of Naples (they had been deposed in 1861) took Park View, Towcester, for the hunting season.

{2} Park View House was commissioned by William Gilbert Elliott, a Towcester Solicitor, shortly before 1833 but only lived in it for a few years. Captain Villiers was a tenant at Park View for a few years in the 1840s and probably a significant one for the subsequent history of the house as he appears to have been an ardent hunter. The stabling was increased from 3 to 12 and the house was then considered a 'hunting residence'. Part of the Easton Neston Estate from 1855 until 2017.

Park View House was a castellated ‘Gothic’ mansion approached by a drive off London Road at the southern end of Towcester opposite Towcester racecourse. It is best known as the residence of the ex-King and Queen of Naples when they occupied the buildings for the hunting seasons in 1875-78. The house was in ruins in mid-1950’s and largely demolished shortly afterwards but one small section of the house plus the entrance lodge and three ranges of stables still survive.

{3} Park View House was a castellated country house in the Gothic style built in the 1830s by William Gilbert Elliott, a local s olicitor, who only lived in it for a short time. By the mid-1840s it was occupied by Captain F W C Villiers who increased the stabling from three stalls to stabling for twelve horses. At this point his father was the Master of Horse to Queen Victoria and an ardent fox hunter, and it is likely that his son also enjoyed the sport. From then on the house was considered to be a hunting residence. The house changed ownership again until 1855 when it was bought by George, the 5th Earl of Pomfret, from which date it formed part of the Easton Neston estate and was leased out to various different tenants. The King and Queen of Naples took Park View for the hunt ing season in 1875 and the two following years. After the racecourse at E aston Neston opened in 1929, the stables were used to accommodate some of the entrants. After the last tenant left, the house was left derelict and was described as a ruin on the Ordnance Survey (OS) map of 1955. By 1973 it had been demolished except for a small section of the south wing which adjoins the present south range of the stables .

{4} There is no longer any visible evidence of the former house apart from fragmentary remains at the eastern extent of the stables.

<1> MK Heritage, 2017, Easton Neston House (Website). SNN110757.

<2> Giggens, B, 2018, Historic Towcester Survey: Park View, London Road, Towcester, Northamptonshire (Report). SNN111153.

<3> Historic England, 2020, Stables at Park View, London Road, Towcester (Designation Advice Report). SNN111826.

<4> Richard Hardy, 2024, Park View Stables, Towcester, Northamptonshire, Historic Building Recording (Report). SNN116364.

Record last edited

May 22 2024 11:07AM