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Audleys Wood, Cliddesden

Audleys Wood House, 1960

Audleys Wood lies in the northeast corner of Cliddesden parish, its grounds separated from Hackwood Park by the road from Basingstoke to Alton. The entrance is from this road by a tree-lined drive to the house. Originally, a second entrance existed from the Farleigh Road, the drive passing the Pensdell farm buildings. The name occurs as Oddele in the thirteenth century and as Odlease in 1576.[1]  The 25” Ordnance Survey map of 1870 marks the land as Odleys Copse .

Built in the 1880s of red brick with tiled roofs, the house is a mixture of styles with many antique fittings imported giving an impression of an earlier age. Major alterations were made c.1900 with the addition of a conservatory/ball-room, in 1952 when converted to a Home for the elderly and again in 1986 when the house became a hotel. It stands in extensive wooded –grounds.

A gentry house and sporting estate, owners included Thomas Pain a director of Tattersalls, the bloodstock auctioneers; William Bradshaw, a great benefactor of St Leonard’s church, Cliddesden; and three generations of the Reading brewery Simonds family.

During the 1939-45 war the house was occupied by Lord Camrose, owner and editor-in-chief of the Daily Telegraph.

 

 


[1] MSS. penes, Merton College, Oxford; VCH vol. 4 p.145.

 

Content derived from research undertaken as part of the Victoria County History project

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20th Century (1901-1999)
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Post World War II (1945-1999)
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Victorian (1837-1901)
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20th Century (1901-1999)