![]() What was once a statue-lined walk has now lost its statues – removed to Chatsworth for health and safety reasons to avoid them toppling and crushing the pupils playing in the grounds of the school. In a walled garden we came across this bothy, built as a playhouse for the Devonshire children and currently housing bits and pieces of listed “stuff” that has to be preserved. Alongside stabling for horses and carriages, the block in the photo was dedicated to cows and sheep below and grooms above. The house was acquired by the Devonshire family by marriage in 1763 when Lady Elizabeth Compton married Lord George Cavendish and in 1858 it was added to the estates of the 7th Duke, William Cavendish. When he finally got his turn 20 years later he died after six months – supposedly due to the stress of the job. The man who commissioned this was Spencer Compton, Britain’s second prime minister, elbowed out of the chance to be the first by Walpole. In 1726 it was remodelled in the Palladian style to the design of Colen Campbell the celebrated architect. The house was originally Bourne Place, a Jacobean manor, a few bits of which survive (a staircase and some panelling), and some form of house may have existed there since Tudor times. Most people in Eastbourne have no idea that Compton Place exists, hidden by flint walls and encircled by the Royal Eastbourne Golf Club (also leased from the Devonshires). The house is Grade I listed and not open to the public. The house and grounds are owned by the Duke of Devonshire and for the past sixty years have been leased to a ladies’ finishing school which since became a language school. ![]() Thanks to the Sussex Archaeological Society I was lucky enough to have a tour of Compton Place here in Eastbourne.
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