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Moving in - to a stately home! #2
Posted by Viv Wilson on 15th June 2020 in Growing Up In a Stately Home | hoar cross hall,Meynell,donington park,shardlow motor racing,fire ladder,weeds,uttoxeter,council tax
MOVING IN - TO A STATELY HOME! My parents took vacant possession of Hoar Cross Hall in 1970 and the whole process of moving house was done over the summer months. We lived about 20 miles away in an old vicarage with a large garden and lots of outbuildings. This house was about 200 years old and they say Bonnie Prince Charlie marched past it on his way to battle back in the day, for all you history buffs out there! Actually I love history and I think my interest was fuelled by living in these historic houses as a child. My dad used to be a racing driver in the 1950s and before that he did motorcycle racing, often at nearby Donington Park. During the 1960s h...
Doing up a stately home #4
Posted by Viv Wilson on 28th June 2020 in Growing Up In a Stately Home | hoar cross hall,Meynell,dungeon,boot boy,flower room,chapel,skeleton,axeman
DOING UP A STATELY HOME: We moved into Hoar Cross Hall during the summer holidays and my parents quickly realised that they had a lot of work on their hands to make the place habitable as well as to earn some money from it. As previously mentioned, there was an East Wing and a West Wing to the house. My dad decided to convert the first floor rooms of each wing into three separate apartments; he had done this at our previous house. This would generate income from rents until we got the main house open to the public. It wasn’t a big job to convert the rooms as the East Wing had four main rooms and two bathrooms already there, which would have been used as...Our mansion gets a facelift #4
Posted by Viv Wilson on 18th May 2021 in Growing Up In a Stately Home | hoar cross hall,Meynell,Chapel,damask room,Hessian room,servants hall,dungeon,execution chamber,skeleton
OUR MANSION GETS A FACELIFT!
We moved into Hoar Cross Hall during the summer holidays and my parents quickly realised that they had a lot of work on their hands to make the place habitable as well as to earn some money from it. As previously mentioned, there was an East Wing and a West Wing to the house. My dad decided to convert the first floor rooms of each wing into three separate apartments; he had done this at our previous house. This would generate income from rents until we got the main house open to the public. It wasn’t a big job to convert the rooms as the East Wing had four main rooms and two bathrooms already there, which would have been used as g...
Celebrating VE Day #94
Posted by Viv Wilson on 8th May 2025 in Growing Up In a Stately Home | hoar cross hall,barons eden,hoar cross hall spa hotel,History,World War 2,World War 1,V E Day,D Day,Great Britain,TB,downton Abbey,Motor bike,RASC,Americans,Aeroplanes,period drama,V J Day,Victory,Meynell,wartime
...My dad, Bill, on his motor bike in the war
In the towns that he stayed in in Italy he talks about the poverty and deprivation of the local people - small children playing in the dirt in ragged clothes and babies covered in sores. Everywhere there was bomb damage. However it seems they managed to have a bit of leisure time, swimming in the sea and using the local bars and cafes. Entertainment was still around too and he joined the RASC band and taught himself to play piano back at the barracks! Anything to stave off the blues!
The RASC band with dad on the mic!
In one of his diary entries in May 1944 he writes about two American trans...