Polesden Lacey - Previous Houses

Previous Houses

The name 'Polesden' is thought to be Saxon. The first house was built here by 1336. Anthony Rous bought the estate in 1630 and rebuilt the medieval house. Richard Brinsley Sheridan, the poet and playwright, bought the house in 1804.

The house at one time belonged to Sir Francis Geary but his Polesden Lacey was demolished when Joseph Bonsor bought the estate and commissioned Thomas Cubit to build anew. Bonsor died in 1835, and the house passed to his son who, in 1853, sold the estate to Sir Walter Rockcliff Farquhar, who held it until his death in 1902. The estate was then purchased by Sir Clinton Edward Dawkings, a career civil servant, who commissioned Ambrose Poynter, architect son of Sir Edward Poynter P.R.A., to build the greater part of the present house. Sir Clinton, however died shortly after its completion. The estate was then bought, in 1906, by William McEwan, for Captain the Honourable Ronald Greville and his wife, the former Margaret Anderson, William McEwan's stepdaughter.