FOREWORD
by Francis Russell
Dorset is justly celebrated for its manor houses. Melbury, however, is something rather more, the great house of the western part of the county. Like so many early buildings, Melbury is at ease in its landscape, the extensive park that descends from the western flank of Melbury Bubb and stretches towards the villages of Evershot and Melbury Osmond, subsuming the site of that of Melbury Sampford, whose church, so rich in monuments, survives in the shadow of the house.
The reversion of Melbury was obtained in 1500 by Henry Strangways. His son Giles Strangways, who was in 1543 to acquire the estate of Abbotsbury, set out to build a house commensurate with his status. This took the form of a quadrangle with what Leland described, in about 1540, as a 'loftie and fresh tower'. This prospect-tower of Ham stone still overlooks what survives of the four ranges of Strangways' house. These were, however, remodelled about 1692 for Thomas Strangways, whose architect Mr Watson had also worked at Wroxton in Oxfordshire. Watson sought to impose a classical order on an uncompromisingly late perpendicular structure. He created the restrained east front, which was intended as the entrance. The pedimented central section of this is echoed on the north and south fronts, the gabled ends of which, refenestrated by Watson, survive from the original house.
Thomas Strangways' eponymous son was succeeded in 1726 by his sister Susanna, Mrs Strangways Horner, whose only daughter Elizabeth, then aged fourteen, in 1736 married Stephen Fox, later 1st Earl of Ilchester, son of Sir Stephen Fox and brother of the politician, Henry, 1st Lord Holland. Fox's main house was Redlynch and as a result Melbury was left substantially unaltered. So it remained until 1872, when the 5th Earl of Ilchester employed Anthony Salvin to construct the great library to the west of the house. This was followed in 1884-5 by the wing beyond with its massive tower designed by George Devey. Rarely were Victorian domestic requirements met with such architectural tact. For both Salvin and Devey sought consciously to complement what they found. Salvin's library might do service for a tudor great hall, while Devey's tower answers that admired by Leland and balances the church. Yet the quiet, almost unselfconscious dominance of Watson's chaste façade is not challenged.
As changing needs in the past determined the architectural development of Melbury, so these now mean that some of the accumulated contents of this are no longer in use. As catalogued below, these offer a microcosm of life in a house of timeless magic.
MORNING SESSION AT 10.30AM
SILVER AND PLATE
Lots 1 - 46
The Property of the Hon. Mrs Townshend
A silver-mounted dressing table mirror; and a silver-mounted blotter
THE FIRST WITH MAKER'S MARK OF JOHN AND WILLIAM P. DEAKIN, CHESTER, 1901, THE SECOND WITH MAKER'S MARK H. M., BIRMINGHAM 1901
Details
A silver-mounted dressing table mirror; and a silver-mounted blotter
the first with maker's mark of John and William P. Deakin, Chester, 1901, the second with maker's mark H. M., Birmingham 1901
The mirror with silver border pierced and chased with lattice-work, shells, scrolls and foliage and with shaped oval rococo cartouche, the blotter with similarly pierced and chased spandrels and central shaped oval rococo cartouche, marked on mounts
the mirror 16¼in. (41.2cm.) high, the blotter 11½in. (29.2cm.) long (2)
the first with maker's mark of John and William P. Deakin, Chester, 1901, the second with maker's mark H. M., Birmingham 1901
The mirror with silver border pierced and chased with lattice-work, shells, scrolls and foliage and with shaped oval rococo cartouche, the blotter with similarly pierced and chased spandrels and central shaped oval rococo cartouche, marked on mounts
the mirror 16¼in. (41.2cm.) high, the blotter 11½in. (29.2cm.) long (2)