Longstock House

1945 Spedan Lewis moved from Leckford Abbas to his new acquisition, Longstock House.

A brief history of Longstock House from 1863

1863 Bought by Mr Joseph Anderson for £35,000.

1869 Bought by Joshua East a successful London business man. His fortune was based on horses and he kept a good stable at Longstock House.

Joshua East's two sons were enthusiastic reserve soldiers and Longstock was the background for military reviews, manoueuvres adn annual sports days for 'Corps' members.

1914 The Estate passsed out of the East family and sold to Mr D L Beddington who died before taking posession and his widow and her family remained in there until 1945. During her time, the house was modernised with the installation of telephone and electricity. The Lodges and garages were also built during the same year, bringing the house to its present shape.

Reginald Beddington developed the first real water garden at Longstock.

1939 Longstock House took a contingent of evacuees from Portsmouth. During the month of September, ninety were living in Longstock, many of these were pupils and staff from the Junior School of the Portsmouth Municipal College. Ten of the girls and their teacher went to Longstock House.

1945 Spedan Lewis buys Longstock House from the Beddingtons.

Spedan ordered a certain amount of restoration work to be carried out on the house, including the need to tackle woodboring beetles and dry rot. However, much more work was carried out in the Park and gardens under Mr Lewis's personal supervision. The water gardens were developed to their present standard and the planting of the Park with specimen trees as an arboretum was established.

Mr Lewis and his family continued to live at Longstock House until 1961.