Blundeston Lodge

(The house, formerly known as Sydnors, Blundeston Villa and Blundeston House was demolished c. 1960)

Parish: BLUNDESTON
District Council: EAST SUFFOLK (formerly Waveney)
TM 515 967
Not open to the public

Blundeston Lodge, a house probably dating to the eighteenth century, was demolished c. 1960 to make way for a prison, itself closed in 2013. Its site is c. 5km (3mls) north-west of Lowestoft where the house lay within pleasure grounds on slightly rising ground north of a small valley down to Blundeston Decoy lake, which runs south-west to connect to Flixton Decoy. During its lifetime it was variously called Sydnors, Blundeston Villa, Blundeston House and finally Blundeston Lodge. These numerous changes of name, and those for the property finally known as Blundeston House (Grade II), have led to some confusion in historic documentary references – at the end of the eighteenth century some references have called Blundeston Hall the home of the Revd Norton Nicholls when he was living at Blundeston Lodge. Bought by a developer in 2016, 10ha (24a) is now the site of a new housing development.

OWNERS OF BLUNDESTON LODGE
In the seventeenth century the Bacon family owned a considerable amount of land in Blundeston and it is believed that Sir Butts Bacon, Bart, seventh son of Sir Nicholas Bacon of Redgrave Hall in Suffolk, had a house on the site of what became known as Blundeston Lodge (The house on the site will be referred to as ‘The Lodge’ or ‘Blundeston Lodge’ for clarity). In 1703 the Bacons sold the manor and their Blundeston properties to Sir Richard Allen of Somerleyton Hall. The Allens sold the Blundeston Hall Estate to Great Yarmouth merchant William Luson in 1714, whilst retaining the manor and the site of The Lodge and its gardens but not the decoy lake that it overlooked. Passing down the Luson family, the Blundeston Hall Estate was divided between William’s three granddaughters on the death of their father Robert in 1767, at which time it seems likely that the Allen family acquired Blundeston Decoy to add to the landholding attached to The Lodge.

In the same year the Revd Norton Nicholls (c. 1743–1809) had just become rector of nearby Lound and Bradwell. Correspondence dated 2nd January 1767 between Norton and his friend, from their student days at Cambridge University, the poet Thomas Gray shows he was living in Blundeston at the time, although no precise address is given. However, as it is later documented that The Lodge was Norton’s home until his death, it is most likely that he moved there on taking up his new post, making him the neighbour of his cousin George Nicholls, Esq. who was married to the eldest Luson sister Maria and living at Blundeston Hall, a short distance to the north-east. Hodskinson’s 1783 map marks a ‘Miss Allen’ as owning a property in Blundeston, although it is not sufficiently detailed to show where or which Blundeston property. However, Augustine Page writing in 1844 states that the property was owned by Mrs F [Frances] Allen but was ‘the residence of that accomplished scholar, the late Rev. Norton Nicholls, LL.B.; a gentleman not more distinguished for his talents and virtues, than from his being the intimate friend of the poet Gray, who was his frequent visitor here’.

It appears that Norton and his widowed mother were a not well off and received financial assistance from relatives. However, he come into some money in 1770, probably after the death of an uncle, William Turner of Richmond, Surrey, which may have helped with the cost of his travels in Europe. In letters to his mother Norton writes of his Grand Tour and the many people he met, a journey he undertook against family advice just before the end of his financial difficulties. In his last letters to her during 1772 he states his reluctance to return to Blundeston. However, return he did and Norton continued as rector of the neighbouring parishes and lived at The Lodge until his death in 1809. Throughout Norton’s time in Blundeston he leased the property from Frances Allen and during his life he was described as ‘a very clever man’ with a ‘great deal of erudition’, ‘ingenuity, taste and politeness’, although with ‘some venial irregularities’ and a ‘supreme coxcomb’ who drank ‘like a fish’!

On Francis’s death ownership passed to Nicholas Henry Bacon, Esq. (1814–43), the second son of Sir Edmund Bacon, Bart of Raveningham in Norfolk. In 1831 The Lodge, known at the time as Sydnors, was bought by Charles Steward, Esq. (b. c. 1800), an officer in the Hon. East India Naval Service and son of Timothy Steward, a Great Yarmouth merchant and shipowner. Charles married his first cousin, Harriet, who was the only daughter, by his first wife, of Ambrose Harbord Steward of Stoke Park in Ipswich. They made The Lodge their home and were both actively engaged in the local area. Charles became a magistrate for Suffolk and Norfolk and wrote A History of the Hundred of Lothingland and Harriet created an ornithological collection documenting the land and waterfowl around them. Their only son was Charles John Steward. He was born c. 1839, becoming Rector of Somerleyton between 1865–97 and lived at Somerleyton Rectory.

Maurice Johnson (1815–1864), who owned Ayscoughfee Hall in Spalding, Lincolnshire, bought The Lodge, probably following the death of Charles Steward. He and his second wife Isabella Mary, who he married in 1848, were living in Lincolnshire on the night of the 1851 census where they had ten servants, so presumably they were using The Lodge as a secondary base from which to enjoy the nearby sea air at Lowestoft and wildlife and sporting activities around Blundeston. Maurice Johnson died at Blundeston in 1864, although his widow continued to live there. At the end of the century Isabella began to dispose of her properties. In 1897 Blundeston Lodge Estate was for sale and bought the following year by Sir Savile Crossley of Somerleyton Hall for £12,500. Isabella also transferred Ayscoughfee Hall into public ownership, which was completed in 1902, three years before her death.

By the 1960s the Blundeston Lodge Estate had been broken-up and Blundeston Lodge with grounds of c. 10ha (24a) were acquired as the site for the construction of HMP Blundeston and the house was demolished. The prison closed c. 2013 and the buildings were demolished to make way for a new housing development that was being constructed in 2022 and continues today.

BLUNDESTON LODGE AND PLEASURE GROUNDS
The architectural style of Blundeston Lodge shown in a the early-twentieth century photograph suggests Sir Butts Bacon’s seventeenth century house had been replaced or substantially rebuilt. The Allen family may have been responsible for these changes, possibly using the proceeds of the sale of the Blundeston Hall Estate to William Luson in 1714. Or perhaps works started at a later date but before it became the home of the Revd Norton Nicholls c. 1767. Described in 1844 as ‘a plain, but handsome building’, it was the surrounding landscape that set it apart from other houses in the parish.

Development of the landscape is first recorded when it was said to have been enlarged and extensively planted in the seventeenth century by Sir Edmund Bacon before its sale to the Allens. For Norton 1767 was the start of a period of further realizing the landscape potential of the grounds surrounding his home. As his friend Thomas Gray noted in a letter to Norton in 1769, he now had ‘a garden of your own, and you plant and transplant, and are dirty and amused!’. Norton was undoubtedly influenced by what he saw in Europe during his travels and for Thomas, who was a frequent visitor until his death in 1771, the pleasure grounds became ‘one of the most finished scenes of sylvan delight, which this island can offer to view’. Described as covering 30ha (75a), the grounds featured a gentle slope down to the decoy lake with a winding walk close to its bank and planting of weeping willows, poplars and alders.

Not only in contact with the renowned landscaper Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown, Norton was a friend of Humphry Repton, who was ten years his junior. Humphry frequently corresponded with Norton to discuss ideas on landscape design and admired Norton’s thoughts on landscape gardening and the work at Blundeston where the emphasis was on natural features combined with reviving some of the elements associated with gardens of the 1740s and 50s. This included serpentine paths, structured views, exotic plantings and ornamental features, all elements of the picturesque landscape style. Norton appears to have had an influence on Humphry’s work and his decision to become a professional landscape gardener in 1788. Garden historian John Phibbs believes that Humphry presented one of his renowned Red Books for Blundeston to his friend the following year, although its existence and whereabouts are unknown. Eventually relations with Humphry soured. Norton spent the remainder of his life until his death in 1809 applying his theories of landscape design to the gardens and parkland surrounding his home.

The tithe map of 1837 shows the house and grounds bought by Charles Steward in 1831. Twenty years after his death many of the landscape features Norton created appear to have survived. The entrance to the house was on the west-facing elevation and the garden front faced south-east. The stables and offices were slightly remote from the house in the northern section of the grounds with a square walled garden with curved corners – the southern being especially pronounced – situated between the house and stable yard. Shelterbelts of trees gave privacy from the road leading north-east to the village centre, known today as Hall Road. Along the edge of these trees nearest the house was an area referred to in the tithe apportionment as ‘pleach’. Presumably this is a reference to a number of trees that had been trained along a framework to create a narrow screen or hedge such as an arbour or tunnel. Outside the walled garden, slip gardens lay to the north and east with a shrubbery to the south. The kitchen garden had a central path with entrances to the east from the stables and west from the house. Further north-east were the stackyard, the home farm and orchard. Described as ‘Lawn’ on the apportionment, parkland stretched from immediately in front of the house down the gentle slope to a sinuously-shaped lake. A small circular plantation lay to the south-west of the house site, with a further planting of trees and shrubs in front of the house surrounding a boathouse on the edge of the lake. There were other plantations along the western edge of the lake. Decoy ‘pipes’ – channels covered in netting that wildfowl were lured into and captured – were developed at the northern and southern ends of the lake, with a further forming an island along its south-western edge called ‘Long Island’, close to a smaller island named ‘Duncan Island’ on the apportionment. At the southern end of the lake were a summerhouse and an old oak tree.

The house was described by Augustine Page in his 1844 Supplement to the Suffolk Traveller as ‘situated amid grounds, groves, and scenery of great beauty’. He continued: ‘At the end of the beautiful lake that ornaments this estate, are two objects which are become highly interesting, from their being the favourite haunts of Gray…a summer house, named ‘Gray’s Seat’, and a venerable pollard, called ‘Gray’s Oak’. Charles Steward added a further feature at the southern end of the lake in the form of an ancient font, said to have been rescued from the dilapidated church in the village.

In 1869, not long after the death of Maurice Johnson, his widow Frances is believed to have employed James Pulham and Son to design and install a fashionable Pulhamite fernery along with a glasshouse/conservatory north-east of the house. Pulhamite was an artificial stone created by the company, which originated in Woodbridge in Suffolk, before moving to Tottenham in London in the early 1840s but had moved to Broxbourne, Hertfordshire by the time of the commission.

The glasshouse/conservatory is shown on the 1884 OS map as a substantial building between the house and the walled garden. Shelterbelts wrapped around the house to the north and east and an area of lawn immediately in front of the house was separated from the parkland beyond, possibly by a ha-ha. A summerhouse is shown on the boundary between the eastern shelterbelt and the parkland that was scattered with freestanding trees as it stretched down to the lake known as Blundeston Decoy. Two boat houses are shown on its northern shore. At the southern tip of the lake the font taken from the parish church is marked lying beside another summerhouse with the tree known as ‘Gray’s Oak’ nearby. Narrow decoy pipes are clearly marked to the north end of the lake and further south along the edge of the lake and forming an island. Believed to have been part of the grounds attached to The Lodge at the time of the 1884 OS map, on the opposite bank of the lake the land appears to have been landscaped on similar principles to include an open area of parkland flanked by belts of trees. The later 1906 map clearly shows this area to be part of the landscape park attached to The Lodge. An ice-house is also marked to the east of the house on the 1885 map. This probably dates from the early-eighteenth century. It is still shown on the 1951 OS map, but was lost when the prison was built.

By 2022 little remained of the landscape created by Norton Nicholls, nor the nineteenth century additions of the Stewards and Johnsons. Norton’s western shelterbelt of trees survives in a degraded form and some freestanding trees in the south-west may have their origins in the eighteenth or early-nineteenth century. However, the decoy lake survives much as it was in Norton’s time.

SOURCES:
Beresford, Camilla and Mason, David, Durability Guaranteed: Pulhamite Rockwork – Its Conservation and Repair, 2008 for English Heritage; Historic England Research Records, HobUiD 1512885.
Dictionary of National Biography, 1885–1900/Nicholls, Norton, Vol 40 entry by William Prideaux Courtney.
Dixon Hunt, John, Gardens and the Picturesque: Studies in the History of Landscape Architect, 1992.
Dixon Hunt, John, Humphry Repton and Garden History, 2012.
Gentlemen’s Magazine, 1790, pt. ii. p. 1057; MISS BERRY, Journals, i. 260.
Hitching, Claude, Rock Landscapes. The Pulham Legacy. Rock Gardens, Grottoes, Ferneries, Follies, Fountains and Garden Ornaments, 2021.
Mathias, Thomas James, Observations on the Writings and on the Character of Mr. Gray, 1815. https://www.thomasgray.org/cgi-bin/view.cgi?collection=secondary&edition=MaW_1815 (accessed March 2022).
Meredith, Hugh, East Anglia, 1929.
Norton Nicholls Papers Collection at Yale University, https://archives.yale.edu/repositories/11/resources/1105/collection_organization (accessed March 2022).
Page, Augustine, A Supplement to the Suffolk Traveller, Or, Topographical and Genealogical Collections, Concerning that County, 1844.
Steward, Charles, A History of the Hundred of Lothingland. (unknown if published and unknown date)
Suckling, Alfred Indigo, The History and Antiquities of the County of Suffolk, Vol I, 1846.
The Contemporary Review, Vol. 73, 1898.
Thomas Gray Archive, letter to Norton Nicholls, 2 January 1769, www.thomasgray.org/cgi-bin/display.cgi?text=tgal0548 (accessed March 2022).
Venn, John ed., Alumni Cantabrigienses: A Biographical List of All Known Students, Graduates and Holders of Office at the University of Cambridge, Vol 2: From 1752 to 1900, 1954.
Whitaker, J., British Duck Decoys of To-day, 1918.
White, William, History, Gazetteer and Directory of Suffolk, 1844, 1855, 1872, 1874.
Williamson, Tom, Humphry Repton: Landscape Design in an Age of Revolution, 2020.

http://spaldingnet.com/the-johnsons-ayscoughee-hall-spalding-lincolnshire (accessed March 2022).
https://www.heritagesouthholland.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/AOS-D-0202-The-Hatchments-of-the-Johnson-Family.pdf (accessed March 2022).
http://www.lothingland.co.uk/ashby5.htm. (accessed March 2022)
https://bigenealogy.com/suffolk/blundeston_parish.htm (accessed March 2022).

Census: 1851, 1861, 1871, 1901, 1911.

1783 Hodskinson’s Map of Suffolk in 1783.
1837 (surveyed 1841) tithe map and apportionment.
1884 (surveyed 1882 to 1883) Ordnance Survey map.
1906 (revised 1904) OS map.
1951 (revised 1946) OS map.

Heritage Assets:
Suffolk Historic Environment Record (SHER): BLN 018, BLN 021.
Blundeston House (Grade II), Historic England No: 1031942.
Historic England Research Records: Hob Uid: 1512885. Site of a Pulhamite fernery at Blundeston Lodge.

Suffolk Record Office (now Suffolk Archives):
SRO (Lowestoft) 1300/13/2, Blundeston, Sydnors/ Bluneston House, Engraving c. 1800.
SRO (Lowestoft) 749/2/164, Sales Particulars for Blundeston Lodge, mansion, park and lake, 24 November 1897.
SRO (Lowestoft) 1300/103/24, The North East Suffolk Photographic and Illustrative Archive, Somerleyton, Suffolk, J. Peto Blundeston Lodge, 1900–99.

Site ownership: Private

Study written: June 2025

Type of Study: Desktop

Written by: Tina Ranft

Amended: