In what Lady Pamela, Countess of Onslow, has written in The National Trust guidebook in 1973 we are told that William Bampfylde, the 6th Earl of Onslow experienced the death of his father, Clandon Park taken over by the Public Record Office for purposes of storage and even though he was living in a time of high taxation and of labour and materials being expensive he managed to convert two rooms on the first floor into a kitchen and dining room. I don’t know how reliable Lady Pamela’s account is because she does not mention where she got her information from and this information is not repeated in any other source. Also Lady Pamela’s writing in general seems to be mainly family history containing amusing anecdotes and a chatty tone. I don’t think that Lady Pamela’s account is very accurate or well thought out so this piece of information is not that useful in talking about Clandon House inside.
As I have been studying other areas of change in Clandon House I have noticed that Lady Pamela’s evidence often conflicts with other more reliable sources. Another interesting factor to be taken into consideration when analysing Lady Pamela’s evidence is that she tries to make it seem in her paragraph about William Bampfylde that he is terribly hard done by and she tries to provoke her reader’s sympathy for him before telling the reader that “after five years Lord Onslow realized he had taken on an impossible task and was forced to the conclusion that his family could no longer inhabit the house which had been theirs for over two centuries.” Since Lady Pamela was Countess of Onslow in 1973 and she is talking about a man who was Earl of Onslow in 1950 it is very likely that she had a personal relationship with William Bampfylde who she refers to as the “present Earl of Onslow.” Either he was her father-in-law or possibly and quite probably her husband. Therefore it is likely that she would try to dress up what he did as in converting the two rooms on the first floor to make him seem as if he was achieving something when he returned to Clandon Park.
For most of the time from when Clandon House was built it was inhabited by the Onslow family and used as a stately home for them to live in. According to Lady Pamela’s writing the 5th Earl Onslow’s wife Violet Marcia’s father: the third Baron Poltimore made Clandon House into a military hospital during WWI. This evidence is backed up by “A Short Guide To Clandon Park” where it mentions a brass plaque in the Onslow Room, which says that it was used as an operating theatre in WWI. When we visited Clandon House we saw this plaque so we know that this piece of information can be trusted. Lady Pamela’s evidence is not very useful as the only source when looking into Clandon Park since it is quite unreliable but is useful as a second source used to back up information already gained.
Lady Pamela says that when William Hillier, 4th Earl of Onslow came to Clandon at the age of 17 in 1870 the house had been shut up for 43 years with only an old woman who acted as a caretaker living in it. Lady Pamela says, “No other human being ever entered the house” during that period of time. The census return for the year 1861 says, however, that living in the house was Jane Catherine Graham, a widow who was the head of her family living with four grandchildren, a governess and eleven servants. Two visitors were also present at the house when the census was taken. This contrasts greatly with Lady Pamela’s evidence. Jane Catherine Graham could have been the old woman mentioned by Lady Pamela but Lady Pamela certainly does not mention anybody else. As I have already stated I don’t think Lady Pamela’s evidence was very reliable or very useful in this circumstance since it directly opposes the census return which is more likely to be reliable because it was carried out by an official doing primary research, going to the door of the house and asking the inhabitants questions. Lady Pamela’s information is, on the other hand, hand family history handed down through generations of people. It is quite likely in this instance that Lady Pamela did not want to mention the fact that the house was rented out during this period.
Therefore the people living in the house didn’t changed very much- the same family more or less inhabited the house apart from the period between the 3rd and 4th Earls which I have just discussed. Even today the 7th Earl and his family live in a house in Clandon Park but not in Clandon House itself. This is a continuity that has gone on throughout the history of Clandon House.
The content and furnishings of the house have changed throughout the history of the house obviously according to the era but what one can see in the house today is very similar to the furnishings which were there in 1778. As it says in “A Short Guide To Clandon Park,” few of the original contents of the house remain and an inventory from 1778 was found during the late 20th century restoration, which enabled the restorers to furnish Clandon nearly exactly how it was in 1778. Therefore even though the house’s furnishings have changed as according to what period of time the people in it were living in (the furniture in 1800 probably looked quite different to the furniture in 1940) because of the restoration the feel of the house and the décor hasn’t charged a great deal since the 18th century.
One factor, which did change the activities in Clandon House quite a bit, was the arrival of the railways to England. In Kelly’s Directories for 1855 there is no mention of railways but in Kelly’s Directories for 1899 it is mentioned that West Clandon has “a station on the Surbiton and Guildford branch of the London and South Western Railway.” From my previous studies of History I know that this was around the time that the railway was becoming in general usage for the gentry in Britain. This must have changed the lives of the people living at Clandon Park a great deal. In Lady Pamela’s writing she quotes the 5th Earl of Onslow in saying of his father that: “He thought no more of taking the train to London and back than of walking from Whitehall to Pall Mall and having done some brisk work at Clandon and Westminster would devote his afternoon to golf at Merrow Down.” I know from my work already on Clandon Park that Lady Pamela is not very accurate so what she quotes above might be exaggerated or untrue. However I can trust it slightly and what she says gives the reader a general feel that the railways in a way made England feel a bit smaller and that the Onslow family would not worry about going to London and back again in a day. I think I can trust Kelly’s Directories quite well as a source because the writers are unbiased and just giving straight information about Clandon. Kelly’s directories get their information from post offices.
An article from Country Life magazine from June 23rd 1989 talks about the dinner parties organised by Lady Florence countess of Onslow in the 1880s and ‘90s. It says that the Onslows would have a dinner party on Saturday and another on Monday with different guests. This backs up the evidence I already have about the railways- the Onslows would not be likely to have two dinner parties in the same weekend with different guests unless the guests had a means of easy transport to Clandon House and back. I know that the evidence from Country Life magazine can be trusted because it mentions its source of information: Lady Florence, Countess of Onslow’s dinner book which I saw when I visited Clandon House. This dinner book was a record of Lady Florence’s dinner parties including information on what food was served, who was invited and who out of the guests accepted their invitations.
Overall I do not think that Clandon Park has changed much since it was built. Of course over the few hundred years minor changes have been made such as small alterations to the exterior and interior décor, the house being used as a military hospital for a small amount of time and a different family inhabiting the house for a small amount of time. The only major change, which would have affected how Clandon Park was used, would be the railway station built in West Clandon. The railways and improved communications in general were a big factor producing change in the 19th century in all of Britain not just Clandon. Compared to some great houses, which are rebuilt, extended and converted again and again, I think Clandon has changed relatively little: the only main piece of building work done to the house was the building of the porch on the West Front.
