Monument record MDR784 - Doveridge Hall (site of), Doveridge

Doveridge Hall was begun in 1769 by Edward Stevens for Sir Henry Cavendish. It was a very conventional Palladian mansion with hexastyle portico and pavilions, demolished in 1934. (1) Doveridge Hall, now demolished, was a large, impressive, but not in the final analysis an entirely harmonious house; nine by five bays, with a lower ground floor of rusticated stone, and two brick storeys, all flanked by lower ground floor wings of three bays ending in pavilions of one bay on a scale with the ground floor of the house. It was built in 1770 by Edward Stevens for Sir Henry Cavendish and set in a fine park stretching down to the Dove. The pavilions and wings were added 6 years later. The house was demolished in 1934. It is to be assumed that prior to 1770, the branch of the Cavendish family occupuied the Old Hall. (2) There was apparently an earlier hall at Doveridge that is thought to have been granted with the estate to Sir William Cavendish in 1552. The Cavendish family rebuilt the house in the 18th century. Some time after 1766, Henry Cavendish comissioned the building of a house on the site, with Edward Stevens leading the construction, and a partnership of Thomas Gardner (an architect builder of Uttoxeter) and Thomas Freeman (an architect builder of Derby) employed in 1776 to add to the construction. The house was completed the designs were exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1771. When Henry Cavendish died in 1776 and was succeeded by his son, also named Henry, Gardner and Freeman's partnership dissolved and the stable block was partially finished, simpler in appearance to the rest of the hall. It is possible that Stevens built the original house without the wings, which are also unlike the work of Gardner, so they may be much later additions. Doveridge Hall was demolished in 1934 and the only known photograph of the house is the one used in a sales catalogue of 1895. (3) Map evidence suggests that there was nothing at site before the 18th century hall; therefore the earlier hall mentioned by Authority 3 is likely to have been located near the 'Old Hall' site on Hall Lane [see SMR 19151]. (4)