Spetchley Park

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Spetchley Park near Worcester, England, has belonged to the Berkeley family, who also own Berkeley Castle in Gloucestershire, since it was built in 1606.

The original house was burned down on the eve of the Battle by disgruntled drunk Scottish Presbyterian Royalists to prevent Oliver Cromwell from using the house for his headquarters. All that is left from the Tudor house is part of the moat. After the fire the Berkeleys converted the stables into living accommodation, and when their fortunes improved the present Palladian house was built of Bath stone in 1811.

Today, the garden at Spetchley has a wonderful romantic atmosphere reminiscent of a bygone era. Indeed very little has changed since Ellen Wilmott’s day. It is a garden of contrasts; there are walled gardens, a melon yard with its original glasshouses, a horse pool, Victorian conservatory, a delightful fairy-tale-like ‘Root House’, statues, fountains, architectural follies, rose gardens, lakes and bridges, superb herbaceous borders and magnificent specimen trees.

A famous regular visitor to Spetchley was the composer Edward Elgar, who stayed at Spetchley many times, living in the Garden Cottage. The pine trees nearby are called "Elgar's Pines" and according to the Berkeley Family amongst others they inspired him to write many pieces including parts of The Dream of Gerontius.^{[citation needed]}

During World War II, Spetchley was earmarked to be used by Winston Churchill and the Cabinet in the event of London becoming too dangerous during the Blitz, or a successful invasion by the Germans and the subsequent loss of London. After the Battle of Britain, Spetchley was instead used by the USAAF 8th Air Force as a place of recuperation for its pilots – a basketball court was put up on the front lawn. During this period, an American fighter plane whose pilot was flying low in a display for his friends dramatically clipped the top of a cedar tree; happily both tree and plane survived and the somewhat shorter tree can be enjoyed today.

Every December the garden is lit for the annual Illuminated Trail,^[1] when the gardens are transformed into an illuminated winter-evening walk. Hundreds of lights and special effects make this a very popular evening, attracting 10,000 people each year to this 10 night event.