Stoke Rochford Hall is a Grade I listed English country house situated in scenic grounds, with a nearby golf course, next to the A1 in south Lincolnshire, England. The parkland and gardens of Stoke Rochford Hall are listed Grade II* on the Register of Historic Parks and Gardens.
History The remains of a Roman villa and bath house were identified by William Stukeley in 1739 and again in 1824 and 1960. No substantive ruins are preserved.
The Neville family had a house on the site in the 14th century. The estate passed to the Rochfords in the 15th century, whence comes the name of the estate, and to the Coneys in the 16th century. The estate was purchased by Sir Edmund Turnor around the time he was knighted in 1663. The grand house he began building in 1665 was demolished in 1774. In 1794, the Turnors built a smaller house at Stoke that was replaced by the current structure in the 1840s.
The present building dating from 1843 was designed by architect William Burn, for Christopher Turnor. For the rest of the 19th century and early 20th century, it was owned by the Turnor family. Christopher Turnor's grandson Christopher Hatton Turnor sold of the Wragby estate in 1917. He started holding summer conferences at the hall. In August 1940, the estate was taken over by his first cousin, Major Herbert Broke Turnor.
First connection to formal education for teachers To launch a novel method of providing formal education at English country houses, a large garden party was held on Saturday August 4 1923, attended by around five hundred guests, including the President of the Board of Education, Edward Wood, 1st Earl of Halifax, aged 40; Frank Tate (educator), the director from 1902-28 of the Department of Education (Victoria) in Australia; Ernest Barker, the Principal from 1920-27 of King's College London; Miss A. E. Levett, the economic historian; William T Phipps, the Kesteven chief education officer; Maudson Grant, the Lindsey director of education; and Prof T Harvey Searls, the Secretary of the British Institute of Adult Education, now known as the National Institute of Adult Continuing Education.Times Monday August 6 1923, page 9
Harvey Searls later worked with Hilda Matheson to establish early education programmes on the new BBC radio service, and organised the Joint Committee of Inquiry into Broadcasting in relation to Adult Education, under Sir Henry Hadow. He became head of adult education at the British Council, and was awarded the Order of St Michael and St George (CMG) in 1959.Times Monday January 16 1961, page 17
Sixty elementary school (primary school) teachers, two thirds from Kesteven and the rest from Lindsey, would attend the summer school, organised by the British Institute of Adult Education, and led by Ernest Barker, with Albert Mansbridge as deputy director.Lincolnshire Echo Monday 6 August 1923, page 2Grantham Journal Saturday 11 August 1923, page 4
The Nottinghamshire Education Committee also sent groups of school children to the hall in 1939, a scheme encouraged by the owner.Newark Advertiser Wednesday 24 May 1939, page 2
Second World War In 1940 the house was requisitioned by the War Office, and used for a variety of purposes. It became the headquarters of the Second Battalion, the Parachute Regiment. The ill-fated 1944 Arnhem 'drop' was planned in the library at Stoke Rochford.
The RAF were at the Hall for two and a half years from 1940. From the 1970s the 2nd Battalion, Parachute Regiment held their annual dinner there, in May;Times Monday May 18 1992, page 14 it was their headquarters in the war for 18 months.Grantham Journal Friday 1 September 1989, page 93Lincolnshire Free Press Tuesday 5 July 1994, page 3
Kesteven College of Education The house was purchased from the War Office by Kesteven County Council in 1948 and became home to Kesteven College of Education, a teacher-training college that closed in 1978. In January 1947 it was decided that the hall would become an 'emergency training college', under the leadership of Jeanie Paterson Slight (1890-1973), from Renfrewshire, who followed the teaching of Friedrich Fröbel. The college would be for the teaching of junior and secondary modern schools, for 100 men and 60 women, to open in early 1947; it was to open for at least three years. The deputy principal was to be a woman. Male lecturers would be paid £400 to £650, and women paid £350 to £550. Senior lecturers would be paid £600 to £750 if men, £500 to £650, if women.Times Friday January 17 1947, page 1 By 1948 it decided that the college would be for women only, and only for primary schools.Times Wednesday November 17 1948, page 1 Most lecturers would only be female, but rural science lecturers could also be male.Times Friday April 1 1949, page 1 Teaching would be in English, History, Geography, Religious Knowledge, Mathematics, Biology, Music, Art and Handicraft, and Physical Education.Times Friday August 6 1948, page 1
In February 1948, Kesteven Council agreed to the conversion to a college, to cost £39,000, with £15,000 for equipment. The College planned to open in January 1949 as the Kesteven Teachers College, with 44 women in 1949. It mostly trained infant and junior teaching, with two year courses.Nottingham Journal Friday 28 January 1949, page 4
Miss M. Lindley was the first principal, who had also started Worcester Training College. It opened on 8 February 1949. Numbers would rise to 160. During the war and in the 1950s, it would hold fund-raising social balls, such as the Belvoir Hunt Ball, at the Kesteven Training College for Women Teachers.The Queen Wednesday 12 January 1955, page 15 By 1952 there were over 100 at the Kesteven Training College.Grantham Journal Friday 8 August 1952, page 3 Miss Elsie Wainwright was acting principal from 1953-54.Times Tuesday August 25 1964, page 12
From 1954, the Principal was William Vawdrey Warmington.Grantham Journal Friday 27 November 1953, page 1 He had taught at the Moat Boys' School in Leicester, now Moat Community College.Leicester Evening Mail Thursday 28 September 1961, page 4 He died aged 61 on 2 September 1964.Times Friday September 4 1964, page 1Grantham Journal Friday 11 September 1964, page 6 Mr Samuel Raymond Dawes, a former Maths teacher, became acting principal, becoming principal in January 1965. He was educated at Taunton Grammar School and Southampton University. He started the Maths department in 1955, and lived at 341 Harlaxton Road, in Grantham.Grantham Journal Friday 1 January 1965, page 9 He died on 24 April 1981.Grantham Journal Friday 2 October 1981, page 1
In January 1955 the college had a weekend school, run by M. W. Barley of the University of Nottingham. From 1960 the college offered three year courses, as a constituent college of the University of Nottingham Institute of Education. A similar site was at Eaton Hall, south of Retford on the former Great North Road (A638), at Eaton, Nottinghamshire, which likewise closed in 1981, and had degrees awarded by University of Nottingham. From September 1966 the college wanted to award degree courses, which was subsequently approved. The four-year BEd degree was awarded by the University of Nottingham. Bridging courses were also taught, for current teachers, to upgrade to degree status. The hall buildings were improved at the same time.Lincolnshire Echo Friday 7 January 1966, page 7
Women and men were not allowed in each others' rooms in the 1960s.Times Wednesday April 18 1962, page 5 There was a large fire on Friday 8 August 1969,Grantham Journal Friday 15 August 1969, page 1 with sixty firefighters attending for four hours from Grantham, Bourne, Corby, Brant Broughton, and Metheringham.
There were 700 men and women in 1970.Grantham Journal Friday 5 June 1970, page 1 In October 1970, Kesteven Education committee approved a swimming pool.Grantham Journal Friday 9 October 1970, page 60 On the afternoon of September 9 1971 the Under Secretary of Education, John Ganzoni, 2nd Baron Belstead, had lunch at the college, with the Kesteven Director of Education, to discuss plans for secondary education in Kesteven, later visiting the Walton Girls' School.Grantham Journal Friday 10 September 1971, page 1 By 1975, the college had 650 places.
Kesteven became part of Lincolnshire in 1974, which now only needed one college of education, so the county education committee put the Hall up for sale in May 1977.Grantham Journal Friday 20 May 1977, page 1 In October 1977, the NUT showed interest.Lincolnshire Echo Tuesday 25 October 1977, page 1Nottingham Evening Post Thursday 27 October 1977, page 16 It was sold in November 1977 for £265,000, with 21 lecture rooms, 23 offices and 102 bedrooms.Sleaford Standard Thursday 3 November 1977, page 1 The College closed in July 1978.Grantham Journal Friday 23 June 1978, page 21
In the early 1960s, an annexe was established at 9 Cottesmore Close in Westwood, Peterborough, in the former RAF Officers’ mess of RAF Peterborough.Peterborough Standard Friday 27 January 1967, page 14 The Peterborough site had thirty places a year, for mature students, and it was not residential.Peterborough Evening Telegraph Friday 6 October 1967, page 11 In March 1975 it was proposed to amalgamate this site with Peterborough Technical College.Peterborough Advertiser Tuesday 11 March 1975 This proposal went one stage further, to move 15 teachers to the Peterborough site in 1978, when the Kesteven site closed; the Peterborough site closed in August 1980.Peterborough Advertiser Friday 14 November 1975, page 4 The deputy warden of the Peterborough annexe, Jim Robinson, became deputy head of the St Hugh's CE secondary school in 1980, and headteacher in 1990.Grantham Journal Friday 8 June 1990, page 38
Former lecturers included Michael Hoyland, born April 1925, taught art from 1963-78; he wrote 'Art for Children: Schooling in the Middle Years', December 10 1970, and 'Variations: Integrated Approach to Art', January 1975 Ron Wastnedge, taught science for primary schools in the early 1960s
National Union of Teachers It retained a connection with education, as the training and conference centre of the National Union of Teachers. It was operated by the NUT from October 1978.Grantham Journal Friday 28 April 1978, page 1Sleaford Standard Thursday 4 May 1978, page 10 It was formally opened on Saturday 11 November 1978.Grantham Journal Friday 17 November 1978, page 26 It had the Studio Theatre until around 1986.Grantham Journal Friday 10 August 1979, page 26 New tennis courts were built, under Stoke Rochford Management Limited.
It was not solely used by the NUT, but also by national organisations and companies for conferences or seminars because of its situation close to the A1 and Grantham railway station. On 25 January 2005, a fire gutted the interior of the hall. It was restored by English Heritage over three years at a cost of £12 million.
Recent history The hall has banqueting facilities, a sports club and a restaurant, and it has been used for wedding receptions and parties. In 2016, it was sold to Talash Hotels Group. On 17 April 2018, Stoke Rochford Hall joined Best Western Hotels and Resorts in Great Britain as part of its BW Premier Collection.Talash Hotel Group Owned Property Joins Best Western
In early 2026, Stoke Rochford Hall was acquired by The Timeless Collection Holdings Limited, an English hotel investment company.Timeless Collection completes acquisition of Stoke Rochford Hall The latter is part of London-based LSG Holdings, which is owned by Italian businessman Elio Leoni Sceti and his family.The Timeless Collection Holdings Limited
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