1 Various articles on Arbury Hall that have appeared in Country Life will be found summarized in Hussey, , English Country Houses: Mid-Georgian (revised edn 1963), pp. 41–48 Google Scholar, and in G. Nares, Arbury Hall, Warwickshire (1970). Fundamental to other works is Wood, A., ‘The Diaries of Sir Roger Newdigate’, Trans. Birmingham Archaeol. Soc. lxxviii (1962), pp. 40–54 Google Scholar. For Sir Roger's genealogy see Franklyn, J., ‘The Incomparable Baronet of Arbury’, Coats of Arms iv (1956–58), p. 274 Google Scholar. For Sir Roger's political career see Namier, L. Sir, Personalities and Powers (1955), pp. 59–77 Google Scholar. For his drawings of Old Copt Hall see C. L, 29 October 1910, and Newman, J., ‘Copt Hall, Essex’ in Colvin, H. & Harris, J. (eds), The Country Seat (1970), pp. 18–29 Google Scholar. Other works that deal with Sir Roger Newdigate's life and architecture are Pevsner, N. & Wedgwood, A., Warwickshire (1966), pp. 67–71 Google Scholar; C. Musgrave, ‘Arbury, Warwickshire: A Gothic Fantasy in the English Midlands’, Connoisseur, September 1968, and McCarthy, M., ‘Sir Roger Newdigate and Piranesi’, Burlington Mag., July 1972, pp. 466-72.Google Scholar

2 C.I. 29 October 1910; J. Newman op. cit., McCarthy, op. cit.

3 This is possible by kind permission of F. H. M. Fitzroy-Newdegate and by the co-operation of M. W. Farr, Warwick County Record Office, Miss Nancy Briggs, Essex County Record Office, and John Harris, Curator of Drawings, RIBA. This paper results from research undertaken in preparation for my doctoral thesis for London University, 1972, and I am grateful for advice to my examiners, Sir Nikolaus Pevsner and John Harris, and for financial support to the Canada Council and the University of Toronto.

4 Catalogue No. 16. Similar juvenile drawings are to be found in the collections of John Chute and Thomas Worsley, both Eton students, and the study of architectural drawing in schools may have been more common than has been realized. Perhaps Lord Burlington's interest in designing buildings for schools had an impact on studies.

5 Nares, , op. cit., p.24.Google Scholar

6 For an account of Lens's career as a drawing-master see Carline, R., Draw They Must (1968), pp. 40–43.Google Scholar

7 Warwick CR 136B 35.5.

8 As note 7: ‘il disegnio della facciata dell'Aurora con sua pianta’, ‘il disegnio dell'anfiteatro’, ‘la finestra di Carbogniari’, and ‘la finestra del Palazzo di S: Giovanni laterano’.

9 The drawings of King George III and John Chute provide examples of the same method of draughting.

10 Warwick CR 136B/17.

11 McCarthy, , op. cit., p. 471.Google Scholar

12 Newman, op. cit., fig. 8.

13 For Sanderson Miller see Dickins, L. & Stanton, M., An Eighteenth Century Correspondence (1910), pp. 434–435 Google Scholar. After his visits with John Chute to Penshurst, Bayham Abbey and Hurstmonceaux, Walpole wrote to Bentley, Richard: ‘We bring you a thousand sketches that you may show us what we have seen’ (Toynbee, P., ed., Letters of Horace Walpole iii, 1903, p. 108)Google Scholar. These sketches do not seem to have survived.

14 The relationship between the Sanderson and Newdigate drawings and the finished building can only be conjectured, for the house underwent many alterations before its demolition in 1926. Its appearance at that date is recorded in C.L. xxviii (1910), pp. 610–617, 646–653. The earliest alterations were in 1775, the year of John Conyers's death, and are recorded in three letters from Joseph Eyre to Sir Roger Newdigate (Warwick CR 136B/1660, 1661 & 1663). That of 15 October 1775 is the most revealing: ‘He [young John Conyers] has ordered Copped Hall to be new sashed and proposes to fit up two more of the rooms above stairs next summer & build stables near his house & bring the kitchen into or near the body of it.’ For another account of the house see Sworder, C. B., ‘Copped Hall, Epping’, Essex Review xxxi (1922), pp.212–217 Google Scholar. Sworder attributes the building to James Wyatt, which is impossible; but there is evidence to support the dates 1753-57, which he gives. See note 24 below.

15 Thomas Nelson wrote to Sir Roger Newdigate from University College, Oxford, 19 October 1764, proposing that Newdigate or Conyers design the alterations to the hall of the college, for which a small benefaction had been made available. Sir Roger undertook the task and had his designs executed by Henry Keene (Warwick CR 136B/1860).

16 Colvin, H. M., Biographical Dictionary of English Architects (1594), p. 479 Google Scholar.

17 George Lambert was also making landscape drawings at Copt Hall at this time (Essex CR D/DW E 29/8). See Einberg, E., ‘A Portrait of Francis Hayman Identified’, Burl. Mag. cxv (1973), pp. 156–158.Google Scholar

18 Box G5/14(l-42).

19 Those by Newdigate are RIBA G5/14 (1, 2, 3 & 6); those by Sanderson with Newdigate annotations are RIBA G5/14 (12, 17, 18, 19 & 37).

20 The fullest account of the building of Hagley is still Dickins, & Stanton, , op. cit., pp. 283–298.Google Scholar

21 Essex CR D/DW E29/1. The total estimate was £1505.

22 Essex CR D/DW E29/8 & 16 respectively.

23 Essex CR D/DW E29/5.

24 Essex CR D/DW E29/6. Interestingly, the recommendation is made that the bearer, Mr Thacker, be clerk ‘under the direction of the person you shall think fit to chuse as an architect’. The letter is dated 14 February 1745, so the building was not started before then. The Newdigate drawings of Old Copt Hall were deposited with a note ascribing them to Sir Roger Newdigate. On the back of one, Essex CR D/DW E27/8, is the legend: ‘Some drawings of different parts of Copt Hall 1741’. But no particular credence need be given to that date. John Conyers succeeded his father Edward in 1742. Sir Roger Newdigate married Sophia Conyers the following year, and John Conyers married in 1744. 1743-44 is the most likely date for the drawings of Old Copt Hall and New Copt Hall. There is a very slight sketch in the Essex Record Office (D/DW E28) titled ‘Scheme for converting the Old Arcade at Copt Hall into a magnificent Ruin by Sir Roger Newdigate, Dec. 2nd. 1753’. This provides the firmest date for the rebuilding.

25 Essex CR D/DW E29/23.

26 Essex CR D/DW E36/7.

27 Essex CR D/DW E 37 & E38/1-5. Further designs for Copt Hall by Wyatt are in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, and are listed in Harris, J., A Catalogue of British Drawings for Architecture, Decoration, Sculpture and and Gardening 1550–1900, in American Collections (1971), p.294.Google Scholar

28 Seen in profile in Fig. 12a.

29 Wittkower, R., ‘Lord Burlington and William Kent’, Archaeological Jnl. cii (1945), pl.iii, fig. 2.Google Scholar

30 Wittkower, R., op. cit., pl.ii, fig.3.Google Scholar

31 The best illustrations are Hussey, op. cit.

32 Hussey, , op. cit., pl.64.Google Scholar

33 Hussey, , op. cit., p. 43 Google Scholar. To the payments recorded there may be added one of £22 19s to David Hiorne on 25 September 1750. This is from the account ledgers of Child & Co., 1749–55, among the archives of Glyn, Mills & Co., to whom I am indebted for permission to examine the Newdigate accounts. Relations between Sanderson Miller and Sir Roger Newdigate had become strained by the end of 1754 when Lord Dacre wrote to Miller: ‘I t'other day saw Sir Roger Newdigate who is extreemly jolly and in good spirits, but says he never sets eyes on you now, tho’ he has told you he is willing to wave all party topics when you are together’ (Warwick CR 125B/452). Possibly ‘my proportional compasses which were given me by Sir Roger Newdigate', mentioned by Sanderson Miller in his will ( Dickins, & Stanton, , op. cit., p. 453 Google Scholar), was a present made in recognition of Miller's advice in the early stages of the rebuilding of Arbury Hall.

34 Hussey, , op. cit., p.43 Google Scholar. For the Hiorne family see Colvin, , op. cit., pp.284–288 Google Scholar.

35 Wood, , op. cit., p.53.Google Scholar

36 Hussey, , op. cit., pl. 72.Google Scholar

37 Wood, , op. cit., p. 54 Google Scholar. The picture may not have been completed until 1764.

38 Wood, , op. cit., p.53 Google Scholar. A letter of Charles Parker to Sir Roger Newdigate (Warwick CR 136B/2133), which is unfortunately undated, speaks highly of Adam's Gothic alterations at Alnwick Castle and suggests that Sir Roger's rather extraordinary decision to put a Neo-Classical ceiling into his Gothic library was prompted by the example of Adam's interior decorations: ‘Mr. Adams was the Architect & has really great Merit in keeping up to the Stile of the old Castle, which he has imitated very well. Upon the Castle Walls are the statues of the Warriors of that Time the Earl Peirce Eye with a Spear etc. The Rooms are all finished with Gothic Fretwork - a little modernized, but altogether has a fine Effect - the Ceilings he has painted in Subdued Colours in the Manner which you sometimes talk of & it gives a gay lively effect to what otherwise would look gloomy.’

39 See Lewis, W. S., ‘The Genesis of Strawberry Hill’, Metropolitan Museum Studies, No. 5 (1934–36), p. 70.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

40 Wood, , op. cit., pp. 50–54.Google Scholar

41 As note 40. The relationship of Henry Keene with Sir Roger Newdigate has been misunderstood by recent writers. It will be the subject of a later study by the author.

42 Nevertheless, the importance of the control exercised by Keene upon the decorative schemes for Arbury is pointed up by Fig. 17b, a Gothic fantasy which Sir Roger may have thought of erecting. Left to themselves, amateur architects could be ridiculous. The example of Thomas Wright comes im mediately to mind, but Richard Bentley also proposed some monsters, and so did John Chute.

43 Wood, , op. cit., p. 51.Google Scholar

44 ibid., p. 53. This chimneypiece antedates its copy in the hall of University College, Oxford, by three years.

45 ibid., p.50.

46 ibid., pp. 45–46.

47 ibid., p. 49.

48 ibid., p. 51.

49 ibid., p. 54.

50 Gentlemen's Mag., 1807, pt.ii, pp. 663–665, 705–708Google Scholar. This account is by R. Churton, whose letter to Francis Newdigate on the subject, (Warwick CR 136B/3548) asks interestingly: ‘Any dates of newbuilding the House? as when did he set about it, and do that “very impudent thing” as he used to [call] it, of cutting through the solid wall of the front & making those beautiful Gothic arches & Gothic windows?’ The letter is dated 18 December 1806. For an earlier account see 1806, pt.ii, pp. 1173–1174.