- Parkland
Newnham Park is the ‘New’ mansion of the Strode family, built near their abandoned medieval home. In 2014 the mansion house with an estate of about 1,550 acres is still owned by a descendant (via various female lines) of the Courtenay and Strode families which held the estate from the 15th century. In 2014 part of the estate is operated as a commercial clay-pigeon shooting ground.
Polwhele wrote in1806 that ‘this house is very handsome and modern-built at a small distance from the old seat. It stands in the middle of the park, which is well stocked with deer, well wooded and having the river Tovey running thro’ it and contains about 200 acres.’ White (1850) noted that it was ‘ built about the beginning of (the) last century, is the handsome residence of George Strode, Esq’. Stockdale noted that it ‘is a very elegant mansion built on an eminence in a delightful part of the parish and commands an extensive prospect of the vale of Plympton with the woods of Saltram. The ancient seat of the Strodes (a family of distinction in early times), called Old Newnham, is situated a short distance from the mansion, still possesses features of great antiquity.’ Some wooded parkland survives.
Newnham Park is listed Grade II.
T Gray: The Garden History of Devon, 1995: 164
