Cheshunt Great House

The site had been a late medieval courtyard building, the residence of the manor of Andrews. The house was built in the latter part of the 15th century and was two storeys high with a tiled roof. Cardinal Thomas Wolsey owned the manor from 1519 until 1529. By the 18th century, the manor was owned by the Shaw family. In 1750, lord of the manor, William Shaw, saw that the exterior of the house was encased in Georgian brick and expanded, In the late 19th century, the house was used on several occasions for conferences. On 8 July 1876, the Provincial Grand Lodge of Hertfordshire was held at the manor, and until the 1930s it served as a Freemasons hall. In 1906, Cheshunt Great House and its 3…

In an early 18th-century print of the house, it was quadrangular, inclosing a courtyard, and there was some evidence that a wing had been removed from the north end of the west front. The south, west, and east fronts of the house still remained in the early 20th century and were built of plain red brick with tiled roofs. The south front entrance of the building had a four-centred stone arch with a very large round arched window above it which was dated to around 1850. The bases of three diagonal brick chimneys are believed to have dated to the early 17th century. Cheshunt Great House had a large hallway and basement; the hallway received some light from built-up windows in the west wall.…