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Bourne Hall - Old and New
The old house at Bourne Hall was designed in about 1770 for Philip Rowden, a London merchant who was looking for a country residence. Later the house came to Thomas Hercey Barritt of Jamaica. He improved the grounds by building a dairy shaped like a castle - the Turrets, demolished in 1967 - and by improving the entrance with the Dog Gate, which is decorated with his coat of arms. After him, in 1859, came George Torr, an engineer and charcoal maker, who became a village benefactor. He gave an organ to St.Mary's church and helped to found the West Street School. When he died, his widow Elizabeth found consolation in perfecting the grounds of the house, relying on her head gardener James Child. Along the walk to the orchards there were prize-winning chrysanthemums, and orchids grew in the heated greenhouses. Inside the house the entrance hall was paved with marble, and there was panelling and plaster columns on the walls. There were eleven bedrooms on the first and saecond floor, and on the ground floor a library and billiard room, as well as two drawing rooms whose fireplaces were carved with marble statuary and ornaments. The servants had their rooms on the lower ground floor. During the First World War the house was used as a hospital for soldiers. From 1925 it housed a girls' school, run from Ewell Castle. Part of the garden became a hockey field, and the conservatories were turned into classrooms. The headmistresses ran it as 'a school for the daughters of gentlemen', and in the earlier years tradesmens' daughters could be turned away. There were three houses - Doric, Ionic and Corinthian - and the talbot from the Dog Gate appeared on the school hatband. The school lost money after the Second World War. It closed suddenly in 1953 and pupils arriving for the autumn term were surprised to find the gates locked. During the following ten years the house, already in an unsatisfactory condition, fell into further decay. It was demolished in 1962 and the present Bourne Hall was built in 1969. When Bourne Hall first opened its doors in 1970, visitors admired a modest display of memorabilia kept by the Council and supported by the local antiquarian society. From these humble beginnings, the Museum has come to cover ten thousand years of human life in the area, from the earliest flint tools to contemporary video recordings, using technology undreamt of even twenty years ago. Today the displays, which are due for refurbishment, are being supplemented by exhibitions (four a year) sent on tour through Borough schools and venues after they have finished at Bourne hall. The Museum provides a centre where specialist collections, such as those accumulated by the Hospital Cluster, can go on view to the public. Kept in its stores are over five thousand objects, and more than ten thousand photographs old and new - only a small proportion of these can be on display at any one time, but they are all available for study or loan. Many items, such as the Roman relics from Ewell and the 18th-century wallpaper from epsom's grand houses, are of regional or national importance. The Museum offers a choice of educational services - there is a Partnership Scheme for teachers, and summer activities are mounted as part of the Bourne Hall programme for children. Older people are served by the Museum through oral history and reminiscence projects. Historical background information can be provided to the community for all purposes from fairs and events to the theming of old pubs and businesses. The Museum gives advice of archaeology and offers a local history service to people researching the story of their house, looking up ancestors for family history research, or simply wondering about the traces of the past which are everywhere in Epsom & Ewell. In the summer of 1996, Bourne Hall Lake was in a sorry state. The waters of this Ewell landmark slowly vanished due to a widespread lowering of the water table - a longterm effect of reduced rainfall and increased use. This was not the first time that the springs had failed, but it demonstrated how local people could no longer rely on the natural forces of geology to keep the lake supplied with springwater through the summer months. Sutton and East Surrey Water offered to find an engineering solution - no easy matter, given the tendency of water to rise as well as drain away through the underlying chalk. In partnership with the Borough Council and the Environmental Agency, they committed £170,000 to the project and as the last trickle of natural water sank into the mud, work began. Before then, archaeological investigation of the site had been undertaken by Bourne Hall Museum to reveal its long history. Originally this was a stretch of river, the headwaters of the Hogsmill. The lake was formed in the middle ages as a fishpond, and in the 18th century it was refashioned as a formal water feature, only to be given its more natural outline to suit the Victorian garden. The water rose at several points within the lake, and up until Roman times offerings were made to these springs, which were sacred. The contractors, Ecco Construction, began work in October by removing the top foot of the lake bed, digging trenches in the subsoil and laying a network of pipes. Above these, there rests a watertight layer of black plastic, and the natural lake bed has been piled back on top of this. When the water rises from underneath in the winter, it drains sideways through the pipes and spills in down the new pond wall; but in summer, when the water table falls and the lake would naturally drain away, it is held in by the impermeable sheeting. Water from a nearby borehole is used to top it up as it evaporates, and a continual overflow into the Horse Pond helps to keep the river Hogsmill fresh and clean. Small, cramped and reputedly haunted, the old Ewell library at Staneway House (on the Seymours Nursery site) was no match for the new facilities at Bourne Hall, and staff were glad to transfer to the new building in 1970. John Dent, who had been Borough Librarian since 1938, had pressed for up-to-date services and quality in the new development. It had three adult sections - recreational, information and reference - while children had their own division with a study room, magazine section and Library Club. Study carrels were provided and beyond them was storage space for 26,000 volumes, a fire-proof store for rare books, and the latest thing in technology - a Telex. The first photocopier arrived three years later. Books were issued on a special rapid system of John Dent's own invention, which was afterwards taken up by other libraries nationwide. The local government changes of 1974 meant that the library was no longer administered by the Borough, but by the County Council, and new policies brought it into line with practice elsewhere in Surrey. Major changes in 1981 involved establishing the Collectors' Library, which served as a centre of excellence for the whole county, and opening an Information Centre. For the first time, videos and cassettes were available on loan and the old reference and information sections were brought together. A Book exchange service was set up for schools, and in 1984 the age of the computer arrived, when the issue and discharge of books was automated and the old card catalogue replaced by microfiche. Bourne Hall Library entered the 1990s with new computer systems which have enabled readers to check on book stock throughout Surrey and to obtain local community information. Other improvements include a carpet throughout the library, a security system (the one that goes ping when books are removed by mistake) and an improved junior non-fiction layout. Fax and colour photocopier services are now available; the library can provide talking tapes and foreign language materials. The local history section offers primary source materials as well as research compilations. The Library organises school visits and children's comptetitions, and invites writers to take part in a series of popular events where they can talk about their craft or lead writing workshops. In March 1996 building alterations transformed the original children's section, afterwards the Collectors' Library, to fit it for use as a Learning Centre with a full variety of reference sources, CD-ROM material, and access to the Internet. Ewell is leading the way in these developments, which will eventually be standard throughout Surrey.
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