View of Fawley Court

This 17th-century mansion stands on the site of a much older property which was torn down after it sustained considerable damage in the Civil War. William of Orange stayed at the house and the Orange Way, a long-distance footpath following his Glorious Revolution's footsteps, passes right by the front gate.

The first recorded owner of Fawley, under Edward the Confessor, was Earl Tosti in 1065. After the Norman Conquest, Fawley Manor was given by William I to his kinsman Walter Giffard, who was one of the leading compilers of the Domesday Book. His steward, Herbrand de Sackville, was recorded as the land holder when the book was compiled in 1086, and the Sackvilles held it in their family for almost 400 years. The house was completely rebuilt for William Freeman, a plantation and slave owner and merchant, in 1684. The resulting house is a large square brick and stone house with two tall storeys, plus basement and attic. During the Glorious Revolution of 1688, William III of Orange stayed in the house during his march from Torbay to London. Between 1764 and 1766 the grounds were dramatically landscaped by Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown. Between 1770 and 1771, the architect James Wyatt worked on decorations in new rooms in the house. The principle downstairs salon was designed by Grinling Gibbons, Christopher Wren’s master carver, and the ceiling features carvings of the prancing fallow deer. Fawley Court was requisitioned by the British Army and used in the World War II by Special Forces for training, but it was left it in a poor state after the war. In 1953, the house was acquired by the Polish Congregation of Marian Fathers, and with its associated library, museum and school was one of the cultural centres for the British Polish community until its closure and sale in the late 2000s. The Court is listed at Grade I for its architecture, and it is reputed to have been Kenneth Graham's inspiration for Toad Hall in his book ‘The Wind in the Willows’, written in 1908.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fawley_Court
nationaltrust.org.uk/chilterns-countryside/trails/hambleden-mill-to-henley-on-thames--a-circular-walk-