October 2007

Oxford University has recently announced plans to build a book and document depository to cope with the huge and ever growing number of works it needs to store, while allowing convenient access to researchers. The very large building is to be sited on virgin land at Osney Mead, in the flood plain of the River Isis (Thames). It will also undoubtedly present a major visual intrusion on the Oxford skyline and remove wild and native amenity from the residents of West Oxford.

Of course, no-one is against the provision of much needed storage for one of the world’s greatest libraries, but the location and the manner of the involvement of the local Council, the Environment Agency and English Heritage have generated a lot of heat. The University is not short of resources, or options for the location and nature of the building, but this looks like a ‘cheapie’ and unnecessarily destructive solution; unbecoming for such a noble institution. English Heritage gave the nod under the wrongful assertion that no alternatives existed.

But our primary concern here is with the scandal of the other book depository – at Nuneham.

The Osney Mead project looks like another short sighted book depository plan, much like the one that sited the existing Bodleian book depository in the historic kitchen garden of Nuneham Estate. This disaster seems to have been conveniently forgotten.

The Nuneham Estate, the Kitchen Garden and the Book Depository
Nuneham House and Estate was begun in 1756, for the first Earl Harcourt, courtier and former chancellor to George III. Between 1777 and 1781 the grounds were re-designed by the second Earl, under Capability Brown. The walled Kitchen Garden dates from then. On a visit in 1786 by George III and Queen Charlotte, the King called it “the most enjoyable place I know”. In 1841 Queen Victoria visited after her wedding to Prince Albert. She was effusive in her praise and noted “a beautiful flower garden and kitchen garden, and all kept up in perfect order”. Around 1863, Lewis Carroll told his stories (later to become ‘Through the Looking Glass’) to ‘Alice’ on river expeditions to Nuneham and Godstow. In 1889 Jerome K. Jerome in ‘Three Men In A Boat’ judged Nuneham ‘well worth a visit....the grounds are very beautiful’.

At the start of the 20th century, the grounds and house had become dilapidated and the estate was used for a variety of purposes, including a headquarters for aerial photography and reconnaissance during and after world war 2. In 1948 Lord Harcourt sold the estate to the University and it was used for halls of residence, then leased to private companies, leased for conference events and is now a Global Retreat and Prayer Centre. The house has been restored in the past half century, the grounds more or less maintained. The old walled Kitchen Garden and the impressive Victorian glasshouses have not been so fortunate. For the latter part of the 20th century they were leased to a private nursery, barely maintained, and a major part of the Kitchen Garden was then destroyed by the University to build a book depository for the Bodleian Library.

It had been intended by the University to consume the rest of the Kitchen Garden, in ‘phase two’ for an extension and car park/access. Encountering some ‘planning’ opposition, the plans were shelved but not abandoned. Meanwhile, the Kitchen Garden was left to degrade and die and has been 10ft high in choking brambles for several years now, entirely untended. The Victorian glasshouses, which are still salvageable, will not be shortly, they are so congested with bramble and wild sapling trees. The ‘unique’ historic Apple arch has already died in part and will disappear by degrees if not given immediate attention. The old fruit trees around the walls have already gone. It must be assumed, since the resources exist to maintain the rest of the gardens and enhance the ‘next door’ Harcourt Arboretum that it has been deliberate University policy to ‘lose’ the kitchen garden to ease planning objections. The state of the kitchen garden is shameful, as is the ‘blind eye’ of English Heritage who apply very different standards to kitchen gardens of equal age and standing everywhere else.

The Apple Walk
It is recounted in local memory that, in Victorian and Edwardian times, visitors to the house were first brought through the Kitchen Garden to experience the beautiful Apple Arch, either at blossom time or when the apples were ripe. The trees were grafted on dwarf stocks and trained in arches over rounded iron hoops – much like a current day polytunnel. The hoops were 10ft apart and there were 25 of them, stretching almost the entire length of the Kitchen Garden. The paired apple varieties on each side of the arch were carefully chosen, to become ripe in sequence from one end to the other and there will undoubtedly be some of the ‘lost’ apple varieties among them. Numbers 17 and 23 are now dead on both sides and lost for ever. Others look in danger of failing imminently.

The age of the existing trees is uncertain. It is possible that some may have been replaced like for like as trees died naturally, over the 20th century. It is also possible and probably likely that some of the existing trees date from the end of the 19th century. It is even possible that some of these trees witnessed Queen Victoria as she walked through the arch and marvelled at it in 1841. It is little short of a national disgrace that this arch should be deliberately destroyed by wilful neglect.

So, Oxford University and English Heritage – the Nation has always equated you with the ‘Pursuit of Excellence’ and you have failed in this instance. We need a much better example from you than this. Shame on you both. You no longer have any excuse and no course other than to restore, fully and authentically, the remains of the Kitchen Garden, without delay.