A Grand Family Seat with a Rich History

Situated in Much Dewchurch, Herefordshire, The Mynde is a country house that has been a heritage site for centuries. Originally built in the 15th and 16th centuries, it was later remodelled in the 18th century and refronted in the 19th century by William Atkinson. The estate had descended in the Pye family since the Norman conquest, and was their family seat in Tudor times. Among the Pyes who owned the property were the lawyer and Elizabethan courtier Walter Pye I and the Royalist courtier Walter Pye II.

In 1709, the Duke of Chandos acquired the house and added the striking Kings Hall with plasterwork by Bugatti and Attari. In 1740, Richard Symons of London purchased the house. Ann Symons (nee Colebrooke) had no children from John Symons. Following his death on 30 December 1763, the estate passed to his nephew Richard Peers, subject to his wife being allowed to live there for her natural life and Peers taking the name Symons. Ann died on 4 March 1765 aged 53.

Sir Richard Symons, MP for Hereford until 1784, died unmarried and childless in 1797. By his grandfather's will, the estate passed to Thomas Raymond, the eldest son of the grandfather’s niece Mary Raymond, who likewise adopted the Symons name and arms. The estate then descended in the direct male line of the Symons family to Thomas Edward Raymond Symons (d. 1928), on whose death it was sold to a fellow army officer, Henry Ambrose Clive, younger son of General Edward Henry Clive of Perrystone Court, Herefordshire. In 1959, William Anthony Twiston-Davies, son of General Edward Henry Clive, bought the estate; he died in 1989. His son, Audley, completed a restoration of the main house between 1997 and 2001, and put the property on the market in 2013.

In 2016, Richard and Sarah Burt purchased the property for £15m. The Mynde is a Grade I listed building.

Sources: Wikipedia, OpenStreetMap, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons