Dinder House

Dinder House
General information
Location	Dinder, Somerset, England
Construction started	1799
Completed	1801
Design and construction
Client	Rev William Somerville

Dinder House, a Grade II Regency listed building in the small village of Dinder, in Somerset, was built in 1801 by the Rev William Somerville on the site of a former manor house. The original house consisted of only the centre part of the building. The outer bays were added around 1850 by Vulliamy, and a further single-storey addition to the north dates from 1929.^[1] The gate piers, quadrant walls and flanking piers include panelled central piers with pagodal caps, and one with iron lamp at its apex.^[2] A bridge over the River Sheppey predates the house.^[3]

The estate had come into the Somerville family on the marriage of an heiress of the Hickes family to George Somerville (d. 1776), father of the William Somerville who erected the new house in 1801. On the death of William's widow, the estate passed to his nephew, James Somerville Fownes, who adopted the surname Somerville, to save its connection with the house.

The last Somerville resident of the house was Admiral of the Fleet Sir James Fownes Somerville, who was in charge of the British force that sank the French fleet at Mers-el-Kébir, near Oran, Algeria, on 3 July 1940. After World War II, Somerville, who was made Lord Lieutenant of Somerset in August 1946, lived in the house, dying there on 19 March 1949. The house passed out of the Somerville family in the 1970s.

Dinder House is now owned by the Mycock family, who bought it in 2002.

References

1. ^ "Dinder House". Images of England. http://www.imagesofengland.org.uk/details/default.aspx?id=268064. Retrieved 2007-09-20. 
2. ^ "Gate piers, quadrant walls and flanking piers to Dinder House". Images of England. http://www.imagesofengland.org.uk/details/default.aspx?id=268065. Retrieved 2007-09-20. 
3. ^ "Bridge over River Sheppey in grounds of Dinder House". Images of England. http://www.imagesofengland.org.uk/details/default.aspx?id=268066. Retrieved 2007-09-20. 

Coordinates: 51°11′58″N 2°36′32″W / 51.19944°N 2.60889°W / 51.19944; -2.60889