WHERE HENRY COURTED ANNE

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 11, Issue 59, 28 July 1947, Page 4

WHERE HENRY COURTED ANNE

NOW NATIONAL TRUST PRESERVATION FOR PUBLIC OF BRITAIN / The latest of the stately homes of England to be added to the nation’s heritage is Knole House, Sevenoaks, Kent, here, it is said, Henry VIII courted Anne Boleyn. One of the largest private houses in England, it has been given by Lord Sackville to the National Trust for permanent preservation for the public. Under the terms of the transfer Lord Sackville and his family have a lease of a part of the house. Knole house has 300 rooms, including vast state rooms and galleries, containing paintings by Reynolds and Van Dyck, and fine examples of early English furniture, silver, and pictures. There are the Venetian Ambassadors’ rooms, the King’s room, which contains exquisite silver furnishings, and an £BOOO state bed, hung with cloth of gold, made by the Earl of Dorset for James I, the ballroom, and apartments containing rugs and tapestries dating from the early 17th to the late 18th centuries. The gift of the house is the consequence, first, of the passing in 1939 of a special, act; and, then, of several years of negotiation between Lord Sackville’s lawyers and the trust. Knole is already opened to the public, but an official of the trust said that because, of lack of staff and other difficulties the house can be shown only to a limited extent this year, but the trust hopes to show it to a greater extent next year.