‘Hardy mansion’ under threat from homes plan

A COUNTRY manor house that inspired Thomas Hardy is at the centre of a planning row after the local council recommended 120 houses be built next door.

The development near Dorchester in Dorset would “ruin the environs” of Elizabethan Grade I-listed Wolfeton House which the novelist frequently visited, according to the Hardy Society.

It was owned for 400 years by the Trenchard family whose name provided the inspiration for the main character in The Mayor of Casterbridge, Hardy’s classic 1886 novel. The house was also visited by Sir Walter Raleigh and King George III.

The planned housing estate would be just 200 yards from Wolfeton.

Tony Fincham, of the Hardy Society, said: “It will damage the environs of the 16th-century house, which remains in appearance exactly as described by Hardy.”

A decision will be made in three weeks by West Dorset District Council.