Growing up in Watford, Cassiobury Park was a big part of my life: splashing in the paddling pools and riding on the miniature railway; playing Pooh Sticks on the rustic bridge over the river; going to watch the fireworks with the whole family on Bonfire Night. Now, as an adult, the park plays only slightly lesser a part in my life – I often go for walks there on my lunch break, I regularly run through Whippendell Woods and along the canal, and I still enjoy the fireworks.

But I must be honest, I had only the vaguest of inklings of Cassiobury’s history – I’d heard something about the Earls of Essex, I’d seen Little Cassiobury but didn’t really know what it was, I knew that there had been a bandstand in the park until the 1970s, and I’d heard my parents talk about the old park gates and entrance lodge being demolished around the same time.

It wasn’t until I got my hands on a copy of Cassiobury: The Ancient Seat of the Earls of Essex, the new book by Watford Borough Council’s head of parks Paul Rabbitts and Watford Museum curator Sarah Kerenza Priestley, that the full extent of this beautiful park’s history finally became clear to me.

“We’re surrounded by Cassiobury’s history, even though the estate isn’t there anymore,” says Sarah, who was born in Watford and has been at the museum for ten years. “We’ve lost Cassiobury House but we’ve still got the parkland, the beautiful lodge houses and the cellars. It’s not a lost history at all.”

Cassiobury Park is now the largest park in Hertfordshire and the principal park of Watford, and it covers an area twice the size of Hyde Park. But this is no ordinary town park.

The manor of Cassio was included in the Domesday Book of 1086, as part of the property of the Abbey of St Albans, and it was bought by Sir Richard Morison in 1545, during King Henry VIII’s reformations. In 1628, the estate passed by marriage to the Capel family. In 1661, Arthur, the second Baron Capel, was made Earl of Essex and by 1668/69 he had moved to Cassiobury permanently.

By 1707, Cassiobury was a significant estate, and the garden designer Charles Bridgeman was employed there in the 1720s. In 1800, the fifth Earl of Essex employed James Wyatt, the famed architect, to rebuild the house, and Humphry Repton, the landscape designer often regarded as the successor to Capability Brown, also worked there. The landscape of the estate was captured by one of Britain’s greatest painters, JMW Turner, in a number of paintings.

By the beginning of the 20th Century, large areas of the park had been sold off to Watford Borough Council for public parkland. By 1921, the lease was surrendered and, in 1927, Cassiobury House was demolished. Much of the remaining land was bought by the council and became further parkland for the expanding Borough of Watford.

This book tells the significant story of a remarkable estate, the families that owned it, and its stunning parkland, that has never been told before.

“Paul and I are both passionate about Cassiobury,” says Sarah, who has been researching the park and estate’s history for more than a decade, “and we’ve become great friends through working on the book. To see the story of Cassiobury in such a beautiful book is a dream come true for me and the museum.”

Apart from producing this book with Paul, one of Sarah’s personal “biggest Cassiobury moments” was bidding and fundraising to secure the painting A View of Cassiobury Park by John Wootton, circa 1748, the largest purchase in the museum’s history, a copy of which you can see in the book.

This book comes at a timely moment in Cassiobury’s history – with the £6.5million Parks for People Heritage Lottery Funded restoration project due to start next year, this book beautifully captures its past just as the next chapter in Cassiobury’s immense history begins.

Cassiobury timeline

793 – St Albans Abbey chronicles state that Cassio manor was given to the abbey in 793.
1086 – the manor of Cassio is included in the Domesday Book. It remained the property of the abbey until the 16th Century. 
1545 – Sir Richard Morrison MP buys Cassiobury.
1550s – Morison begins building a house at Cassiobury. 
1628 – Cassiobury passes to the Capel family through marriage. 
Late 17th Century – Little Cassiobury is built, half a mile away, as a dower house for the Capel family. 
1796 – The Capels allow the Grand Junction Canal to be built crossing their land.
1802-1809 – JMW Turner visits Cassiobury and makes sketches and a series of watercolours.
1846 – The Capels rent Cassiobury to Queen Adelaide, widow of William IV. She is visited there by Queen Victoria and Prince Albert.
1893 – Financial difficulties force the sale of a number of paintings through Christie’s, including three Turners, and porcelain, bronzes and furniture.
1890s – The break-up of Cassiobury begins, with lodges, farms and parts of the park being sold off. 
1900 – The house is offered to let as the family is not often in residence.
1909 – Against the wishes of the Watford residents, the council makes its first purchase of Cassiobury land.  
1912 – The bandstand is opened. 
1916 – The seventh earl dies after being hit by a taxi, and Cassiobury is left empty. 
1922 – The eighth earl organises the sale of the house and its contents. 
1927 – Unable to find a new occupier, the house is demolished for its materials. Construction of the Cassiobury estate soon begins. 
1960s – The eighth earl is last heard of living in the Caribbean in a house called Little Cassiobury. 
1970 – The main entrance lodge is destroyed to make way for the widening of Rickmansworth Road.

  • Cassiobury: The Ancient Seat of the Earls of Essex is available from bookshops and from Watford Museum.