A Short History of Shobrooke Park Gardens
Shobrooke Park Gardens were first laid out in 1845 by Henry Hippisley Tuckfield.Henry was Jack Shelley’s Great Great Grandmother’s cousin.
The garden was to complement his new house, called Shobrooke Park and the Park itself.
The house was destroyed by fire in 1945.
The garden was neglected until 1968 when John and Dorothy Shelley (Jack’s parents) moved back to Devon and started the clearance work.
In 1981 Dorothy Shelley built the modern bungalow and continued to reclaim the garden.
Jack and Clare Shelley moved into the bungalow in 1992 and set about replanting the garden.
The Debois Landscape Group did a historical survey of the park and garden for us and the restoration work has been based on their recommendations.
We are indebted to Task Force Trees because without their financial assistance the work would not have been possible.
Until 1939 this garden was looked after by a team of six men and a boy, using a garden pony and hand tools.
All the restoration work has been a compromise between recreating the original garden and creating a garden that we can maintain with much less woman power but using modern machinery.
Shobrooke Park. 1930 Postcard. Burnt down in 1944
