Rookesbury Park was built in 1824 by Dean Thomas Garnier of Winchester, and has stayed run by and in ownership of the family ever since.
The house was well built, from it's foundations on brick piles and substantial arched cellars to windows with fine stone surrounds. On the west facade a severe tetrastyle Ionic portico in Portland stone was attached on the narrower side of the rectangular plan, to a brick built body surmounted by lime render to look like stone. The original building stands 200 years on in similarly exquisite condition.
1530 - 1700
The Protestant Garnier family is first heard of about 1530 when they were living in Vitry le François a small town on the River Marne in France. After the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1648, Isaac Garnier escaped to England. In 1691 he became Apothecary General to the College of Chelsea and in 1692 his 4th son Paul, became a tenant at Rokeby, Wickham.
1760 - 1800
George Charles Garnier took over the post of Apothecary to the Army and continued his father’s friendship with Garrick and other celebrities. He married Margaret Miller in 1766 and became High Sheriff of Hampshire in 1776. During this time the remainder of the Rookesbury estate was purchased from the Rashleigh family. The first son was drowned, the second son died of yellow fever whilst serving in the West Indies and the 3rd son William (b 1772), who became Prebendary of Winchester Cathedral, succeeded in 1796.
1824 - 1900
William demolished the old house as it was deemed to be inconvenient and in 1824 a new house designed by Charles Heathcote Tatham was built on rising ground and backed by woods, Grecian Ionic in style and of Portland stone. The house then served as a family home to the Garniers for the century.
1929 - 2012
The estate was a little over 4000 acres in 1926 when John Carpenter Garnier died. In 1929 Miss Eileen Gunday took a lease on the main house and founded a school with 15 pupils. It was a school from then until 2012 when closed as no longer viable, except for during the 2nd World War when the house was requisitioned. In 1951 the estate was handed over to George Carpenter Garnier by his father to avoid death duties. The father died in 1960 and by 1979 the estate comprised a little over 1000 acres. The main house became Rookesbury School which was leased from the Rookesbury Estate.
