Silverlands, Chertsey
Built for Vice-Admiral the Rt. Hon Sir Frederick Hotham sometime between 1818-1825, it was the Hotham family home until around 1887. Over the next 50 years, Silverlands changed hands a few times and then in 1938 it became the new home for the Actors Orphanage. The Actors Orphanage was set up in 1896 to house children who had become orphaned by the film and theatre professions.
In 1947, the St. Peter’s Training School for Nurses was formed. This was opened with 3 student nurses at Silverlands. This ran alongside the buildings use by the Actors Orphanage, until 1958 when the Orphanage Ceased to exist.
The building remained a nurse’s training school up until it closed in the late 1990's. A few years later, it was in the news as in 2001 when plan were put in place for it to house the relocated Wolvercote Clinic for convicted paedophiles. This angered local residents, as it was not the kind of clinic they wanted near to their children’s schools. October 26th 2001 saw the first candlit vigil outside Silverlands, BBC News covered the event as 300 protests remained there in the rain. From then on, every Friday between 17:00 and 19:00 it was repeated. Whilst this was going on, Silverlands was enjoying a refit to the tune of around £3million.
In response to a Parliamentary Question tabled 4th July, 2002, it was confirmed by Home Office Minister, Hilary Benn, that Silverlands would NOT become the home of the Wolvercote paedophile clinic currently based in Epsom, Surrey; it has been empty ever since.
These are some quotes from people who lived at Silverlands when it was an orphange;
Silverlands, as I remember it when I was a very little girl, was very, very big, like a giant’s castle. A grand entrance way, high ceilings, lots of fancy molding and a bust of Sir Gerald Du Maurier in the entrance hall along with a portrait of William Terriss and a large photo of the present Queen in her wedding dress.
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Our first glimpse of our new school was quite impressive. Silverlands was a large mansion in a spacious estate, which had been built between 1814 and 1825. Heading up that long road from the front gate to the building itself, I don’t think Yettey and I said a word. It was certainly not what we had envisioned, so totally different from Langley Hall in every way, on appearance, at least. One of those differences gave me a few moments of consternation—where were the soccer goals and the cricket pavilion? Naturally, the soccer goals were installed at the proper time, but the cricket pavilion was to remain a memory of Langley. The first thing that caught the eye on entering the building was the magnificent staircase that curled up to the second floor, highlighting an attractive lobby. The other rooms on the ground floor were spacious and practical. Who knows? In the middle of the 19th century, they might have been ornate. No matter, the children of the Actors’ Orphanage did not rate ornate. We didn’t even know what it was. Another interesting feature was the courtyard at the back of the building that encompassed several small rooms, which became classrooms and locker rooms. A larger enclosure had once stabled the owner's horses. At the far corner of the courtyard were stone steps leading up to an almost tower-like room, which became sort of a boys’ hideaway. I think we colonized it.
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