Keeping the faith

The garden at Stonor Park, Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire The home of Lord and Lady Camoys: From their first mention in the late 14th century, the gardens of Stonor Park have gone through as many ups and downs as the family that still lives there. Today, after decades of careful work, they are in top form, finds James Alexander-Sinclair

- James Alexander-Sinclair

THE Stonor family has been in this lovely bit of the Chiltern Hills for an extremely long time. The drive winds through ancient trees and up steep grassy slopes (which afford excellent, albeit hazardous and hair-raising, sledging opportunities) until the house and chapel are revealed. Quite a lot of country houses have chapels: Stonor Park goes one better. Not only does it boast a remarkable example, but it also possesses an ancient stone circle, around which pagans frolicked about 5,000 years ago.

The chapel was built in the 13th century (using one of the ancient stones as a foundation) and has been in use as a Catholic chapel ever since. If you remember that for at least 250 years of that period Catholics were not exactly encouraged (and at times hounded), then that shows pretty extraordinary commitment to faith and house. There are not many advantages to a couple of centuries of persecution and crippling fines, but it does mean that Stonor Park retains a great deal of its original character. No billionaire ancestors to demolish chunks and build Gothic extensions; instead, it is a house that has gently and stoically evolved over the past 800 years.