Listed Building History: Gate piers and wall of The Grange
The Grange is a large nineteenth-century mansion off Larkin’s Lane and is completely invisible from the road. It stands in five acres of grounds. Only its boundary wall and gate piers are listed.
The Grange was probably built around the mid-nineteenth century. It was originally known as Elmbank, and is named thus on an 1888 map, but it was frequently referred to as “Headington Villa”.
It is difficult to identify the house in directories until the Post Office Directory of 1877, where it is first named as Elmbank, and its occupant is Mrs Popham.
The next occupant, listed in directories from 1883, was William Wylie. He died in 1887, and his elderly wife, Mrs Ann Wylie, remained in the house. She was aged 86 at the time of the 1891 census and had four live-in servants: a cook, lady’s maid, housemaid, and a gardener. When she died in 1894 she left the house to her companion, Miss Louisa Boss, for her lifetime, and then to her nephew, Robert Wylie.
Louisa Boss, who renamed the house The Grange, lived there for another 28 years, so Robert Wylie did not get his inheritance until 1922. Wylie (who was one of the directors of Headington Sports Ground Ltd who bought the Manor Ground for the recreational use of the people of Headington) died in 1948.
From 1948 until the 1980s the house was occupied by the surgeon Arthur Elliot-Smith, who founded the Elliot-Smith Clinic.at the Churchill Hospital.
Only the wall and gate piers of The Grange are listed: reference: 1485/757
