Broadlands

The North Stairs and Oak Room

The paintings on the North Staircase chronologically trace the direct 'Father-to- Son' descent of Lord Mountbatten. The earliest painting is of Philip I the Magnanimous of Hesse 1504-1567. He was a leader of the ;eague of Protestant Princes who drew up The Protest in support of Martin Luther. There are also portraits of three Tsars who married into the Hessian family. Queen Victoria's portrait is included as she was Lord Mountbatten's great -grandmother . The Russian military scenes were painted for Lord Mountbatten's grandfather Prince Alexander of Hesse.

Lord Mountbatten's Russian connections are highlighted by a unique display of the coronation books of the last three Russian Tsars. The two larger books commemorate the coronations-of Lord Mount batten's great uncle Emperor Alexander II in 1856, and his cousin Emperor Alexander III in 1883. The smaller book commemorates the coronation of his uncle Emperor Nicholas II in 1896. The massive book of Alexander II is one of the largest books ever to be printed and bound.

The Oak Room which Lord Romsey uses as a cinema gives some indication of the interior of the Jacobean St. Barbe house. Originally it looked out over an open courtyard and the parkland but the building of the Georgian east portico cut off its outlook.

In 1922 Mountbaten, then a promising young Naval Officer married Edwina Ashley. The family had inherited Broadlands from palmerstons step-son. He took his new bride Edwina on honeymoon to Harewood, where much to their amusement their host Charlie Chaplin asked them to star in a short film chaplin wrote and directed called Nice and friend. The hero Chaplin rescued Edwina from a game of speed and as you'd expect everyone lived happily ever after.

The wainscotting of Sir John St. Barbe's time is of grained oak and the carved wreath bordering Lely's portrait of 'Lady Dorothy Sydney' is in the style of Grinling Gibbons.