Bradgate Park - Leicestershire, UK - Wikipedia Entries on Waymarking.com

"Bradgate Park is Leicestershire’s most popular park. Located in Charnwood Forest just northwest of Leicester it covers 850 acres (3 km²). The River Lin runs through it, flowing into Cropston Reservoir which was constructed on part of the park. To the north-east lies Swithland Wood. The park's two well known landmarks, Old John and the war memorial, both lie close to the 200m contour. The landscape is rocky moorland with a covering of coarse grass and bracken. Several spinneys of woodland (pine and mixed deciduous) are enclosed by stone walls, and are not accessible to the public. There are a number of magnificent specimens of ancient oaks several hundreds of years old. The park is home to herds of red deer and fallow deer."

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"The Bradgate Park Trust, a registered charity, was formed in December 1928 with the gifting of Bradgate Park by Charles Bennion. The Trust’s objects (charitable purposes) are:

“The provision of a public park and recreation ground, and the maintenance and improvement thereof, for the benefit of the inhabitants of the County of Leicestershire and of visitors thereto, with the object of improving the conditions of life for such persons ”

And (added in a 1980 Charity Commission Scheme granted to update the original Trust Deed) :

“To advance the education of the public in the appreciation and care of the environment.”

The original 1928 Deed of Trust sets out our founder’s vision for his charity , which includes to “preserve so far as may be the natural aspect and features and state of rural beauty and plant life of the Park...”. In 1931 the ownership of Swithland Wood was transferred to the Trust, donated by the Rotary Club of Leicester, who had purchased this portion of the original Bradgate Estate of the Earls of Stamford to save it from development and preserve it as a place for public recreation.

The subsequent gifting of additional land (the most recent additions being White’s Wood and Stocking Wood, purchased in 2014 with the support of Leicestershire County C ouncil, Leicester City Council, the National Forest Company and the Helen Jean Cope Trust) means that the Bradgate Park and Swithland Wood Estate today extends to over 510 h ectares (1,260 acres) and includes 336 hectares ( 830 acres ) at Bradgate Park , 59 hectares (146 acres) at Swithland Wood and also a peripheral belt of farmland and woodland which helps protect the boundaries of the historic deer park.

The landscape of Bradgate Park, together with its underlying geology, is nationally important and is legally protected by the Bradgate Park and Cropston Reservoir Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI). The 288 -hectare parkland component of the SSSI is described by Natural England (the Government’s conservation advisory body) as “one of the finest remaining examples of ancient parkland in Leicestershire .... [and] contains some of the last remaining fragments of wet heat hland in the county.” Certain features including the Precambrian fossils and recently discovered upper -Palaeolithic archaeology are of international importance.

There are two Grade II* and three Grade II listed buildings within Bradgate Park. The Park is included in the English Heritage Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest at Grade II. There are two Scheduled Ancient Monuments, comprising the remains of Bradgate House and a moated lodge site 200m west of Bradgate House, which investigations in 2016 show to have been a 13 th century hunting lodge.

Swithland Wood is also a Site of Special Scientific Interest, as one of the largest remnants of ancient semi - natural woodland in Charnwood Forest."

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