Brooksby Hall

Brooksby Hall is a late–16th-century manor house on 3.2 square kilometres (800 acres) of land between Leicester and Melton Mowbray. Situated 13 kilometres (8.1 mi) northeast of Leicester, the hall and the neighbouring church of St Michael and All Angels are the last remnants of the medieval village of Brooksby, which was founded during the period of the Danelaw in the 9th century AD. In the 15th and 16th centuries Brooksby was depopulated by enclosures carried out by the estate's owners, which turned its cultivated land into sheep pastures in order to profit from a boom in wool. A 31-acre garden adjoins the hall, leading down to the River Wreake and the railway line from Leicester to Peterborough. The hall, which is Grade II* listed, was occupied for centuries by the Villiers family and later by Admiral David Beatty, the British commander at the Battle of Jutland in 1916. It is now part of the Brooksby Melton College and is also used as a wedding and conference venue.