Before the arrival of the railways, the area was reputedly so quiet that its inhabitants could set their clocks from the striking of Big Ben, and in 1815 they claimed further to have heard the cannon fire at Waterloo.  The house was built c.1888.  It was part of the development of the Flitcroft estate, called after its 18th century owner who was a protege of the Earl of Burlington and the architect of Wentworth Woodhouse in Yorkshire, which at over 600 feet in length, made it the longest house in England.