Hope End


Hope End is an area and former estate of Herefordshire, England, near the Malvern Hills, noted for its literary associations. As described by a 19th-century railway guide, Hope End Park and a country house lay near the West Midland Railway, between the stations at Colwall and Ledbury. Hope End House may refer to any one of three houses on the estate, all reduced and much altered from their original states. Hope End ward is a local government area that is more extensive than the old estate.
In 1831 an earlier guide, to Ledbury, noted Hope End among "gentlemen's seats and residences", by the Colwall road. It belonged then to E. M. Barratt. This was Edward Moulton-Barrett, father of Elizabeth Barrett Browning who was brought up there; financial problems caused him to sell it the following year. The same guide gives fulsome praise to the Park: "Nothing can surpass the romantic beauty of Hope-end park. The most lovely graces of nature are here combined." According to Elizabeth, the setting for her poem The Lost Bower was the wood above Hope End House's garden.
Land at Hope End, around, is on the Register of Historic Parks and Gardens of English Heritage.

Owners

The house was burnt in 1910, but the stables remained.