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Released November 2009

Anglo-American Heritage

In time for Thanksgiving Day 2009 and following an earlier English Heritage initiative, the National Monuments Record has undertaken a project to research a number of interesting sites relating to Anglo-American Heritage.

England and America have a long historic association, which is reflected in a large variety of monuments within England’s historic environment. These range from monuments relating to the Pilgrim Fathers and other important people who left England for a better life in America, to famous Americans who are commemorated in England for their achievements effecting both countries, or remains relating to America’s military presence in England and more recently America’s influence on England’s modern architecture.

Ancestral Links

From the colonization of Jamestown in 1607 and the Pilgrim Fathers, who fled England and established a colony in Massachusetts in 1620, there were many more people in England who left their country for various reasons. Some later played an important role in the history of America. For a large number of Europeans England was also a transit-stop on their way for a new life in America and many spent their last night in the Old World in an English port. Sadly, for some this dream was never realised, to which numerous shipwrecks of emigrant ships en route to America
pay testimony. View records of sites with ancestral links here.

Sulgrave Manor, Northamptonshire: the ancestral home of the Washington family
AA97/05604 copyright English Heritage NMR

Reproduced by kind permission of Images&Voices, Oxfordshire County Council, Reference Number: HT03086
The graves of the Penn family, including William Penn, one of the founding fathers of the USA, in the grounds of the early Quaker meeting house, built in 1688 at Jordans, Chalfont St. Giles, Buckinghamshire.

Presidents and Politics

England is not only often the ancestral home of many American presidents like for example George Washington himself, there are many structures in England which are connected to them in the form of commemorative monuments. With regards to American politics a surprising building is the former embassy of the Republic of Texas. The Texas Legation was in London from 1836 until 1845 which was the period of time when Texas had split away from Mexico, but had not yet joined the United States. Another interesting site in the Wiltshire countryside is the depiction of the colonization of Maryland in 1633 in Hook Manor. View records with associations to presidents and politics here.

Famous and ordinary Americans are commemorated on a variety of monuments in England. Many of the ordinary were soldiers who have found themselves on English soil either as enemies or allies. Both are commemorated, the former for example in a church window in the Church of St. Michael, which was built by French and American prisoners of war or as an ally in a war memorial at the D-Day Port Memorial in Weymouth. Also significant episodes in American history are remembered such as the American victory in the American War of Independence at Parlington Park, paradoxically sited in the grounds of a sympathetic English aristocrat. View records of commemorative monuments here.

Military

From the American War of Independence to the Cold War, there are many monuments which pay testimony to American troops. These were either erected in sympathy with the American cause for Independence like the farmhouse “Bunkers Hill”, named after the battle of Bunker Hill, the first major battle of the American War of Independence, or they are structures which served American troops on their involvement in the World Wars, for example in the D-Day landings in 1944. More recently the American military left traces in the form of hardened airfield structures during the Cold War. View some of the records relating to the American military here.

Architecture

A footprint of American culture in England can also be found in the form of transatlantic architecture. An early example of an estate cottage built in American colonial style is that of New York Cottage at Belmont Park built in about 1790. A more recent example is Palladium House, which is a scaled-down version of an American tower block built in 1928 to 1929 for the National Radiator Company and designed by Raymond Hook. Another significant building in the International Modern Style by the American architect W. E. Lescaze is that of High Cross Hill House built in 1932. Examples of English architecture leaving for the United States are two former rooms in the Lansdowne Club: the Principal Drawing Room went to the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the Dining Room found a new home in the Metropolitan Museum in New York. View records relating to transatlantic architectural links here.

Trade and Industry

There are interesting examples of American and English trade or craft connections. One is a former corn mill, built in 1820, which was constructed using ship’s timbers. They originated from the American warship Chesapeake, which was captured by HMS Shannon on 1st June 1813. Many timbers still bear American carpenters’ marks. Another example is the first stained glass window made in America for England. It can be found in St. Andrew Church in Wickhambreaux and was made in 1896. View these two records about links to American crafts here.

Hook Manor
Number 9 Grosvenor Square
Memorial to President John F Kennedy
Sulgrave Manor: ancestral home of the Washingtons
Statue of Abraham Lincoln, Manchester
Statue of George Washington
Washington House
Statue of President FD Roosevelt
Winfield House
Former Embassy of the Republic of Texas
Bust of John F Kennedy
Lincoln Memorial Tower

Commemoration

Statue of Princess Pocahontas
Triumphal Arch at Parlington Park
Church of St Michael at Dartmoor Prison
Headstone to John Singer Sargent
Memorial Chapel at the American Military Cemetery
Lamb House
Eisenhower Statue
America Fountain
Weymouth D-Day Port Memorial

Military

‘Bunkers Hill’ Farmhouse
Nautilus House
Boston Castle
D-Day Embarkation Slipways at Beacon Quay
Avionics Building at Alconbury Airfield
Hardened Aircraft Shelters at Alconbury Airfield
Upper Heyford Airfield
Embarkation hard site Q2
Dummy pillboxes at Baggy Point

Architecture

Former Ideal House, now Palladium House
Ashdown House School
Administrative building at Heinz UK headquarters
Research laboratories at Heinz UK headquarters
High Cross Hill House
Gymnasium at Foxhole School
American Embassy in London
Lansdowne Club
New York Cottage

Trade and Industry

Church of St Andrew in Wickhambreaux
Chesapeake Mill

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