A-Z Challenge 2017 - Houses, some real, some not - 'K'

K - Ketton Hall

This is a location with which I was once very familiar.

Gateway to Ketton Hall

( © Copyright Alan Murray-Rust , licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence)

As a boy in the Rutland village of Ketton I walked alongside the wall many times and with other lads threw sticks to knock down conkers from the horse chestnut trees that grew along its length. I'll even admit to being given a 'bunk-up' to climb over it. 

Later I walked to the gate at the far right end of the wall, then the entrance to Ketton Cricket Club. More recently it became the way in to a green burial site.

During WWII the Hall was the home of Air Marshal Sir John Baldwin, Acting Commander-in-Chief of Bomber Command (1942) and Air Officer Commanding Tactical Air Force (Burma), (1943-1944).

Lady Baldwin, a member of the York Terry's confectionery family, would stop and talk to me (as a five year old) when she passed the wooden gate to my home. I never lived down telling her that my oldest brother had gone to war to stick a bayonet up Hitler's arse!

As for Ketton Hall, it was recently on the market for £2.5 million.