Harpley

To the north stands Houghton Hall, a lovely 18th century house in a large park, containing the partly 13th century church in which there are memorials to the Walpoles.

Britain's first Prime Minister, Sir Robert Walpole, builder of the house, lies in a vault under the church. The interesting church is mainly in the Decorated style and noted for its old bench-ends, ancient doorway and the angel-carved roof.

Sir Robert Walpole was not only Britain's first Prime Minister - a term bestowed upon him initially as an insult to his determined, singular but boring manner of restoring Brtiain's fortunes from war in the early 18th century - he navigated the country fianncially through and the disastrous collapse of the South Seas Company speculative era that almost bankrupted Britain into its first true Depression and began a steady regimen of paying off the National Debt.

He was in many ways Brtain's most successful political leader, in the modern sense. He initiated the tradition of Prime Ministers residing in 10 Downing Street and he presided over and encouraged an unprecedented era of international peace for 21 years. Walpole's reign secured the current dominance of Parliament and