Edensor

Edensor is mentioned in the Domesday Book, but the current version of the village dates back to the 1830s when it was rebuilt by Joseph Paxton.  The buildings are of local stone and incorporate a variety of architectural styles: Norman, Elizabethan, Georgian, Italianate, Swiss.  Paxton left the fourteenth century church alone but Sir George Gilbert Scott rebuilt it in 1867.  The village houses estate employees and pensioners.

IN LOVING
MEMORY OF
KATHLEEN
1920 - 1948
WIDOW OF MAJOR THE
MARQUESS OF HARTINGTON
KILLED IN ACTION. DAUGHTER
OF THE HON. JOSEPH KENNEDY
SOMETIME AMBASSADOR OF THE
UNITED STATES TO GREAT BRITAIN

Joy she gave. Joy she has found.

IN MEMORY OF
JOHN F. KENNEDY
PRESIDENT OF THE
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
WHO VISITED THIS GRAVE
29 JUNE 1963

President Kennedy's sister, Kathleen, is buried in the churchyard.  She married the elder son of the 10th Duke of Devonshire in 1944.  He died in the war a few months afterward and is buried in Belgium.  Four years later, Kathleen was killed in a plane crash.  Had they both lived, they would have become Duke and Duchess in 1950.

In June of 1963, while in England to meet with Prime Minister Macmillan, President Kennedy made a side trip to Edensor to visit his sister's grave.  The stone slab in the ground commemorates the occasion, just five months before his own death.

Grave of  Sir Joseph Paxton

In the centre of the churchyard is the grave of Joseph and Sarah Paxton.  The 6th Duke of Devonshire hired him as head gardener at the age of twenty-three.  His first day on the job, he met Sarah in the Chatsworth kitchen.  Although his only formal training was as a gardener's apprentice, he is remembered chiefly for his genius in engineering and architecture.  Queen Victoria knighted him for designing the Crystal Palace to house the Great Exhibition of 1851.  He later became a Member of Parliament.

The Paxton home was a mansion on the Chatsworth estate, but fame kept Joseph away much of the time.  Sarah preferred life here to the social circles of London.

If you have lots of time,
spend some with...

 Diana Woodforde of Edensor