Thomas White (c. 1736–1811): Redesigning the northern British landscape

By Deborah Turnbull and Louise Wickham

This volume aims to restore the reputation of Thomas White, who in his time was as well respected as his fellow landscape designers Lancelot 'Capability' Brown and Humphry Repton. By the end of his career, he had produced designs for at least 32 sites across northern England and over 60 in Scotland. These include nationally important designed landscapes in Yorkshire such as Harewood House, Sledmere Hall, Burton Constable Hall, Newby Hall, Mulgrave Castle as well as Raby Castle in Durham, Belle Isle in Cumbria, and Brocklesby Hall in Lincolnshire. He has a vital role in the story of how northern English designed landscapes evolved in the 18th century.

The book focuses on White's known commissions in England and sheds further light on the work of other designers such as Brown and Repton, who worked on many of the same sites. White set up as an independent designer in 1765, having worked for Brown from 1759, and his style developed over the next thirty years. Never merely a 'follower of Brown', as he is often erroneously described, his designs for plantations in particular were much admired and influenced the later, more informal styles of the picturesque movement.

The improvement plans he produced for his clients demonstrate his surveying and artistic skills. These plans were working documents but at the same time works of art in their own right. Over 60 of his beautifully-executed colored plans survive, which is a testament to the value his clients placed on them. This book makes available for the first time over 90% of the known plans and surveys by White for England. Also included are plans by White's contemporaries, together with later maps, estate surveys, and contemporary illustrations to understand which parts of improvement plans were implemented.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Oxbow Books
• Release date: Dec 22, 2021
• ISBN: 9781914427015

Deborah Turnbull

Dr. Deborah Turnbull completed her PhD on Thomas White at the University of Hull in 1990. Now retired, she has lectured on garden and art history and continues research on the historic designed landscape. She is the co-author with Dr. David Neave of Landscaped Parks and Gardens of East Yorkshire (Georgian Society for East Yorkshire, 1992).

Book preview

CHAPTER ONE

Thomas White in context

Mr. Brown, Mr. White and Mr. Repton did more for British Landscape Gardening than has been done in any country perhaps in the world. We cannot help grieving for the loss of men so great as they were, but we have room still left to rejoice, although they are dead, and now no more, that their famed talents will never die

(Shepherd 1836, 29).¹

The name of Thomas White (c. 1736–1811) was included by Thomas Shepherd, in the august company of the landscape designers, Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown (1716–83) and Humphry Repton (1752–1818). His prophesy that the ‘famed talents’ of Brown and Repton would ‘never die’ has, it seems, proved accurate, although it required the research and publications by Dorothy Stroud in the 1950s and 1960s to revive their faded reputations and provide full histories of their activities and achievements (Stroud 1962; 1975).

Knowledge of White’s distinctive and important contribution to landscape design has though faded. Until Deborah completed her PhD thesis on his work in 1990, his name and the nature and extent of his work were virtually unknown in the field of garden and landscape history. This book will readdress White’s contribution to nationally important designed landscapes in northern Britain such as Harewood, Sledmere, Burton Constable, Newby Hall, Mulgrave Castle, Raby Castle, Belle Isle, Scarisbrick and Brocklesby. It will focus in particular on White’s known commissions in England. This will help in the understanding of his importance in 18th-century landscape design and thereby shed further light on the work of Brown, Richard Woods and Repton who worked on many of the same sites.

Why has White’s name largely been lost to history? Perhaps because his work in the design of estate improvements and alterations was often in the style of Brown, so much so that their designs have on occasion been confused. For example, an unsigned and undated plan for the Brocklesby estate in Lincolnshire was attributed by Stroud to Brown (1975, plate 59b). On stylistic evidence, it is now accepted to be in the hand of White as another similar plan for Brocklesby has since been identified. Brown tended to be engaged at the large and renowned estates of the aristocracy and nobility, whereas White’s landscaping commissions were for the more modest domains of the landed gentry in northern England and Scotland. White’s name therefore had not been given the same exposure in topographical descriptions and historical accounts of the grander estates accorded to Brown. Perhaps this neglect of White has been due to him being long regarded as a ‘follower of the great Mr. Brown’ (Youle 1793, 371), rather than as an innovator in the field of 18th-century landscape design. Still today, any mention of him is often predicated by some reference to White either as a ‘pupil’ or ‘ex-foreman’ of Brown, although White left Brown’s employ in 1765 and he had a flourishing business for nearly 40 years.

Although Repton started his career after White, they did overlap and at many sites such as Armley House, Owston, Grove, Scarisbrick, Harewood and Mulgrave Castle, Repton followed White in advising clients and producing plans. Many of Repton’s ‘Red Books’ survive, testament to their immediate appeal and the reason that his work has remained in the public consciousness. Repton must surely have seen the White plans for the places where they coincided and been influenced by their artistic merit and use in ‘selling the commission’.

In the last 30 years, much more research has been carried out on the work of Brown and Repton, with both designers given considerable prominence recently with celebrations to mark the anniversaries of their birth (Brown in 2016) and death (Repton in 2018). In 2016–7 alone, six books were published nationally on Brown,² with many more done at a regional level by local Gardens Trusts such as Yorkshire Capabilities, published by the New Arcadian Press detailing Brown’s work in Yorkshire. In 2020, another book has been published looking at Brown’s business and influence (Finch and Woudstra 2020). Repton’s work has also been the subject of many recent publications including On the Spot, looking at his Yorkshire landscapes (Eyres and Lynch 2018) and Tom Williamson’s more recent overview (2020). Another contemporary of White’s has been given greater attention with Fiona Cowell publishing her research on Richard Woods (Cowell 2009).

The improvement plans White produced for his clients demonstrated his surveying and artistic skills. These plans were working documents and at the same time works of art in their own right. Over 60 of his beautifully executed coloured plans are known to have survived, which is a testament to the value his clients placed on them. These plans together with his bank account with Drummonds Bank proved valuable in providing corroboratory evidence of several of White’s known commissions and provided clues towards the discovery of hitherto unknown clients when Deborah was doing her PhD research.³ Since then more sites (such as Campsall, Busby, Kirkleatham in Yorkshire and Scarisbrick in Lancashire), plans and archival evidence have come to light that give us a greater insight into White and his work.

White was both a landscape designer and a keen arboriculturist and in both these areas of activity was later succeeded by his son, also Thomas (1764–1836). Details of White’s early life are not known but he must have trained initially as a surveyor. White was then employed by Brown between 1759 and 1765 and worked for him at both Chillington in Staffordshire and Sandbeck in Yorkshire. White’s first known plans, three survey maps of the Chillington estate (Figures 2.1, 2.2 and 2.4), were made between 1761 and 1763. He and his family moved to West Retford, Nottinghamshire in about 1770, having previously lived in Tickhill, Yorkshire. Although he purchased an estate at Butsfield near Lanchester in County Durham in 1773, White did not live there permanently until about 1800. His arboricultural activities at his estate, which he later named Woodlands, were considerable and his efforts were recognised by the Society of Arts in their award of 11 medals. In 1787 the Society published White’s detailed account of his achievements at his own estate (SAT 1787, 5–37; White 1804).

Like Brown, White used few elements in his designs. Clumps, belts and single trees, expanses of grass and sometimes areas of water were variously combined to create a setting which, if successful, would offer both physical and mental serenity. He followed similar working methods to those of Brown. He first visited the estate and assessed its situation, discussing requirements with the owner. He then drew up a plan, appointed a foreman to oversee the work and returned periodically to check the progress made and leave further instructions. The amount he charged varied considerably depending on the work required and the time taken. White’s contracts with John Christian Curwen for Belle Isle and Workington amounted to £3,355, while for the four years he was engaged at Raby Castle he received £2,100. His bank account shows that he was paid well over £5,000 during a period of four years by John Musters of Colwick Hall (Figure 1.1) in Nottingham.

FIGURE 1.1. Colwick Hall c. 1791 © picturenottingham.co.uk.

It is interesting to compare White’s bank account with that of Brown, which reveals that on average his yearly income was only one-tenth of Brown’s. Unlike Brown, so far as we know, White undertook no architectural work. His own house at Woodlands was possibly designed by John Carr, with later proposals by Robert Adam. There is a series of drawings by Adam in the Soane collection of proposals for a house for ‘Thomas White’, one of which refers to John Carr (SM Adam volume 33/84–88).

Those acquainted with White, who were his firm supporters, maintained his reputation after his death. The Reverend John Hodgson in his poem of 1807 entitled ‘Woodlands’, Sir Henry Steuart in his Planter’s Guide of 1828 and Shepherd in his Lectures on Landscape Gardening in Australia published in 1836, all devoted considerable space to White. John Bailey’s queries about planting addressed to and answered by White were published in the General View of the Agriculture of the County of Durham in 1810 (192–198). Other contemporaries were less complimentary to White such as the early 19th-century landscape designer and prolific writer, John Claudius Loudon (1830, 543; 1859, 270), Thomas Dick Lauder (Gilpin 1834, 2376–2379) and Thomas Hunter (1883, 106). In the early years of the 20th century informative, though not always totally accurate, accounts of White and his family were published in the Consett Guardian in 1902 (December 19, 7) and in the Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle upon Tyne in 1917 (218–223 and 251–560).

Until the late 1960s, references to White were largely confined to descriptions of his estate in County Durham and to his activities as an arboriculturist. Alan Tait then published material on White’s activities as a landscape designer in Scotland, in particular The Landscape Garden in Scotland 1735–1835 (1980). Evidence of the extent of White’s work in northern England was first brought to light by David Neave in the preliminary results of his research published in 1972 and in a longer article in 1984 (1972, 12–13; 1984). David Jacques in his Georgian Gardens (1983) discussed at some length the contributions made by lesser 18th-century landscape designers, including White. In the Oxford Companion to Gardens (Jellicoe 1986, 602–603) White and his son were given a relatively full, if somewhat dismissive, biographical entry. This sparked Deborah’s initial interest and subsequent PhD research, to counter Dr William A. Brogden’s summary in the Oxford Companion that ‘like Brown, their [White and son] style was predictable’ (ibid., 603).

White was working at a time when the landscape of England was being transformed by estate owners. The development of the ‘English style’ of landscape gardening had begun in the early part of the 18th century, partly as a reaction to foreign (i.e. French and Dutch) styles, such as the one shown in the engravings of Kirkleatham Hall (Figure 1.2) and Newby Hall (Figure 1.3) but also due to the wealth being made by the booming British economy. Taking an interest in and developing an estate by the landowner became the ‘polite’ thing to do and this in turn provided the opportunity for men like White and Brown to become professional landscape designers. Brown had followed both Charles Bridgeman and William Kent, the two most successful early professional designers, at Stowe in Buckinghamshire.

FIGURE 1.2. Kirkleatham Hall by Johannes Kip, c. 1709 © The Trustees of the British Museum.

FIGURE 1.3. Newby Hall by Johannes Kip, c. 1707 from Estates of Great Britain and Ireland. Private collection.

FIGURE 1.4. Lumley Castle by Samuel Buck, 1728. British Library, Maps K.Top.12.41.

As models to follow, Bridgeman’s and Kent’s ways of working were very different, with the former about detail and precision and Kent relying more on an overall effect, much like the theatre sets he had previously worked on. Charles Bridgeman (d. 1738) had started as an apprentice in the famous Brompton nursery run by the designers, George London and Henry Wise (see Mowl 2000, chap. 5). His first known work was at Blenheim in 1709 with John Vanbrugh and by the 1720s, he had a well-established practice working at many sites including Claremont and Rousham, as well as Stowe (see Willis 2002), all places where Kent would work too. He was also thought to have prepared a plan for Lumley Castle c. 1721 (Willis 1993, 256), elements of which can be seen in the drawing by Buck published in 1728 (Figure 1.4). Bridgeman prepared detailed improvement plans for large scale areas and was noted for his avenues and the use of the ha-ha that enabled the wider landscape to come closer to the main house.

William Kent (1685–1748) had trained as a painter but with the encouragement of his patron, Lord Burlington, he turned to garden design in 1733 when he started work at Chiswick, Burlington’s Palladian villa. Other commissions soon followed including Stowe and the Prince of Wales’ garden at Carlton House. Although there are sketches by Kent of his design ideas, especially for garden buildings, there are no surviving detailed plans by him. This is perhaps because Kent left that to others. In a famous letter from Thomas Robinson to Lord Carlisle (dated 23 December 1734) we get a view of his working methods:

There is a new taste in gardening just arisen, which has been practised with so great success at the Prince’s garden in Town [Carlton House], that a general alteration of some of the most considerable gardens in the kingdom is begun, after Mr. Kent’s notion of gardening, viz., to lay them out, and work without either level or line (Hunt and Willis 1988, 290).

The ability of both men to attract patrons and thus work had not gone unnoticed and others who entered the profession understood that they had to provide their clients with a detailed view on how they were going to transform their estate. Until Humphry Repton came up with the clever idea of ‘before and after’ pictures in his famous Red Books,⁴ the buyer had to trust the salesman or in this case, the landscape gardener. Brown’s nickname ‘Capability’ is alleged to derive from his ability to persuade all potential clients of the ‘capabilities’ of a site, i.e. that it could be improved with his help, despite a seemingly uninteresting landscape beforehand. Brown’s plans are generally quite simple and in monochrome, more working documents than sales tools and this reflected his personal approach. Others such as Richard Woods (see Cowell 2009), William Emes (see Jacques 1983, 85–86, 115 and pl. VII) and Nathaniel Richmond (Brown 2020) made much more detailed and attractive plans as they perhaps lacked Brown’s ability to personally charm the client.

Although we know little of White’s early working life, his six years working for Brown must have made an impact on him. Being a surveyor at Chillington, foreman at Sandbeck Park and possibly Temple Newsam would have shown him how to turn design ideas into practice including how to get commissions. When he was given the opportunity in late 1765 to work at Harewood, it was of interest that he followed Woods there (Cowell 2009, 202–203) and again the following year at Goldsborough (ibid., 196–197), both of the properties being owned by the Lascelles brothers, Edwin and Daniel respectively. Both commissions had ended sourly for Woods who had fallen out with the Lascelles brothers. This disagreement may have taught White how to manage client relations both in gaining the business and keeping it.

He also must have learnt by his early mistakes, judging by his many clients, including repeat ones such as Bacon Frank at Campsall Hall and the owners of Burton Constable Hall. For example, in an early commission for Busby Hall in 1766, his suggested place for the new walled kitchen garden was abandoned. Its position to the south-west of the Hall may have looked right for the overall design but this was on steeply rising ground. Busby’s owner, William Marwood, though did not consult White again but instead sought the advice of the head gardener at Castle Howard in 1768 (NYCRO ZDU 169) and then engaged Anthony Sparrow to landscape the area around the new kitchen garden in 1773 (NYCRO ZDU 159).

The survival of many of White’s improvement plans is fortunate and has proved invaluable in studying his development as a landscape designer. The plans vary enormously in scale and condition. Each one provides its own interest and often a great charm in the depiction of the proposed transformation of the landscape. White generally worked on a large scale with many of his plans exceeding 1.8 m square in area. The study of the plans has revealed White’s undoubted abilities as a draughtsman and artist. The designs he produced in the 1780s and 1790s are delightful and colourful examples of the confidence he had found in his work by this time. The title and reference vignettes he produced in these years show artistic ability and a sensitivity to both nature and to the particular estate for which the plan was prepared. For example, on his plan for Ardoch, White’s little drawing of a Roman camp as the title vignette displays wit and delicacy, while his inclusion of an existing monument in his Preston Hall design of 1794 gives the plan a relevance, immediacy and interest.

Although attractive in appearance, White’s plans can and have been criticised on two counts: their lack of variety and their vagueness. Superficially there is indeed a similarity in the plans, the same elements of trees, grass, water, house and drives being included in virtually all of them. However, a study both of individual plans and of his work as a whole does not indicate that White was in fact churning out a series of identical proposals without reference to the particular situation of his commission. Loudon’s accusation that the work of landscape designers such as White exhibited a ‘false taste’ which ‘reduced a liberal to a mechanic art’ and his view that not one of White’s plans ‘differed from the rest in anything but magnitude’ (Loudon 1830, 539) is not borne out by the plans themselves. White’s two plans for Abercairny (1791 and 1793) shows that in both plans his proposals for the water and planting were designed to enhance the existing slightly rolling terrain. It is also clear that here, perhaps as he came to know the estate better, White’s views changed over the two years separating the plans, his second one showing a more developed treatment of the lake and the clump planting. By contrast at Castle Fraser in 1794 White was dealing with a more rugged area and proposed some heavy planting and thick clumps generally more in keeping with the setting. The ‘vagueness’ of White’s plans did perhaps present some problems in their implementation in view of his infrequent presence to supervise the putting of his ideas into practice. The correspondence regarding Scone illustrates very well the difficulties encountered by the factor, William Blair, in understanding White’s proposals as set out in his plan. Blair also felt that White ‘altered’ his schemes thus leaving him completely in the dark as to his requirements (SA 1231/8).

White left no account books or details of his commissions, however, financial records in the form of estate accounts together with his own bank account from 1774 have provided a further source of information about his work. Records of payment often include invaluable clues to other commissions in the form of addresses on accounts or mentions of journeys undertaken. They can also indicate the amount of time spent at an estate, the names of others involved in the landscaping work and, of course, the amounts of money paid out for specific tasks or for the entire job.

The social standing of his clients ranged widely from the gentleman merchant owner of the small estate of Welton in Yorkshire, Thomas Williamson, to the 7th Viscount Stormont, later created 2nd Earl of Mansfield, at Scone Palace in Perthshire. He is not known to have advertised his services, however, the study of the source of many of White’s commissions has shown family, social, professional and other links amongst his clients. White’s early association with Brown may well have provided his first independent commission at Harewood in 1765, but the way in which subsequent requests for his services arose is of interest, particularly the association with architects such as John Carr in England. Designed landscapes were often changed when the main house was remodelled or rebuilt. When a completely new house was built such as Norton Place (Figure 1.5) for example, it seems the new house and landscape were designed together to form a cohesive unit.

FIGURE 1.5. Norton Place by Howlett, c. 1803 © The Trustees of the British Museum.

The contention that White’s position as a mere ‘follower’ of Brown justified his neglect, can be re-examined in light of the new material now available to us. Steuart claimed that White possessed ‘a more correct taste and a more vivid fancy’ than his ‘master’, Brown, while Shepherd felt that White ‘justly exploded many of Mr. Brown’s plans as being too formal’ (Steuart 1828, 202; Shepherd 1836, 19). Both these views imply that, rather than merely imitating Brown’s style, White introduced and developed his own ideas using the skills and procedures he had learnt from Brown as a foundation.

In the estates where direct comparisons between White and Brown plans may be made, the White plans do indeed exhibit less formality than Brown’s, most noticeably in the suggestions for clump and belt planting. Brown’s clumps at Brocklesby and Sledmere (Figure 11.29.1) appear heavy, solid and somewhat contrived while White’s are smaller, scattered and interspersed with individual trees. At Burton Constable, Brown retained the avenue running eastwards from the house and other trees are shown in geometric formations, whereas White’s plan of 1768 (Figure 11.5.1) eliminated all hint of formality. White’s plans do exhibit a freer use of imagination than Brown’s and almost totally eliminate any formal elements. The difficulty lies in assessing if and how these plans were translated into reality and to what extent the apparent stiffness of Brown’s designs on paper was softened on the ground. Were White’s more attractive and lively plans in fact less easily and successfully realised in practical terms?

The extant planting contracts for Belle Isle, Workington, Douglas and Buchanan and the records of the Society of Arts have provided more proof of the extent of White’s arboricultural activities. His deep interest in the cultivation of trees and his practical experience in planting in both England and Scotland brought him considerable respect and great satisfaction. Steuart’s claim that White did not fully approve of the landscape fashion of his day and would rather have produced designs in the picturesque style advocated by Richard Payne Knight and Uvedale Price is still open to debate (Steuart 1828, 203). Certainly the evidence from White’s plans and his surviving correspondence does not support the claim and it may be that Steuart was justifying his friendship with the Whites with these words. However, it may indeed be true that White’s own taste was for a less ordered landscape and, had the demand been there, his designs would have included fewer clumps and belts and more ‘variety’ and ‘intricacy’.

It is clear, however, that White was more than just a pupil and follower of Brown and that his work is worthy of study in its own right. Although hitherto seen as a minor figure within the context of the history of landscape design, White’s contribution to the shaping of the British countryside was of great importance. Where Brown was the pioneer, White and others formed his vanguard, disseminating and propagating far afield his ideas and methods.

Notes

1Thomas Shepherd (d. 1834), ‘the first nurseryman and landscape gardener to operate in Australia, was an important and influential advocate of the British landscape movement as promoted by Brown and Humphry Repton. For 20 years he was a nurseryman at Hackney near London, but a decline in business determined him to emigrate to New South Wales’ (Jellicoe 1986, 514). Shepherd claimed to be acquainted with White and his Lectures contain a long section on him.

2These include works by leading Brown scholars such as John Phibbs (2016; 2017), David Brown and Tom Williamson (2016) and Steffie Shields (2016).

3The existence of Thomas White’s account at Drummonds Bank in Charing Cross, London was discovered by David Neave, and that of Lancelot Brown by Peter Willis.

4For reproductions of those surviving for Yorkshire estates as examples, see Eyres and Lynch (2018).

CHAPTER TWO

Early career and working with Brown

Mr. White was an excellent agriculturist, an ingenious mechanic, and a planter of great skill. Like his master Brown, he was in the habit of undertaking the execution of his own designs, and also of plantations of considerable extent, in both England and Scotland

(Steuart 1828, 424).

In these few words Steuart, a friend and supporter of both White and his son, summarised the former’s life and work and expressed his high regard for White’s abilities and achievements. By the end of the 18th century White had acquired a fairly considerable reputation as a landscape designer and tree planter. From his beginnings, unfortunately still rather hazy, we can trace his development as a designer and implementer of designed landscapes in the manner of Brown and as a keen arboriculturist whose successful tree planting endeavours were to be recognised and rewarded by the Society of Arts and others.

The biographical details of White’s early years are unknown prior to him living at Tickhill in the early 1760s. In his middle years, he is known to have resided at West Retford and his later years, until his death, were spent at his own estate of Woodlands near Lanchester in Durham. His death on 27 July 1811 is recorded on a memorial tablet in the church in Lanchester and also on a tombstone lying in the churchyard. There is a discrepancy in the recording of his age at death, which, though it clearly reads ‘aged 75’ on the tablet, appears to read ‘aged 73’ on the tombstone. This therefore gives us a possible birth date of c. either 1736 or 1738.

From entries in White’s bank account, there are references to Thomas White senior who could possibly be his father. From his will made in 1810 we learn of a sister, Rebecca, who married John Brown, a coal merchant from London. They married on 21 June 1767 in London and the witnesses were Charles and Mary Johnson White. Charles and Mary were the parents of Charles Mason White who married Thomas’ daughter, Eleanor, and was described as her cousin. Charles therefore was either Thomas’ brother or close cousin. Charles White worked as an architect for the Board of Ordnance at the Tower of London and later at Portsmouth, a prestigious job that he would have got through family connections. He was also an accomplished amateur artist with pictures exhibited at the Society of Artists and Free Society of Artists from 1765 to 1783, including one of the church at Tickhill in 1769 presumably done when visiting his relative, Thomas (Graves 1907, 276/7).

We do not know to what level White was educated, however, Steuart claimed that he had ‘a far better education than his master [Brown] could boast’ (1828, 223). As Brown attended Cambo village school until the age of 16, we can assume that White must have attained at least that level of schooling. John Hodgson wrote that at Cambo School ‘the fertile and ingenious mind of Capability Brown underwent the first processes of cultivation, and had those seeds of useful learning sown upon it, which enabled him to rise to the head of a new and elegant profession’ (1827, 280–281). The style and content of some of White’s own letters and the interest he later showed in the verses of the Reverend Hodgson point to a reasonably cultured and educated mind. The professional quality of White’s 1761 surveys for Chillington clearly indicates that he received training as a surveyor but where and by whom is not known.

The first definite evidence we have of White is from Brown’s debit account at Drummonds Bank, which showed that on 3 April 1759 he received £15, the first of a series of fairly regular monthly amounts. Where he was working for Brown in 1759 is not known. By this stage, Brown had been an independent designer for nearly 10 years and was working at many sites including Chillington in Staffordshire, where White was probably acting as a foreman for Brown in addition to being a surveyor. The owner, Thomas Giffard, had called in Brown about 1759 as the estate records lodged at Staffordshire Record Office has a ‘disbursement book for Thomas Giffard 1758–1775’ (SRO D590/619) that includes details of ‘Mr Brown’s Works’ between 1759 and 1765. In the same accounts, White’s name appears twice, with the first indicating he was a foreman at the time: 1760 – ‘White for the Men’s lost Time, 9s 0d’ and 1761 – ‘Mr. White per Bills, £2 15s 2d’. The second payment is more ambiguous as he is now referred to as ‘Mr.’ indicating a rise in station and by this time White was also acting as a surveyor. A handsome map of the Chillington estate owned by Giffard ‘surveyed