AN ILLUSTRATED HISTORY OF ROUNDHAY PARK

 

Thomas Nicholson's Legacy

This wonderful mansion and associated landscape were the result of one man's fortune and vision. When he died in 1821, aged just 56, the house and its grounds were almost complete - a lasting memorial to the 'local boy made good'. In less than twenty years Thomas Nicholson had created one of the most outstanding landscapes in the county, which, with its naturalised features of lakes and clumps of trees set sympathetically within the rolling landform of Roundhay, provide a fitting tribute to the picturesque landscape movement. Thomas and his gardeners exercised considerable skill in creating such a stunning landscape from former unproductive agricultural land. Thomas was interred at Camp Lane Court, the Quaker burial ground in Leeds, leaving his wife, Elizabeth, to reside in the house for a further eleven years.

Thomas Nicholsons funeral monument
Thomas Nicholson's funeral monument in St. John's Church

 

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