The Deanery Garden, Peterborough

Eayre’s 1728 map shows two large fish ponds which were later filled in by 1825. The front garden was an orchard and Tout Hill was in the bishop’s deer park. The deer park disappeared in 19th-century development of Peterborough. Well documented as an early Victorian picturesque garden of great note, Dean Turton maintained a fine garden in the 1840s until the end of the 19th century. The cemetery areas and the Deanery garden retain an overwhelming picturesque atmosphere.

Today car parking in the entrance court has reduced the edges of the island bed. Within the garden only 1/3 of the vegetable garden is worked, the remainder is grass and orchard. Much of the perimeter landscape remains but along the northern herbaceous border ground elder has taken over and will be difficult to maintain. The ‘dell’ created in the moat of the castle is overrun with tree seedlings as are the slopes of Tout Hill. The mature copper beech dominates the east lawn but the nearby Judas tree, cockspur thorn and mulberry are old and add to the air of general decline in the garden.