Burton Lodge – later Burton House

Burton Lodge was built around 1791 and was a fine Georgian Mansion of two story red brick construction. At some point the Lodge seems to have been split in to two houses, this led to a change in the name and also the address from 1861, it now became Nos.13 and 15 Brewery Place, Burton House.

In 1861 a Portuguese wine merchant by the name of Antonio Agostino de Macedo was living at No.15 Brewery Place, Burton House. On the face of it a Portuguese wine merchant living here seemed an unusual choice, but in the area were numerous malt houses, and this may have some bearing on why this location was chosen.

Antonio had a son, Joachim Antonio Augustinho de Macedo, he was also a wine merchant but, he also had a second interest that of Portuguese Vice-Consul in Leeds. Both the Macedo’s were living in Burton House at this time. Joachim had a son, Joaquim Agostino de Macedo, who once again was a wine merchant but his other interest was that of being a 2nd Lieutenant in the Leeds Rifles. One of Macedo’s daughters, Florinda, married Francis Taffe an Irishman and they went to live in Ireland.

In 1900 there was a Conservatory and a Victorian extension to the building. In the Conservatory plants were in tiers and a vine had been trained to grow right across the roof. The last known occupants of Burton House before it was purchased by Leeds City Council in 1919 was a family reported to be Robert and Suzanne Lawson.

The reason the Council purchased Burton House was to provide an annexe for Hunslet Moor School, later this was to become the Sixth Form of Cockburn School, this School had opened in 1902 as the Southern Higher Grade School and was the last School Board School to open, it was renamed Cockburn in 1904 after the former Chairman of the Leeds School Board.

In the 1950s there were temporary buildings to the right of the House, these were the Dining Halls, these were used by Hunslet Moor School and is thought probably by Rowland Road School as well. The School tennis courts as well as the School sports ground along with long jump and high jump facilities were behind the Dining Halls.

In 1986 Cockburn School was closed and moved to Gypsy Lane, Parkside School. It was at this time that Bellway Homes secured an Urban Development Grant of £273,000 for conversion of Burton House into ten flats (1 to 10 Burton House) with plans for a further twenty-eight to be built on the adjoining land, the conversion of the House was completed in October 1986. One of the tenants of a ground floor flat is said to have renovated it back to the original ceilings, the flat being the classroom they had used while at Hunslet Moor School.

 

This post was written by Ken Burton

Photo: Burton House in 1950 ©Leeds Library & Information Services via leodis.net

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4 Replies to “Burton Lodge – later Burton House”

  1. What an exceptional snippet of history, thanks for sharing Ken. My Mum and Auntie were brought up in nearby Brewery Yard in the 1930s/40s.

  2. Thank you for the memories of burton house. I attended in the 1950’s when Hunslet Moor school had two classrooms on the ground floor in Burton House, Cockburn high school occupying the upper floor. The adjacent white buildings were, indeed, the canteens for Hunslet Moor school but I have no recollection of the tennis courts and sports ground mentioned. I would be interested to know where this was situated because, as far as I remember, next to the canteen was Hunslet moor school.

  3. I went to Hunslet Moor school and we used the ground floor of Burton House (2 classrooms) and Cockburn High school used the first floor. Mrs Rhodes was one teacher and Miss Brown was the other teacher and caretaker was Mr Skipsey. That would be early fifties when l attended. Lovely building with lots of light coming through the large bay windows.

  4. I went to Rowland Road school from 1942 to 1954
    And we went to Hunslt Moor School canteen every day for our dnner walked there and back.

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