NOSTALGIA: Growing exotic fruit at Pontypool House and Park
The Hanbury family home at Pontypool House and Park had established walled kitchen gardens on the slopes of Penygarn Hill, by the mid 1700s. Within the walled gardens in the early nineteenth century were built coal-heated Palm Houses (greenhouses) for growing ‘exotic’ fruit, such as peaches, pineapples and grapes. In 1850, they produced 112 pineapples, 103 melons, 406 nectarines, 359 peaches, 295 bunches of grapes, 213 figs and 406 plums. In 1855, the Hanbury-Leigh family employed a head gardener, then Henry Dalrymple - who had his own tied residence on Penygarn Hill, and 22 under...
Source: freepressseries.co.uk