English: Photograph of the Tower in Oteley Park near Ellesmere, Shropshire, England. Oteley Hall (situated on the southeast shore of the Mere (lake)) was used as a Hospital during both world wars but was demolished in 1959 following a fire. The Mainwaring family still own and farm the 2,000 acre estate, part of which is open to the public. A smaller modern home was built by the Mainwaring family 100 m north of the demolished mansion.

History

During the reign of King Henry VIII, Elizabeth Oteley, the heiress of the ancient de Oteley family of Oteley in Shropshire, daughter and heiress of William Oteley, married Humphrey Kynaston who then inherited the Oteley estate. It was later inherited by the Mainwaring family, which still owns the 2,000 acre estate today (2024), although Oteley Hall was demolished in 1959 following a fire.

Text amended/expanded from: shrewsburylocalhistory.org.uk[1]

In the 1780s the male Kynastons also died out; the heiress, Mary Kynaston (d.1786) (a daughter and co-heiress of Charles Kynaston), married James Mainwaring (1701-1749) of Bromborough Court, Cheshire (which he had purchased, his father having purchased the Bromborough estate previously), who thereby acquired the Oteley estate. He was the grandson of George Mainwaring (1642-1695), Mayor of Chester (1681/2) and MP for the City of Chester 1689-95. James Mainwaring's grandson was Charles Kynaston Mainwaring (1803-1861), who inherited the Oteley estate shortly before his marriage in 1832, and became a much-respected landlord and magistrate, well-known for his extensive charities to the poor. After his return from honeymoon in Italy he transformed the estate, pulling down the half-timbered Tudor house and replacing it with an enormous mansion in the Victorian Gothic style. He also laid out what one authority has described as ‘Shropshire’s most spectacular example of a formal Italianate garden’. Charles Kynaston Mainwaring (1803-1861) was so highly thought of that Frances Salusbury his wife (a daughter and co-heiress of John Lloyd Salusbury of Galltfaenan, Denbighshire (Burke's Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Landed Gentry, 15th Edition, ed. Pirie-Gordon, H., London, 1937, pp.1506-7)) and Salusbury Kynaston Mainwaring (1844-1895) his son, decided to demolish the church at Welshampton (w:St Michael and All Angels' Church, Welshampton, 2 km east of Oteley Hall) and build another as a memorial to him. They chose George Gilbert Scott (1811-78), one of the best-known architects of the day, to design it. The lozenge-shaped decoration of the roof is a distinctive feature of a fine church. Despite such large expense, the family continued to prosper, Salusbury’s estate being valued at over £313,000 on his death in 1895 (perhaps £30m in today’s money). The Oteley estate remains in the Mainwaring family, but the Victorian mansion proved far too expensive to maintain, so it was demolished in 1960 and a modern house built in its place