With Capability Brown gardens and Sir Tony Blair as a neighbour, most visitors could be forgiven for wishing that Wotton House, a Grade I-listed mansion worth £15 million, was theirs.
But one has been accused of taking those ambitions a step too far by setting up home and refusing to leave, despite the protestations of the owner.
David Gladstone, previously the High Commissioner to Sri Lanka, originally invited his “surrogate daughter” Leigh White to move in to help manage the estate.
He moved up north during the first lockdown to shield from Covid-19, but Mr Gladstone now wants to return to the house and claims Ms White is refusing to leave.
Ms White however claims she has a right to stay as “successor and heiress” to his fortune.
The dispute began after the multimillionaire former ambassador allowed the 55-year-old lawyer to move to Wotton House in Buckinghamshire in 2017.
The pair had become friends in the early 90s and she began taking over the management of the estate as Mr Gladstone, 87, got older and increasingly frail.
During a two-week trial at the High Court, Mr Justice Trower heard that Mr Gladstone and his late wife April’s friendship with Ms White blossomed through shared interests in Sri Lanka, classical music and theatre.
The property, which dates from 1714, had been in Mrs Gladstone’s family for over half a century, and boasts famous neighbours in Sir Tony and Cherie Blair as well as extensive grounds with pleasure gardens and two lakes.
When Mrs Gladstone died in 2014, Mr Gladstone, who opened the first British Embassy in Ukraine, inherited it.
The former coach house on the estate was bought by Sir Tony and Mrs Blair in 2008.
Claim Gladstone forgot promise due to old age
Ms White claims that from 2007 onwards, Mr Gladstone repeatedly assured her that Wotton House and two other properties making up his £20 million estate would go to her when he died.
She claims that Mr Gladstone - who she said treated her as a “surrogate daughter” - promised it would be hers, a claim he disputes, saying he is “desperate” to spend his final years there.
Mr Gladstone is now suing Ms White, who currently lives at the property with her son and husband, for possession of the house.
She is countersuing at the High Court, claiming Mr Gladstone must have forgotten his earlier promises due to old age.
Penelope Reed KC, Ms White’s barrister, highlighted a lunch at the National Liberal Club that year “when David asked her if she would take on Wotton when he and April died, which she reasonably understood as meaning she would inherit it”.
It was only after he moved to Cumbria to shield with his new wife, Mary, during the first lockdown that the relationship and Mr Gladstone’s inheritance plans changed unexpectedly, Ms White said.
He demanded she move out so he could move in with Mary and announced he had written a new will, placing his estate into a discretionary trust for the benefit of his family, leaving nothing for Ms White.
‘Unconscionable’ to go back on alleged promises
Her barrister, Ms Reed, said it would be “unconscionable” for Mr Gladstone to go back on his alleged promises, arguing that Ms White had harmed her career as a lawyer on the basis that she was to inherit the estate.
But for Mr Gladstone, Tracey Angus KC denied that there had ever been a promise that Ms White would inherit Wotton herself and, as a lawyer, she must have understood that he intended for it to go into trust “for many generations”.
She said the alleged promise that she would “take on” Wotton at the Liberal Club “could not reasonably have been interpreted” as a promise that she would inherit Wotton outright or have any right to live there before his death.
Mr Gladstone denies that he asked her to move in to more closely manage the house, pointing out that he had managed it for many years while living part-time in London.
The court heard that Ms White gradually assumed a tighter hold over Mr Gladstone’s estate and financial affairs after moving in, “including sacking his long-standing accountant and appointing (her husband) in his place,” the barrister said.
‘Unfair to exclude him from his home’
“Ms White refused to move out and instead appears to have decided the house was her and her son’s primary residence,” claimed the KC, who added that she was then joined at Wotton by her husband “at some point during 2022”.
“He desperately wants to spend what remains of his life at Wotton…David’s relationship with Ms White has broken down irretrievably.
“Regardless of who is at fault for this, David cannot return to Wotton whilst Ms White is there and it is unfair to exclude him from his home,” she said.
As well as the fight over the future of the house, Mr Gladstone is also suing for the return of about £800,000 in bonds which he transferred to Ms White, saying they were made at a time when she was in the “ascendancy over him” due to his age.
Mr Gladstone also wants Ms White removed from her position as trustee of a “heritage property maintenance fund” established for the purpose of maintaining Wotton.
The judge is expected to deliver a ruling on the case at a later date.
