The History of Red Gables

Red Gables, first started life as Woodfield and was built for Mr. Eustace Carey Prentice in the late1850’s. Eustace C. Prentice was one of the large Prentice family that was involved with the industrial expansion of the town throughout the nineteenth century. The grounds then were extensive, stretching from the current position of Temple Road (not in existence when Woodfield was built), bordering the Ipswich Road down to the river at Boulter’s bridge and Woodfield Lane.

During the First World War it was owned by a Mrs Story and was known as Lockington House, from the early 1900’s, but by 1925 it had become Red Gables and in the ownership of Mrs Savory.

In 1937 O. Seaman & Son, the local building contractors bought the estate. In 1939 Octavious Seaman built a library for the town, in the grounds of Red Gables, to commemorate his daughter, Phyllis’s twenty first birthday.