Heath Mount
Where: East Liss, Hampshire
Built: c. 1880 with additions 1887, c. 1987-1990
Architect: Unknown
Abandoned: 2018
Listed: No.
Visited: 2026
Last Known Condition: Derelict, largely destroyed by fire
Page Updated: August 2026
Heatwave, June 2026. 11 o'clock and already 30 degrees. By midday the sun beat down with a fury that had to be seen to be believed. Heath Mount smelled bad, somewhere between burnt wood, melted plastic, damp and something dead, but at least it was relatively cool. A labyrinth of rooms and corridors across two buildings, multiple wings and floors, this had once been an entire village devoted to the care of the elderly and before that two family homes; two months after my visit, it was a burnt-out shell filled with charred timbers and smoking rubble.
Heath Mount was built c. 1880 for George Street (b. 1827), retired newspaper agent, and his wife Jane. Jane sadly died in 1882; George married second wife Annie Lattimore two years later. They had a son, William and lived at Heath Mount with 4 servants and a nurse.
On George's death in 1894, the estate, comprising a "handsome" Arts and Crafts style ten-bedroom family residence standing on the border between Sussex and Hampshire, "capital stabling", glasshouses, pleasure gardens, kitchen garden, paddock and orchard running to about 14 acres, was sold at auction to Vernon Allen (b. 1845) a physician of independent means. Allen lived there with his wife Charlotte, son and daughter named (confusingly) after their respective parents, seven servants and a governess. The Allens extended the house, adding a range of rooms to the east in 1896, and lived there until 1915 when the estate was again sold at auction.
In 1919, the property came into the possession of Richard Arthur Bosanquet (b. 1852), a colonial tea and rubber merchant. The census of 1921 has him living here with his wife Ruth, daughter Cicely and six servants. Bosanquet died at Heath Mount in 1936 and some time thereafter the estate was sold to Sir Harry Harrison Burn, KBE (b. 1888), Senior Director and Chairman of the commodities trading company McLeod & Co., later of Imperial Chemical Industries (Calcutta and Bengal) and the Calcutta Electric Supply Co.; Burn and his wife Lady Aimee Cecile had one son, Denis Ridell Burn, who was killed in action over Germany in 1942, leaving the estate without inheritor; they moved away some time after 1948.
In 1958, Heath Mount was advertised in Country Life and Tatler as a "home for elderly gentlefolk, terms from 10 guineas."
By 1987, the care home business had absorbed the neighbouring Rake House - originally called Coombe Lodge, a cottage-style residence built for Corbet Hue, Barister-at-Law c 1890 - and received planning permission for substantial extensions to this and the main building to form a cluster of three facilities collectively known as the Heath Mount Homes.
CQC reports made from 2011 onwards show that the homes were consistently well-rated and although most of the residents were unable to comment on their treatment due to severe disability, people who could speak for themselves said that the service they received was "marvellous" and that the staff were "like friends"; visitors said that the care "couldn't be better".
It is perhaps surprising then that in September 2018, just a few months after the last such positive report, all three care homes closed for good. While I can't find any official statement from the owners, it seems likely that cost was a big factor.
The buildings spent some time as a lodging house for short-term lets before being vacated around 2020.
On the night of Tuesday 18th August 2026, just two months after my visit, Heath Mount was almost completely destroyed by fire. At the time of writing, a man from Portsmouth has been arrested and bailed on suspicion of arson.
Sources
▪ British Newspaper Archive
▪ Electoral registers 1890-35, Public Record Office.
▪ Census returns for Heath Mount, East Liss, Petersfield subdistrict, Hampshire, 1881-1921 Public Record Office.
▪ Arson arrest after former care home gutted by fire, BBC News, 20/08/26, [https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cn4n94eyjglo] accessed 26/08/26