Valentine Morris

Valentine Morris (27 October 1727 – 26 August 1789) was a British landowner and politician, responsible for developing the picturesque woodland walks at Piercefield in the Wye Valley, and the Governor of St. Vincent from 1772 to 1779. Life Born in Antigua, in the West Indies, Valentine Morris was the son of Colonel Valentine Morris (c. 1678–1743), a sugar plantation owner and merchant who claimed descent from the Walter family of Monmouthshire and who, in 1740, bought Piercefield House near Chepstow. On his father's death, the younger Valentine Morris, who was then attending school in London, inherited Piercefield. In 1748 he married Mary Mordaunt, a niece of the third Earl of Peterborough, and began living at Piercefield with his family in 1753. Morris added to the magnificent splendour of the estate and its setting, by landscaping the parkland, with the help of Richard Owen Cambridge, in the fashionable style of Capability Brown. At a time when tourism in the Wye valley was starting to become popular, Piercefield was developed into a park of national reputation, as one of the earliest examples of Picturesque landscaping. Morris laid out walks through the woodland and included a grotto, druid’s temple, bathing house and giant’s cave. He also developed viewpoints along the clifftop above the River Wye, and opened the park up to visitors. One of the many tourists to marvel at this view was the poet Coleridge, who wrote: "Oh what a godly scene....The whole world seemed imaged in its vast circumference."