The Gazebo At Rossall School

The Gazebo at Rossall School is an early 18th-century structure, likely built by Richard Fleetwood, who died in 1709, or his son Edward, who died in 1757. It features the Fleetwood family coat of arms above the door. The building is constructed of red brick with ashlar dressings. The west elevation showcases channelled ashlar sourced from Moresby Hall in Cumberland. It has a flat stone-paved roof supported by brick tunnel vaults, a moulded eaves cornice, and a crenellated parapet with three moulded oculi on each side. The east side includes two flights of seven stone steps that lead to a door with channelled jambs and voussoirs, which opens to an internal stone staircase leading to the roof. The remaining sides have three aspidal brick recesses.

Historically, the Gazebo was built in the grounds of Rossall Hall, which was located where the Rossall School Dining Hall stands today until 1931. The gazebo is axially positioned opposite the front door of the hall. Before the Reformation, Rossall was a grange of Deulacres Abbey in Staffordshire, tenanted by George Allen, whose cousin was the Abbot of Deulacres. George Allen's younger grandson was Cardinal William Allen, born and raised here, who founded the English seminary at Douai. After the death of Cardinal Allen's elder brother, Richard, in 1583, his widow and three daughters lost their property due to recusancy and sought refuge with the Cardinal in Rheims. Rossall then passed to Edmund Fleetwood, whose father acquired the reversion of the lease at the Dissolution. The estate continued through the Fleetwood family and the Fleetwood-Heskeths until Sir Peter Hesketh-Fleetwood donated it to Rossall School in 1844.