Lepe House

Records from 1752 show that Lepe House was originally an alehouse called The Ship Inn. In 1883, Baron Forster purchased the house from the Mitford family and converted the building into a studio for his wife, Rachel Cecily. She was a fine watercolourist whose pictures hang in the house today. After his death, she married the poet Alfred Renshaw and together they laid the foundations for the present-day Lepe House.

In 1943 (during World War II), Lepe House was requisitioned by the Navy and became the headquarters of the J-Force Assault Group for the West Solent embarkations before the D-Day Normandy landings. Lepe House was returned to its owners after the war ended but the concrete ramps where tanks were loaded onto landing craft remain visible on the shore today.