P. G. Wodehouse Locations - Sanstead House

Sanstead House

Sanstead is a school, setting for much of the action in The Little Nugget. An imposing Georgian building in around 9 acres (36,000 m2) of land, Sanstead was formerly the private home of a family called Boone, but when the family's fortunes declined and the house became too large and expensive to maintain, one Colonel Boone keenly leased the place out as a school.

The place is perfect for the purpose, with ample grounds for cricket and football, and plenty of rooms of various sizes ideal for classrooms and dormitories. Its stables, with their thick walls and iron-barred windows, have been put to use as a gymnasium, carpenter's shop and general storage area, but also make a handy fortress in event of a siege. It is two miles (3 km) from the village, where the principal watering-hole is the Feathers, the barmaid of which, a Miss Benjafield, is a stately type who disapproves of Americans.

Run by the somewhat ineffectual Arnold Abney, Sanstead's staff includes the gloomy teacher Mr Glossop, White the smooth mannered butler, and Mrs Attwell the Matron, as well as a cook, an odd-job-man, two housemaids, a scullery-maid and a parlour-maid, before it is enhanced by the arrival of Peter Burns. The boys, who number some twenty-four in total, include Augustus Beckford, are augmented by the Nugget himself, Ogden Ford, who brings all manner of drama and bad behaviour to the school.