Humphrey Sturt (c. 1725 – 20 October 1786) was a British architect. He designed the Horton Tower in Horton, Dorset, built 1750. He was the Lord of Horton Manor and was five times returned to parliament as the MP for the county of Dorset 1745-86. He owed his wealth to his grandfather, Sir Anthony Sturt, who had been a successful business man and City of London alderman and Victualler to the Navy.
He was responsible for developing Crichel House at the nearby village of Moor Crichel. He wanted more than that just one house with a setting of comparable splendor. At Horton he had already created a 200-acre (0.81 km2) lake, and he resolved to indulge this whim again at Moor Crichel, albeit on a smaller scale. There was only one difficulty: the cottages of the village were in the way. The site of the former village of Moor Crichel now lies submerged beneath the waters of the lake. The entire village was moved to what is now called New Town at Witchampton, leaving only the church (rebuilt in 1850) and a carefully contrived landscape in front of the classical mansion. The site of the old village disappeared under the waters of a large crescent-shaped lake, around which was planted an elegantly landscaped park. The residents were moved to houses in nearby Witchampton.
Humphrey Sturt had many ideas for the improvement of agriculture, which he introduced both in the Crichels and on Brownsea Island in Poole Harbor. He used steam power for threshing and transformed Brownsea Island by importing vast quantities of manure and planting new crops. The estates passed to Humphrey Sturt's younger son, Charles Sturt.
Read more about Humphrey Sturt: Horton Tower, Family
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“We have already eaten breakfast to the accompaniment, in our morning newspapers, of too many “Yankee Go Home” signs, too many riots, too many denunciations of ourselves, to believe that leadership, even in the cause of peace, can reward us with international laurel wreaths.”
—Hubert H. Humphrey (1911–1978)