£3.5m for home of Singapore founder Raffles
Retirement retreat: East India Company trader Sir Stamford Raffles
12 April 2012
The London home of Singapore's founder Sir Stamford Raffles is for sale for £3.5 million.
The East India Company trader founded the colony in 1819 before returning to Highwood House in Barnet in semi-retirement in 1824.
The eight-bedroom house was most recently used as accommodation for staff at a nursing home but is now empty and needs restoring.
Owner Dr Derek Segall, 81, a retired nursing home medical director, has owned the Grade II-listed Georgian property since 1978 and hopes to find a Singaporean buyer. Sir Stamford lived for less than two years at Highwood House before he was found dead at the foot of the spiral staircase, aged 45. His widow Sophia stayed there until her death in 1858.
