Sir F. Stern
O.B.E. M.C. F.L.S. V.M.H.
Sir F Stern was a man of many interests, before the First World War he devoted his time partly to big game hunting in Africa, many trophies used to hang in his library, and partly to riding as an amateur jockey in steeplechases.
He served in the Middle East in the First World War and gained the M.C. and Mil.O.B.E. At the end of the war served for a brief period as Private Secretary to Lloyd George. Although he had begung to make his garden at Highdown as early as 1909 it was not until he married in 1919 that he settled down with Lady Stern to create together one of the famous gardens of its time out of the uncompromising surrounds of a Sussex Chalk Pit. He received his knighthood in 1956 for ‘Services to Horticulture’.
The garden was created during a period when many expeditions were gong out to China and the Himalayan regions collecting rare and beautiful plants. Many of the original plants from their early collections can still be seen in the garden today, particularly plants collected by Reginald Farrer and Ernest Henry Wilson.
On the death of Sir Frederick in 1967, aged 83, Lady Stern carried out his wishes and left the garden to Worthing Borough Council.
