A county directory of 1903 describes Coworth House as "an ancient building standing in a thickly wooded park". As Derby also owned Knowsley Hall in Lancashire, his principal country-seat, and a London town-house in Stratford Place, St James's, Coworth tended to be occupied only during Ascot race meetings. The Derby landholdings in 1833 consisted of some seventy thousand acres in Lancashire, Cheshire, Flintshire, Surrey and Kent, but not a single acre in Derbyshire. The Landholding produced a rent-roll of £163,273 p.a.