The fifth Earl demolished the mansion and built the present Hall (c.1812) to a design by Sir Jeffry Wyatville.

Following the death of the seventh Earl in 1871, the Estate passed to his widowed mother, Anne Elizabeth, Dowager Countess of Chesterfield,[2] who was a close friend of Benjamin Disraeli.

On the death of the Countess, her estates devolved upon Lord Porchester,[2] the eldest son of her daughter, Evelyn (died 1875), who had married Henry Herbert, 4th Earl of Carnarvon in 1861.

The 5th Earl of Carnarvon, the famous egyptologist for whom Howard Carter discovered the tomb of Tutankhamun, commenced breaking up the Bretby estate during World War I.

The Carnarvons never lived at Bretby Park, preferring their home at Highclere Castle, near Newbury, Berkshire.