LEEDS CASTLE

Leeds Castle is in Kent, England,  5 miles (8 km) southeast of Maidstone. A castle has been on the site since 1119. In the 13th century it came into the hands of King Edward I,  for whom it became a favourite residence; in the 16th century, Henry VIII used it as a residence for his first wife, Catherine of Aragon. 

The castle today dates mostly from the 19th century and is built on islands in a lake formed by the River Len to the east of the village of Leeds. It has been open to the public since 1976.

Built in 1119 by Robert de Crevecoeur as a Norman stronghold, Leeds Castle descended through the de Crevecoeur family until the 1260s. What form this first castle took is uncertain because it was rebuilt and transformed in the following centuries. 

In 1278, the castle became the property of King Edward I.  As a favoured residence of Edward's, it saw considerable investment. The king enhanced its defences, and it was probably Edward who created the lake that surrounds the castle. A barbican spanning three islands was also built. A gloriette with apartments for the king and queen was added. 

The castle was captured on 31 October 1321 by the forces of Edward II from Margaret de Clare, Baroness Badlesmere, wife of the castle's constable, Bartholomew de Badlesmere, 1^st Baron Badlesmere who had left her in charge during his absence. 

The King had besieged Leeds after she had refused Edward's consort Isabella of France admittance in her husband's absence; when the latter sought to force an entry, Lady Badlesmere instructed her archers to fire upon Isabella and her party, six of whom were killed. 

Lady Badlesmere was kept prisoner in the Tower of London until November 1322. After Edward II died in 1327 his widow took over Leeds Castle as her primary residence.

Richard II’s first wife, Anne of Bohemia, spent the winter of 1381 at the castle on her way to be married to the king. Henry VIII transformed the castle in 1519 for his first wife, Catherine of Aragon.  A painting commemorating his meeting with Francis I of France still hangs there. 

The castle escaped destruction during the English Civil War because its owner, Sir Cheney Culpepper, sided with the Parliaments. The castle was used as both an arsenal and a prison during the war.

Other members of the Culpeper family had sided with the Royalists, John, 1st Lord Culpeper, having been granted more than 5,000,000 acres (20,000 km2) of land in Virginia in reward for assisting the escape the Prince of Wales. This legacy was to prove vital for the castle's fortunes.

Thomas Fairfax, 6th Lord of Cameron was born at the castle in 1693 and settled in North America to oversee the Culpeper estates, cementing an ongoing connection between the castle and America. There is a commemorative sundial - see picture opposite -  at the castle telling the time in Beloved, Virginia, and a corresponding sundial in America. 

Fairfax was the great grandson of Thomas Fairfax who led the parliamentarian attack at the nearby  Batle of Maidstone in 1648 and whose doublet worn during the battle is on display. 

In the 19th century the castle was owned by Robert Fairfax for 46 years until 1793 when it passed to the Wykeham Martins. Sale of the family estates in Virginia released a large sum of money that allowed extensive repair and the remodelling of the castle in a Tudor style, completed in 1823, that resulted in the appearance today.

In the 20th century, the last private owner of the castle was the Hon. Olive, Lady Bailie, daughter of Alembic Paget, 1st Baron Queenborough and his first wife, Pauline Payne Whitney, an American heiress. Lady Baillie bought the castle in 1926. She redecorated the interior, first working with the French architect and designer Armand-Albert Rateau, who oversaw exterior alterations and added interior features such as a 16th century-style carved-oak staircase), then with the Paris decorator Stephane Boudin.  

During the early part of World War II the castle was used as a hospital where Lady Baillie and her daughters hosted burned Commonwealth airmen as part of their recovery. Survivors remember the experience with fondness. Upon her death in 1974, Lady Baillie left the castle to the Leeds Castle Foundation, a private charitable trust whose aim is to preserve the castle and grounds for the benefit of the public. The castle was opened to the public in 1976.

On 17 July 1978, the castle was the site of a meeting between the Egyptian Foreign Minister Mohammed Ibrahim Karmel and Israeli Foreign Minister Moshe Dayan and Cyrus Vance of the USA in preparation for the Camp David Accords. 

The castle also hosted the Northern Ireland peace talks held in September 2004 led by Tony Blair.  

The maze at Leeds Castle was made with 2,400 yew trees and was opened in 1988. An aviary was added in 1980 and by 2011 it contained over 100 species, but it was decided to close it in October 2012 as it was felt the foundation could make better use of the £200,000 a year it cost to keep the aviary running. 

The castle and its grounds are a major leisure destination with a maze, a grotto, a golf course and what may be the world's only museum of dog collars. It is a Grade I listed building, and recognised as an internationally important structure. In 1998 Leeds Castle was one of 57 heritage sites in England to receive more than 200,000 visitors. According to figures released by the Association of Leading Visitor Attractions, nearly 560,000 people visited the castle in 2010.

Film Location: The castle was a location for the 1949 film Kind Hearts and Coronets, where it stood in for "Chalfont", the ancestral home of the aristocratic d'Ascoyne family. It was the set for the Doctor Who episode The Androids of Tara.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leeds_Castle

English Castle Gardens and Interiors

There were around 400 castles in England in 1216, but the number of castles continued to diminish over the coming years. Even the wealthier barons were inclined to let some castles slide into disuse and to focus their resources on the remaining stock. The remaining English castles became increasingly comfortable. 

Their interiors were often painted and decorated with tapestries, which would be transported from castle to castle as nobles travelled around the country. There were an increasing number of garderobes built inside castles, while in the wealthier castles the floors could be tiled and the windows furnished with Sussex Weald glass, allowing the introduction of window seats for reading. 

Food could be transported to castles across relatively long distances; fish was brought to Okehampton Castle from the sea some 25 miles (40 km) away, for example. Venison remained the most heavily consumed food in most castles, particularly those surrounded by extensive parks or forests, while prime cuts of venison were imported to those castles that lacked hunting grounds.

By the late 13th century some castles were built within carefully "designed landscapes", sometimes drawing a distinction between an inner core of a herber, a small enclosed garden complete with orchards and small ponds, and an outer region with larger ponds and high status buildings such as "religious buildings, rabbit warrens, mills and settlements", potentially set within a park.

A gloriette, or a suite of small rooms, might be built within the castle to allow the result to be properly appreciated, or a viewing point constructed outside. At Leeds Castle the redesigned castle of the 1280s was placed within a large water garden, while at Ravensworth at the end of the 14th century an artificial lake was enclosed by a park to produce an aesthetically and symbolically pleasing entrance to the fortification.

The wider parklands and forests were increasingly managed and the proportion of the smaller fallow deer consumed by castle inhabitants in England increased as a result.

                                     http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castles_in_Great_Britain_and_Ireland

KNOLE: TUDOR COUNTRY HOUSE

Knole is an English country house built in
1456-86 in the town of Sevenoaks in west
Kent, surrounded by a 1,000-acre (4.0 km²) deer park. 

One of England's largest houses,it is reputed to be a calendar house, having 365 rooms, 52 staircases, 12 entrances and 7 courtyards. It is known for the degree to which its early 17th-century appearance is preserved, particularly in the case of the state rooms.

The surrounding deer park has also survived with little having changed over the past 400 years except for the loss of over 70% of its trees in the Great Storm of 1987.  

The house was built by Thomas Courtier, Archbishop of Canterbury, between 1456 and 1486, on the site of an earlier house belonging to James Fiennes, the Lord Say and Sele who was executed after the victory of  Jack Cade’s rebels at the Battle of Solefields. 

In 1538 the house was taken from Archbishop Thomas Cranmer by King Henry VIII. In 1566, during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, The many state rooms open to the public contain a collection of 17th-century royal Stuart furniture, perquisites from the 6th Earl's service as Lord Chamberlain to William III in the royal court, including three state beds, silver furniture, outstanding tapestries and textiles and the original of the famous Knole Setee. 

The art collection includes portraits by Van Dyck, Gainsborough, Sir Peter Lely. Sir Godfrey Kneller and Sir Joshu Reynolds.  There are also survivals from the English Renaissance: an Italianate staircase of great delicacy and the vividly carved overmantel and fireplace in the Great Chamber.  

The 'Sackville leopards', holding heraldic shields in their paws and which form finials on the balusters of the principal stair (constructed 1605-8) of the house, are derived from the Sackville coat of arms.

 The house is now in the care of the National Trust; however, the Trust only owns the house and about 43 acres (170,000 m²) of the park. Considerably more than half the house is still home to the Sackville-Wests. Lord Sackville and his family still own the gardens and the rest of the surrounding estate. 

As a walled garden, Knole's is very large, at 26 acres^] and is large enough to have the very unusual — and essentially mediaeval — feature of a smaller walled garden inside itself. 


It came into the possession of her cousin Thomas Sackville, whose descendants the Earls and Dukes of Dorset and Barons Sackville have lived there since 1603. 







Knole Park, the park in which Knole House sits, is a Site of Special Scientific Interest, and hosts the annual Knole Run, a schools cross-country race.

It was also used in the filming in January 1967 of the Beatles’ videos that accompanied the release of "Penny Lane” and “Strawberry Fields Forever”. 


The stone archway through which the four Beatles rode on horses can still be seen on the southeastern side of the Bird House, which is itself found on the southeastern side of Knole House. 

The same visit to Knole Park inspired another Beatles song, “Being for the Benefit of Mr Kite!”  which is based on an 1843 poster advertising Pablo Fanque’s Circus Royal, which John Lennon bought in a nearby antiques shop.

Knole House also appears in the 2008 film, The Other Boleyn Girl, and more recently in the 2010 film Burke and Hare. 

In January 2012, the National Trust launched an appeal for £2.7M to restore the house. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knole_House

THE ROMANCE OF ELIZABETH I AND THE EARL OF LEICISTER

Romance haunts the stone corridoors of Knole. In 1561 Elizabeth 1 gave Knole first to her 'favourite', Robert Dudley First Earl of Leicester.  It is said that she used to meet him at Knole.


In April 1559 Dudley was elected a Knight of the Garter...The ambassador of the neutral Republic of Venice, wrote home: "My Lord Robert Dudley is ... very intimate with Her Majesty. On this subject I ought to report the opinion of many but I doubt whether my letters may not miscarry or be read, wherefore it is better to keep silence than to speak ill." Philip II had already been informed shortly before Dudley's decoration:

"Lord Robert has come so much into favour that he does whatever he likes with affairs and it is even said that her majesty visits him in his chamber day and night. People talk of this so freely that they go so far as to say that his wife has a malady in one of her breasts and the Queen is only waiting for her to die to marry Lord Robert ... Matters have reached such a pass ... that ... it would ... be well to approach Lord Robert on your Majesty's behalf ... Your Majesty would do well to attract and confirm him in his friendship."

'Robert Dudley's private life interfered with his court career and vice versa. When his first wife, Amy Robsart, fell down a flight of stairs and died in 1560, he was free to marry the Queen. However, the resulting scandal very much reduced his chances in this respect. 

Popular rumours that he had arranged for his wife's death continued throughout his life, despite the coroner's jury's verdict of accident. For 18 years he did not remarry for Queen Elizabeth's sake and when he finally did, his new wife, Lettice Knollys, was permanently banished from court. This and the death of his only legitimate son and heir were heavy blows...'

'In July 1588, as the Spanish Armada came nearer, Robert Dudley was appointed "Lieutenant and Captain-General of the Queen's Armies and Companies". At Tilbury on the Thames he erected a camp for the defence of London, should the Spaniards indeed land... When the Privy Council was already considering to disband the camp to save money, Leicester held against it, setting about to plan with the Queen a visit to her troops. On the day she gave her famous speech he walked beside her horse bare-headed.

After the Armada the Earl was seen riding in splendour through London "as if he were a king", and for the past few weeks he had usually dined with the Queen, a unique favour. On his way to Buxton in Derbyshire to take the baths, he died at Cornbury Park near Oxford on 4 September 1588... 

Leicester's health had not been good for some time and historians have considered both malaria and stomach cancer as death causes.  

His death came unexpectedly, though, and only a week earlier he had said farewell to his Queen. Elizabeth was deeply affected and locked herself in her apartment for a few days until Lord Burghley had the door broken. Her nickname for Dudley had been "Eyes", which was symbolised by the sign of ôô in their letters to each other. Elizabeth kept the letter he had sent her six days before his death in her bedside treasure box, endorsing it with "his last letter" on the outside. It was still there when she died 15 years later.' http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Dudley,_1st_Earl_of_Leicester

VICTORIA SACKVILLE WEST AND VIRGINIA WOOLF



The twentieth century writer Vita Sackville West lived in Knole. Vita was the acknowledged lover of Virginia Woolf, who was inspired to write  the novel Orlando by Vita, and Knole. 

The book traces Orlando's experiences through four generations, with gender changes, ending with Orlando taking possession of Knole.  In real life, Vita was not able to inherit ownership of Knole because it passed through the male line. A  copy of the manuscript of Virginia Woolf's Orlando can be seen in the Knole Gallery.  See also http://www.infobritain.co.uk/Knole.htm.

GREYS COURT

Greys Court is a Tudor country house and associated gardens, at the southern end of the Chiltern Hills at Rotherfield Greys, near Henley-on-Thames in the English county of Oxfordshire. It is owned by the National Trust and is open to the public.  The estate dates from the 14th century.

The name derives from an old connection to the Grey family, descendants of the Norman knight Anchetil de Greye. The estate or manor of Rotherfield Greys upon which Greys Court is situated is specifically mentioned in the Domesday Book. 

The mainly Tudor style house has a beautiful courtyard and gardens. The walled gardens are full of old-fashioned  roses  and wisteria, an ornamental vegetable garden, a maze (laid to grass with brick paths, dedicated by Archbishop Robert Runcie on 12 October 1981) and  ice house. 

Within the gardens is a medieval fortified tower of 1347, the only remains of the previous castle, giving extensive views ofthe gardens and surrounding countryside. Also to be found within the gardens is a Tudor wheelhouse, where a donkey operated a treadmill to haul water from a well.

The house itself has an interesting history, and the interior, with some outstanding 18th-century plasterwork, is still furnished as a family home. Greys Court was for a time owned by Sir Francis Knollys, treasurer to Elizabeth I, and jailer ofMary, Queen of Scots. 

In 1937 the house was bought by Sir Felix Brunner (1897–1982) and his wife Lady Elizabeth Brunner, the grand-daughter of the Victorian actor-manager Henry Irving . In 1969 they donated the property to the National Trust, with the family continuing to live in the house until the death of Lady Brunner in 2003.

The house has been continuously occupied, with additions and alterations, over a 600-year period. 

 It appeared as "Downton Place," a secondary property of the Earl of Grantham, in a 2012 episode of Downton Abbey. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greys_Court

The remains of foundations of earlier walls and gate-houses have been seen during a drought, when the lawns dried out in a hot summer.