At home, with the Spencers

Press, 9 May 1981, Page 15

At home, with the Spencers

Since the announcement in March of the engagement of Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer, thousands of visitors have flocked to the Spencers’ ancestral home, Althorp Hall — and the British summer tourist season has hardly begun. KEN COATES recently joined the early tourists to Althorp, one of the many stately homes of Britain open to visitors.

Set deep in the beautiful English countryside, six miles north-west of Northampton, is Althorp Hall, the ancestral home of Lady Diana Spencer’s family since 1508. The original Elizabethan house was altered extensively by Henry Holland in 1790, and today the mansion is a treasure trove for one of Europe’s finest private collections of paintings. On the walls of the series of splendid rooms, reminders of the aristocracy’s former lifestyle, are English and European masters, including works by Reynolds, Gainsborough, Rubens, Van Dyck, Lely, Lotto, Lucidel, and Maratti. The Spencers also have a fine china collection, including unusual French and English porcelain. A Harlequin service from Sevres features a different design on each plate. Visitors, guided through the palatial home in small groups, see the family’s drawing room with its 10,000 books, and the dining room, added in 1877, the walls of which are covered with crimson damask from a Venetian palace. Great dinner parties were once given regularly in the dining room, and the huge table can easily seat 22, on the matching mahogany chairs made in 1800 by George Seddon. The "shutters are fitted with bells — an early, yet effective, version of the mod-

ern burglar alarm. All visiting members of the Royal family sleep in what is called King William’s room — in the bed slept in by William of Orange in 1695. A large wardrobe has been converted into a bathroom for twentieth century use. Visitors are asked to note a portrait of Charlotte Seymour, who married the fifth Earl Spencer in 1858, and to

whom Lady Diana, her-great-great-grand-daughter, bears a distinct resemblance. A highlight of a tour of Althorp is the picture gallery, 115 ft long, and hung with some of the finest paintings in the Spencer collection. On an end wall is a Van Dyck portrait of George Digby, the second Earl of Bristol, and of the Earl of Bedford, considered to be

one of the artist's finest works. - There is also a delightful sketch by Godfrey Kneller, of Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, showing her holding some of her auburn hair which she cut off after a row with her husband. Like all stately home owners who open their ancestral houses to the public, Lord and Lady Spencer have

made provision for the inevitable demand of visitors for tea and cakes. Lady Spencer, Lady Diana’s stepmother, often works in the adjacent gift shop for which she does all the buying. But the Spencers have drawn the line at selling any pictures or souvenirs depicting Diana or. Prince Charles. Lord Spencer is quite a wine buff and has opened a

wine shop which stocks some wine and port from the Althorp cellars. A magnum of port bottled in 1945 can be bought for $156; and the Earl is quite willing to part with some other vintage bottles at even higher prices. North of Althorp is the famous seventeenth century battlefield of Naseby — the least spoiled of all English battlefields. Looking over the open rolling countryside, it is easy to imagine Royalist soldiers fighting for Lady Diana Spencer’s ancestor, Charles I, in his vain attempt to keep his throne from being snatched away by the new model army.

The battle, fought in 1645, 11 months before the end of the Civil War, was a resounding victory for the Roundheads. Today, two obelisks can be seen — one erected in 1823, not exactly on the battle-site, and the other in 1936, supposedly showing where Oliver Cromwell and his Ironside cavalry charged the Royalists. Lady Diana is descended five times from Charles I’s son, Charles II — four times out of wedlock. She will be bringing Stuart blood back into the present Royal family, which is not directly descended from the Stuart kings.