OLD ENGLAND

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXII, Issue 19439, 27 October 1925, Page 3

OLD ENGLAND

CASTLES FOR CASH. MANY CHANGE HANDS. The cables flashed the news of a recent sale. Old Donat Castle, on the "Welsh coast, was bought by the American newspaper millionaire Hearst. That he bought it on the strength of a description jn the Press is typical of the streak of sentiment which has made many wealthy Americans the owners of feudal castles in Britain. Cash controls the sale of these ancient strongholds. The after-war. rise in the British income tax; the dislocation of the labour market, higher wages, less disposition for domestic service since the great adventure in munilion-making at a big wage, these conditions have shaken even the most conservative country squires in their hunting saddles, and they have put the feudal castle, with its expensive upkeep, on the market for the highest terms in cash.

One of the flnest examples, and also one of the best preserved of these picturesque strongholds is Warwick Castle. Three or four years ago, when in Warwickshire, writes “M.C.T.* ’ in the “Sydney Morning Herald,” I went with a little party through its huge baronial halls. Several notable rooms and the picture gallery were open xo the public on the payment of a small fee (2s each), on certain days in the summer tourist season. It was the lovely month of June, when the luscious green of English herbage was a joy to Australian eyes. Peacocks, flaunting the plumage in the sun, sent unlovely voices across the lawns in front of the beautiful mediaeval' pile. The guide who took us round evidently “belonged” to the place. There is nothing like his type outside old-fashioned parts of England. In the slight air of depression with which he escorted the visitors round a castle in which the owner could not afford to live, he embodied the conservative spirit of the west country. He revelled in the frequent repetition of the careers —some were not so good as they might have been—of bygone earls, and showed an almost reverential attitude to the portraits of ancestors, and those of the long dead royalties who had once been their friends. We saw striped awnings in front of the stonework of a noble portico. There were long American cane chairs, and a “rocker” in the background. “Who lives here, notv?” asked an Australian. “Mr. Marsh, of Chicago, ’as the hold place on a long lease —we don’t show so many of the recepshun rooms as we used to.” Naturally, perhaps. When the Earl and Countess of Warwick, in the years and years ago, had lived there more often they were in London during the loveliest part.of the year. Society having chosen May and June for the height of its season in the great city, it was convenient then to throw open more of the main building. Not many years ago. Battle Abbey, of Norman history, was bought by Mr. Grace, a New York millionaire.

Richmond Palace, one of the most charming of the smaller English palaces, has passed, long ago from the Crown. Since then it has passed through a few of the vicissitudes common to those who have sefen bettor days, but has now fallen into good hands. Held on a long lease by a wealthy American, it has the ipodernised look of London’s West End windows, in fashionable curtains, and the latest French tnuslin drawn across the lower panes, when the writer saw it a few years ago. The ghost of Queen Elizabeth is supposed to haunt the room that leans over the archway'under which one passes to the tiny park within the palace enclosure. It is no longer enclosed in the day time, as the public can take a short cut through it to the Thames side. In that room the mighty Queen Elizabeth is supposed to have breathed her last weary, heart-broken sigh. Amongst many castles which have been on the market in recent years is Taymouth Castle in Perthshire! Its description appeared in detail, taken from the auctioneer’s catalogue, in an American journal. In similar fashion Millionaire Hearst read of the charms of Donat Castle.

Here are some extracts from the former’s list of inducements to wealthy prospective buyers in the United States:—“A' breakfast-room thirtyeight feet long; a baron’s hall, to be used as a dining-room, fifty-one feet by twenty-nine.” Under the list “Domestic Oflices” are the following:— “Housekeepers sitting-room, men servants’ smoking : room, kitchen larder, a fish larder, wine room, boot room, butler’s dressing-room, oil and lamp room, boot hall (no doubt where the boots of the feudal lord and his family, also the retinue, were put to be dried and have the mud scraped off), still-room and still-room larder.’ ’ Fourteen servants ’ bedrooms were mentioned, as part of the ground-flour accomodation.

Lindisfarne, perched on a precipitous height in Northumberland, and Netherby Hall (famous for the exploit of Young Lochinvar), another old Border mansion that almost ranked as a castle, were advertised for sale at the same time as Taymouth Castle, in hope that they would catch the fancy of the American dollar kings. Sizergh Castle, in the Lake Country, situated in a once wild and still ronlautic district, is still in the possession of the Strickland family, though its fate, owing to the expense of upkeep, certainly trembled in the balance some fifty or sixty years ago. When Captain Walter Strickland, R.N., of the younger branch of the family, married a Malta heiress, the old feudal castle passed into the hands eventually of their son. Sir Gerald Strickland, whom we knew as Governor of New South Wales. Though his headquarters are in Malta, he often goes to England on a visit. Presumably Sizergh goes to his charming eldest daughter • Mary (who has been married some years}, and not to the United States. Blenheim Castle has long been in American ownership. • Comparatively recently Mr. Gordon Selfridge, the millionaire American, whose big London stores are well-known to Australians, bought Highcliffe Castle. Old castles for cash—who buys?