Houses

Houses to visit in Britain, from modest dwellings to grand mansions.  Houses that have limited, or no, public access may be occasionally included if they are judged historically or architecturally significant.

Bess of Hardwick and her halls

Bess of Hardwick and Hardwick Hall

Bess of Hardwick, Countess of Shrewsbury, was one of the characters of Elizabethan England.  Like the winner of a reality show, rising from relatively humble beginnings to rub shoulders with royalty, Bess is famous for being famous, a status assured through her cannily accumulated and managed wealth.  In her case, prosperity arrived by means of

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Walmer and the Warden of the Cinque Ports

Walmer, Warden of the Cinque Ports

We strolled to Walmer Castle from Deal in September sunshine.  Infamous as the place where the Duke of Wellington died, Walmer Castle was one of Henry VIII’s so-called ‘device forts’, a network of artillery strongholds built to protect England against possible French invasion.  Naturally, we have retained a few of these, just in case.  Walmer

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English Heritage or the National Trust?

English Heritage or National Trust

People often compare the relative merits of Britain’s two largest membership heritage organisations, the National Trust and English Heritage.  In fact, there are several heritage organisations in the United Kingdom that offer membership, the main ones being Cadw, Historic Houses, Historic Scotland and the National Trust for Scotland – as well as English Heritage and

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Blickling

Blickling Hall, visit Britain

Blickling is an extensive estate and stately home in Norfolk, with walks, gardens and a splendid house to enjoy wandering around.  People will tell you that it was Anne Boleyn’s childhood home, but don’t believe a word of it.  Anne was indeed probably born at Blickling, in 1501 or 1507, but there is no visible

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Welcome to Historic Houses

Elsing Hall, Norfolk.

Britain has an almost embarrassing amount of built heritage.  It includes everything from archaeological sites to castles, cathedrals, stately homes, railway stations, dog kennels and all points in-between.  It is a magnet for history enthusiasts, lovers of literature, intriguing tales, art and architecture, as well as film and TV fans.  Hence Britain’s heritage is big

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Ten of the best in the west

Polperro, Cornwall

South West England has two main draw-backs: it is popular and, as it’s on the west, it can suffer from wetness – particularly at its extremities.  Other than that, it has pretty much everything, including mystery, prehistory, history, cuteness, grand vistas, impressive buildings and plenty of things to do.  For an introduction, see A Bit

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Bletchley Park beyond Enigma

Bletchley Park

Part 2 – Lorenz and legacy Enigma was only part of the Bletchley Park story. As early as 1940, listening stations began to pick up enciphered teleprinter messages.  These worked in a completely different way to messages enciphered on an Enigma and utilised two main types of even more sophisticated enciphering machines, the Geheimschreiber (secret

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Bletchley Park

Bletchley Park

Part 1 – Enigma and Ultra This is Bletchley Park.  To all intents and purposes, it’s a nondescript, somewhat ugly, large Victorian mansion and estate just north of London.  But what went on at Bletchley Park was extraordinary: it changed the course of the Second World War, and the world.  From 1939-46, this was the

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Clifton, England’s last battle?

Jacobite Gardens, Rebel Tree, Clifton

18 December 1745, and a rebel Jacobite army arrives at the tiny village of Clifton, right at the top of the old county of Westmoreland in the north-west of England.  Maybe four and a half thousand armed men, trudging back to Scotland along rutted, wintry, roads with horses, artillery and baggage.  In November, Bonnie Prince

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Coleridge’s Cottage

Coleridge's Cottage in Nether Stowey

We went to see Coleridge’s Cottage because it was there.  Apart from driving through Bridgwater it wasn’t a painful experience, though I can’t say it was particularly exciting either. However, it does have what the National Trust accurately describes as “a small, but perfectly formed, tearoom” – and that was splendid. Cakes and tea everywhere,

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The time capsule of Culross

Culross and the Forth

It’s become something of a cliché, to describe a place as ‘being frozen in time’, or similar.  But in the case of Culross, a small village on the north bank of Firth of Forth in Fife (try saying that after too many sherbets), there’s an element of truth in the statement. Most of Culross manages

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What does Gawthorpe Hall remind you of?

The first sight of Gawthorpe Hall may strike a chord with fans of Downton Abbey, the period soap-opera that followed the fortunes of the Crawley family and those that served them.  I’m sure those of the true Fellowes’ faith will correct me, but doesn’t this Lancashire house look a little like Highclere Castle, the real

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