Bruce Castle
Bruce Castle (formerly Lordship House ) is a 16th century mansion on Lordship Lane in Tottenham , London (other sources are 15th century). It was named after the Bruce house , a Scottish royal family who formerly owned the land on which the building stands. It was probably built in place of a smaller building. The current house is one of the oldest surviving English brick houses . It was rebuilt in the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries. It is one of the listed buildings in Great Britain .
The house was inhabited by Sir William Compton , the Barons of Coleraine and Sir Rowland Hill , among others . After being used as a school in the 19th century, it was greatly expanded to the west and eventually turned into a museum. Today it provides information on the history of the area, what is now the London Borough of Haringey , and - through its association with Sir Rowland Hill - the history of the Royal Mail . The building also houses the archives of the London Borough of Haringey. In 1892 the property became one of the first public parks in Tottenham.
Origins of the name
The name Bruce Castle is derived from the Bruce house . The Scottish royal family owned a third of the Tottenham estate. However, there was no castle in this area and it is unlikely that the family lived in this area. After taking the Scottish throne in 1306, Robert the Bruce lost his land in England, including the possessions in Tottenham. This ended the relationship between the Bruce family and the area. The former Bruce Land went to Richard Spigurnell and Thomas Hethe .
The three parts of Tottenham reign were united under the Gedeney family in the early 15th century and have remained ever since. In early records the building is referred to as the Lordship House . The name Bruce Castle appears for the first time under Henry Hare, the second Baron Coleraine, although Daniel Lysons assumed in The Environs of London in 1795 that the name was in use as early as the 13th century.
architecture
A free-standing, cylindrical Tudor tower stands southeast of the house. It is generally considered to be the oldest part of the building, while Lyson believes it was added later. The tower was built from local red brick and is 6.4 meters high, the walls are 91 cm thick. The reason for the construction of this tower is not known. It is believed that it was used as a dovecote .
The sources dispute the exact construction date and there are no surviving records of the builders. Architectural evidence suggests that some parts of the building were built in the 15th century. William Robinson in History and Antiquities of the Parish of Tottenham (1840) assumes the year 1514, while the Royal Commission on Historic Monuments assumes the late 16th century. Nikolaus Pevsner was of the opinion that the front indicates a Courtyard House , the rest of which has been lost.
The main facade of the mansion has been significantly redesigned over time. The house was built of red brick with ashlar stones as corner stones , the main facade is bordered by symmetrically adapted bay windows with large windows. The house and stand-alone tower are an early example of the use of brick as the main building material for English houses.
Under Henry Hare, 2nd Baron Coleraine (1635–1708), the house was fundamentally redesigned in 1684; most of the southern facade dates from this time. The final bay windows were enlarged and the portal was redesigned with stone protrusions and pillars, a parapet, a small tower and a dome. A plan from 1684 shows a hall in the center of the house, with operating rooms to the west and the reception room to the east. On the first floor there was the dining room above the hall, the splendid bedroom above the kitchen and the lady's chamber ( the lady of the house) above the vestibule.
In the early 18th century, Henry Hare, the third Baron Coleraine (1694–1749), converted the north wing of the house. In the course of the renovation, some rooms were added and a large ornament in the form of the Coleraine coat of arms was attached to the north facade. In the late 18th century, under the ownership of James Townsend , the narrow east facade was converted into an entrance facade, giving the building the current image of a typical Georgian house. At the same time, the gables of the attic rooms on the south side were removed, which resulted in the current appearance of the south facade. A 1789 inventory of the house in preparation for its sale included a hall, drawing room, drawing room, dining room and breakfast room on the first floor, with a library and billiards room on the first floor.
In the early 19th century, the west wing of the house was torn down, giving the building its current asymmetrical appearance. The house was converted into a school and in 1870 a three-storey extension in neo-Gothic style was added to the north-western part of the house.
2006 excavations by the Museum of London exposed the foundations of an earlier building on the property that was previously unknown. Pipe rolls from 1742 refer to the repair of a drawbridge , which suggests that the building was surrounded by a moat at the time. An archaeological journal from 1911 gives a casual reference to the leveling of the trench that had recently been carried out.
History and residents of the house
16th century: first residents
It is widely believed that the first owner of the house was Sir William Compton, one of the most prominent courtiers of his time and groom of the stool under Henry VIII , who acquired Tottenham in 1514. However, there is no written evidence that Compton actually lived in this house; however, there are indications that the current building was built at a later date.
The earliest known source about the building is dated to 1516, when Henry VIII met his sister Margaret Tudor , Queen of Scotland, here at Maister Compton's House beside Tottenham . The Comptons owned the building throughout the 16th century, but few records of the family or house from this period have survived.
In the early 17th century the house was owned by Richard Sackville, 3rd Earl of Dorset and Lady Anne Clifford. Sackville went into debt because of his passion for gambling and lavish lifestyle; the house (now called "The Lordship House") was rented to Sir Thomas Peniston. His wife Martha, daughter of the 1st Baron of Stowe, was Richard Sackville's mistress. The house was later sold to the wealthy landowner Hugh Hare, 1st Baron of Coleraine from Norfolk .
17th century: the Hare family
Hugh Hare, 1st Baron Coleraine
Hugh Hare (1606–1667) inherited a large sum of money from his great-uncle Sir Nicholas Hare, Master of the Rolls . After his father died, his mother married Henry Montagu, 1st Earl of Manchester, which allowed the young Hugh Hare to rise rapidly in court and social circles. He married Montagu's daughter for the first time and acquired the rule of Tottenham, including the Lordship House ; shortly afterwards, in 1625, he was promoted to Baron Coleraine .
As he was closely connected to the court of Charles I , the English Civil War ended Hare's lucky streak. His Longford Castle and Totteridge House had been taken over by the Parliamentary Forces and when they were returned after the Restoration everything was in a very dilapidated state. Records of Tottenham from this period have been lost and the ownership and status of the Lordship House during the Commonwealth of England are therefore unknown. Hugh Hare died in his home in Totteridge in 1667: he choked on a bone over a turkey meal while he laughed and drank. He was succeeded by his son Henry Hare, 2nd Baron Coleraine.
Henry Hare, 2nd Baron Coleraine
Henry Hare (1635–1708) chose Lordship House as his residence and renamed it to Bruce Castle in memory of the area's historical links with the Bruce House . Hare was a noted historian and the author of the first history of Tottenham. He grew up in the Hare family home in Totteridge and it is not known when he moved to Tottenham. When his first son, Hugh, was born in 1668, the family was still living in Totteridge, but when his first wife Constantia died in 1680, the family was already living in Bruce Castle. According to Hare, Constantia was buried in All Hallows Church in Tottenham. However, the church register of this period, which is completely preserved, gives no information about her death or her burial.
After Constantia's death, Hare married Sarah Alston. They had already been engaged in 1661, but she had married John Seymour the 4th Duke of Somerset in his place . There is evidence that a secret relationship existed between the two during Sarah's marriage to Seymour and Hare's marriage to Constantia.
After Hare's marriage to the Dowager Duchess of Somerset, the house was completely rebuilt in 1684. A large part of today's south facade dates from this time. The dominant feature of the facade is the main tower with a belvedere, a motif from the English Renaissance in the late 16th and early 17th centuries (the Compton family home in Northamptonshire , Castle Ashby House , also received Renaissance stylistic features during the 17th century ). Near London, Hatfield House has the same main tower, built in 1611, as Bruce Castle, as does Blickling Hall in Norfolk, where the tower was built around 1616. The similarity of the house also shows a preference for the architectural style of Burton Agnes Hall, built between 1601 and 1610 .
Although sources (e.g. Pegram) speculate that Constantia committed suicide due to the ongoing relationship between Hare and the Duchess of Somerset, little is known about her life and the circumstances of her early death. Her ghost reportedly still haunts the building. The earliest record of the ghost appeared in the Tottenham & Edmonton Advertiser in 1858 - almost 200 years after Constantia's death :
“A lady of our acquaintance was introduced at a party to an Indian Officer who, hearing that she came from Tottenham, eagerly asked if she had seen the Ghostly Lady of Bruce Castle. Some years before he had been told the following story by a brother officer when encamped on a march in India. One of the Lords Coleraine had married a beautiful lady and while she was yet in her youth had been seized with a violent hatred against her - whether from jealousy or not is not known. He first confined her to the upper part of the house and subsequently still more closely to the little rooms of the clock turret. These rooms looked on the balconies: the lady one night succeeded in forcing her way out and flung herself with child in arms from the parapet. The wild despairing shriek aroused the household only to find her and her infant in death's clutches below. Every year as the fearful night comes round (it is in November) the wild form can be seen as she stood on the fatal parapet, and her despairing cry is heard floating away on the autumnal blast. "
The legend is largely forgotten today and no sightings of a ghost have been reported in recent times.
The building in the 18th century
Henry Hare, 3rd Baron Coleraine
Sarah Hare died in 1692 and was buried in Westminster Abbey , Hare died in 1708, he was succeeded by Henry Hare, 3rd Baron Coleraine. Henry Hare was one of the leading archaeologists; he only resided briefly in Bruce Castle between longer trips through Europe.
The house was remodeled while it was owned by the 3rd Baron Coleraine. An additional suite of rooms was added in the north wing and an ornamental gable with the crest of the Coleraine coat of arms on the north front.
Hare's marriage did not take place, but after an affair with the French Rosa du Plessis, she gave birth to his only child in France in 1745, a daughter named Henrietta Rosa Peregrina. Hare died in 1749, leaving the property to his four-year-old daughter, but the legacy was not recognized due to her French nationality. After years of litigation, the property including Bruce Castle went to Henrietta's husband James Townsend , whom she married at the age of 18.
James Townsend
James Townsend was one of the leading citizens of his time. He served as Justice of the Peace, was a Member of Parliament and in 1772 became Lord Mayor of London while Henrietta was a noted artist. Many of her engravings from 18th century Tottenham are preserved in the Bruce Castle Museum.
The house was remodeled again after 1764 while it was owned by James Townsend. The narrow east front was redesigned to the entrance front and gave the building the typical appearance of a Georgian house. The roof gables of the southern front were removed, giving the facade its current appearance.
James and Henrietta Townsend's son, Henry Hare Townsend, showed little interest in the area and the traditional role of landlord. After renting the house several times, it was sold to Thomas Smith of the Honorable Society of Gray's Inn as a country estate in 1792 .
John Eardley Wilmot
John Wilmot (1749–23 June 1815) was Member of Parliament for Tiverton (1776–1784) and Coventry (1784–1796). In 1783, a commission from Parliament investigated the events that led to the American Revolution . Wilmot also oversaw the settlement of property payments, the provision of housing and the care of the 60,000 loyalist refugees who reached England in the wake of the American Declaration of Independence .
After the beginning of the French Revolution in 1789, a second wave of refugees reached England. Although the UK Parliament did not offer assistance at the event, Wilmot, with the assistance of William Wilberforce , Edmund Burke and George Nugent-Temple-Grenville, 1st Marquess of Buckingham, set up Wilmot's Committee, which provided funding for housing, food and jobs procured for the refugees from France. A large number of these refugees settled in Tottenham.
In 1804 Wilmot retired from public life and wrote his memoirs of the American Revolution and his role in exploring its causes and consequences at Bruce Castle. They were published in 1813, shortly before his death.
After Wilmot's death, the London merchant John Ede bought the house and the property; he had the west wing of the house torn down. As the current asymmetrical appearance of the building shows, it was never rebuilt. In 1827 Ede sold the property to Rowland Hill , a Worcestershire educator who used the property as a school.
19th century: the Hill School
Rowland Hill and his brothers had taken over the management of their father's school in 1819, and in 1827 the school moved from Birmingham to Bruce Castle, with Rowland as principal. The school went radical , inspired by Hill's friends Thomas Paine , Richard Price and Joseph Priestley . According to this teaching principle, it fell to the teacher to convey the interest and desire to learn something, but not to teach facts. Corporal punishment was abolished and alleged violations were tried in a student court. The school was taught according to a (for the time) radical curriculum; this included foreign languages, arts and engineering. In addition to numerous other students, the school taught, among others, the son of the diplomat of the newly independent nation South Africa who was stationed in London and the son of the mathematician Charles Babbage .
In 1839 Rowland Hill, who had pioneered an influential postal reform proposal, was appointed Secretary of the General Post Office , where he introduced the world's first postage stamp. He then left the school and handed it over to his younger brother Arthur Hill. When he retired in 1868, his son George Birkbeck Norman Hill took over the management of the school.
During the era in which the school was operating, the character of the area had changed beyond recognition. Tottenham was once made up of four villages on Ermine Street (later the A10 Road), surrounded by marshland and farmland. The construction of the Northern and Eastern Railway in 1840, with stations at Tottenham Hale and Marsh Lane (later Northumberland Park), made commuting from Tottenham to central London possible for the first time, even if this awkward eight-mile route via Stratford was more than twice as long direct route. This also provided a direct connection to the port of London . In 1872 the Great Eastern Railway opened a direct line between Enfield Town Railway Station and Liverpool Street Station, including a stop at Bruce Grove Railway Station, near Bruce Castle. The railroad offered workers a discounted fare, which enabled poor commuters to live in Tottenham and work in central London. As a railroad hub, Tottenham became an important residential and industrial area. At the end of the 19th century, the only undeveloped area left was the land owned by Bruce Castle and the floodplains of the River Lee in the Tottenham Marshes and the River Moselle at Broadwater Farm .
When Birkbeck Hill retired as headmaster in 1877, the family's connection with the school ended. The school closed in 1891, after which the Tottenhams parish council bought the house and property. On this property, which is part of Bruce Castle, Tottenham's first public park was opened in 1892. The house opened to the public as the Bruce Castle Museum in 1906 .
Todays use
Bruce Castle is now a museum and houses the archives of the London Borough of Haringey and a permanent exhibition on the past, present and future of Haringey and its former boroughs; At times there are exhibitions about the area.
Other exhibits include Rowland Hill and The History of the Post, a collection of significant early photographs, a collection of historical rulership documents and courtly roles pertaining to the area, and also an early copy of the Spurs Opus , the complete history of Tottenham Hotspur FC , making it is made possible for the public to read.
In 1949 the building was included in the Statutory List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest - the round tower was even Listed Building Grade I at the same time . The 17th century boundary walls in the south and west of the park were included in Listed Building Grade II in 1974. In 1969 the museum of the Middlesex Regiment was added to the building , part of the collection of which was given to the National Army Museum .
In July 2006, as part of the centenary of the opening of the Bruce Castle Museum, an archaeological excavation committee was organized for the grounds by the Museum of London . Numerous everyday objects were discovered in the lime substructures, which point to a previous house in the same place.
Bruce Castle in Literature: Heraud's Tottenham
Bruce Castle was in 1820 in John Abraham Herauds Tottenham mentioned that in Spenserstrophen was written. It is a romantic description of the life of Robert the Bruce :
"
Lovely is moonlight to the poet's eye,
That in a tide of beauty bathes the skies,
Filling the balmy air with purity,
Silent and lone, and on the greensward dies—
But when on ye her heavenly slumber lies,
TOWERS OF BRUS! 'tis more than lovely then.—
For such sublime associations rise,
That to young fancy's visionary ken,
' Tis like a maniac's dream - fitful and still again."
literature
- Cherry, Bridget; Pevsner, Nikolaus: The Buildings of England , London 4: North . Penguin, London 1998, ISBN 0-14-071049-3 , OCLC 40453938
- Clifford, Anne: The Diaries of Lady Anne Clifford . Alan Sutton, Stroud 1990, ISBN 0-86299-560-4 , OCLC 59978239
- Connor, Jim: Branch Lines to Enfield Town and Palace Gates . Middleton Press, Midhurst 2004, ISBN 1-904474-32-2
- Lake, GH: The Railways of Tottenham . Greenlake Publications Ltd, London 1945, ISBN 1-899890-26-2
- Olsen, Donald: The Growth of Victorian London . Batsford, London 1976, ISBN 0-7134-3229-2 , OCLC 185749148
- Pegram, Jean: From Manor House… to Museum, Haringey History Bulletin, 28 . Hornsey Historical Society, London 1987, ISBN 0-903481-05-7
- Robinson, William: History and Antiquities of the Parish of Tottenham . (2 ed.), London 1840, OCLC 78467199
- Underwood, Peter: The AZ of British Ghosts . Chancellor Press, London 1992, ISBN 1-85152-194-1
Web links
- haringey.gov.uk: Bruce Castle Museum
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c Pegram 1987, p. 2
- ^ A b c British History online: Daniel Lysons (1795): TOTTENHAM , The Environs of London , 3: 517-557, accessed October 2, 2008
- ↑ a b c d e Pegram 1987, p. 3
- ↑ a b Robinson 1840, p. 216
- ↑ a b c d e f g h i Cherry and Pevsner 1998, p. 584
- ↑ a b Cherry and Pevsner 1998, p. 11
- ↑ a b c d e f Pegram 1987, p. 9
- ^ British History online: Page, William (1911): ANCIENT EARTHWORKS , A History of the County of Middlesex 2: 1-14
- ↑ Pegram 1987, p. 4th
- ↑ Clifford, 1990, p. 83
- ↑ a b c d Pegram 1987, p. 5
- ↑ Pegram 1987, p. 6th
- ↑ a b c d Pegram 1987, p. 7th
- ↑ Underwood 1992, pp. 46-147
- ↑ The Ghostly Lady of Bruce Castle, Tottenham & Edmonton Advertiser, March 1858
- ↑ a b c d Pegram 1987, p. 8th
- ↑ Revolutionary Players of Industry and Innovation: Dick, Malcolm (2004): Joseph Priestley and his Influence on Education in Birmingham ( Memento April 1, 2007 in the Internet Archive ), (DOC 65 kB), accessed March 16, 2009
- ↑ a b c Pegram 1987, p. 10
- ^ A b British History online: TFT Baker, RB Pugh (1976): Tottenham: Growth after 1850 , A History of the County of Middlesex (Victoria County History) 5: 317-324, accessed June 6, 2007
- ↑ Lake 1945, pp. 12-13
- ↑ Lake 1945, p. 22nd
- ↑ Olsen 1976, p. 290
- ↑ Cherry and Pevsner 1998, p. 57
- ↑ Pegram 1987, p. 11
- ^ A b Hidden London: Haringey - Bruce Grove , accessed October 2, 2008
- ↑ BBC News: Fontaine, Valley Spurs well and truly books, Bruce Castle Museum , September 26, 2008, accessed October 2, 2008
- ↑ Images of England: BRUCE CASTLE, LORDSHIP LANE N17 ( Memento of the original from October 23, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed March 23, 2009
- ↑ Images of England: TOWER TO SOUTH WEST OF BRUCE CASTLE, LORDSHIP LANE N17 ( Memento of the original from October 23, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed March 23, 2009
- ↑ Images of England: SOUTH BOUNDARY WALL TO BRUCE CASTLE PARK, LORDSHIP LANE ( Memento of the original from October 23, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed April 8, 2009
- ^ British History online: TFT Baker, RB Pugh (1976): Tottenham Manors , A History of the County of Middlesex (Victoria County History) 5: 324-330, accessed March 23, 2009
- ↑ Army Museums Ogilby Trust: Middlesex Regiment Collection ( Memento of the original from April 28, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed April 21, 2009
- ↑ Museum of London: Financial Statements for the year ended March 31, 2007 together with the Governors 'and Auditors' reports ( Memento of September 6, 2008 in the Internet Archive ), page 17, October 4, 2007, (PDF 680 kB) on October 2, 2008
- ^ Museum of London: Locals invited to muck in at Bruce Castle , July 3, 2006, accessed October 2, 2008
- ^ Museum of London: Bruce Castle Park community excavation, 2006 ( Memento January 6, 2009 in the Internet Archive ), accessed October 2, 2008
- ^ Heraud, John Abraham (1820), Tottenham: A Poem.
Coordinates: 51 ° 35 ′ 56.4 " N , 0 ° 4 ′ 31.4" W.