Sizergh Castle is a

stately home 300px, Oxfordshire.html" ;"title="Blenheim Palace - Oxfordshire">Blenheim Palace - Oxfordshire An English country house is a large house or mansion in the English countryside. Such houses were often owned by individuals who also owned a To ...

with

garden A garden is a planned space, usually outdoors, set aside for the cultivation, display, and enjoyment of plants and other forms of nature. The single feature identifying even the wildest wild garden is ''control''. The garden can incorporate bot ...

and estate at

Helsington Helsington is a civil parish in the Westmorland and Furness district of the English county of Cumbria. It includes the village of Brigsteer and Sizergh Castle and Garden, a property owned by the National Trust. In the 2001 census the parish ...

Cumbria Cumbria ( ) is a ceremonial county in North West England. It borders the Scottish council areas of Dumfries and Galloway and Scottish Borders to the north, Northumberland and County Durham to the east, North Yorkshire to the south-east, Lancash ...

, England, about south of

Kendal Kendal, once Kirkby in Kendal or Kirkby Kendal, is a market town and civil parish in the unitary authority of Westmorland and Furness, England. It lies within the River Kent's dale, from which its name is derived, just outside the boundary of t ...

. Located in

historic History is the systematic study of the past, focusing primarily on the human past. As an academic discipline, it analyses and interprets evidence to construct narratives about what happened and explain why it happened. Some theorists categ ...

Westmorland Westmorland (, formerly also spelt ''Westmoreland''R. Wilkinson The British Isles, Sheet The British IslesVision of Britain/ref>) is an area of North West England which was Historic counties of England, historically a county. People of the area ...

, the

castle A castle is a type of fortification, fortified structure built during the Middle Ages predominantly by the nobility or royalty and by Military order (monastic society), military orders. Scholars usually consider a ''castle'' to be the private ...

is a Grade I

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Hi ...

. While remaining the home of the Hornyold- Strickland family, the castle with its garden and estate is in the care of the

National Trust The National Trust () is a heritage and nature conservation charity and membership organisation in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. The Trust was founded in 1895 by Octavia Hill, Sir Robert Hunter and Hardwicke Rawnsley to "promote the ...

. In 2016 the Sizergh estate was included in the newly extended

Lake District National Park The Lake District, also known as ''the Lakes'' or ''Lakeland'', is a mountainous region and National parks of the United Kingdom, national park in Cumbria, North West England. It is famous for its landscape, including its lakes, coast, and mou ...

Details

The earliest part of the building is a tower of fourteenth or fifteenth century date.

Woodwork

Some of the early furnishings date from the time of

Walter Strickland Walter Strickland (1598? – 1 November 1671) was an English politician and diplomat who held high office during the Protectorate. Biography Strickland was the younger son of Walter Strickland of Boynton. His elder brother, William, was k ...

(1516–1569) who married Alice Tempest in 1560. She made inventories of the house after her husband's death. These mention three oak armchairs and three chests still in the house. There are

oak An oak is a hardwood tree or shrub in the genus ''Quercus'' of the beech family. They have spirally arranged leaves, often with lobed edges, and a nut called an acorn, borne within a cup. The genus is widely distributed in the Northern Hemisp ...

-panelled interiors, including the Inlaid Chamber, where the panelling is inlaid with floral and geometric patterns in pale poplar and dark bog-oak. The contents of the Inlaid Chamber were sold to the

Victoria and Albert Museum The Victoria and Albert Museum (abbreviated V&A) in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.8 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and named after Queen ...

in the 1890s and it was displayed as a reconstructed

period room A period room is a display that represents the interior design and decorative art of a particular historical social setting usually in a museum. Though it may incorporate elements of an individual real room that once existed somewhere, it is usual ...

. The return of the panelling to its original location at Sizergh was advocated by among others

Mark Girouard Mark Girouard (7 October 1931 – 16 August 2022) was a British architectural historian. He was an authority on the country house, and Elizabethan and Victorian architecture. Life and career Girouard was born on 7 October 1931. He was educ ...

, an authority on England's country houses. The panelling returned in 1999 under a long-term loan. In 2017 it was reported that transfer of ownership to the National Trust had been made formal. The

bargeboard A bargeboard or rake fascia is a board fastened to each projecting gable of a roof to give it strength and protection, and to conceal the otherwise exposed end grain of the horizontal timbers or purlins of the roof. The word ''bargeboard'' is pr ...

s on the gables probably date from the seventeenth century.

Paintings

The Castle contains a variety of paintings, including the following: * a collection of portraits of the Catholic Royal Stuart family reflects the Strickland family's links to the Jacobite court in exile at

Saint-Germain-en-Laye Saint-Germain-en-Laye () is a Communes of France, commune in the Yvelines Departments of France, department in the Île-de-France in north-central France. It is located in the western suburbs of Paris, from the Kilometre Zero, centre of Paris. ...

in France. There are portraits by Alexis Simon Belle,

painter in ordinary A court painter was an artist who painted for the members of a royal or princely family, sometimes on a fixed salary and on an exclusive basis where the artist was not supposed to undertake other work. Painters were the most common, but the cour ...

James VII & II James II and VII (14 October 1633 – 16 September 1701) was King of England and Monarchy of Ireland, Ireland as James II and King of Scotland as James VII from the death of his elder brother, Charles II of England, Charles II, on 6 February 1 ...

and the

Old Pretender James Francis Edward Stuart (10 June 16881 January 1766), nicknamed the Old Pretender by Whigs or the King over the Water by Jacobites, was the House of Stuart claimant to the thrones of England, Ireland and Scotland from 1701 until ...

, of Queen

Mary of Modena Mary of Modena (; ) was List of English royal consorts, Queen of England, List of Scottish royal consorts, Scotland and Ireland as the second wife of James VII and II. A devout Catholic, Roman Catholic, Mary married the widower James, who was t ...

and her daughter Princess Louisa Maria. * Strickland family portraits, including **works by local artist George Romney, **a portrait of Mrs. Anne Strickland (the artist's mother) by Harriet Strickland (1816–1903), and a portrait of Lady Edeline Sackville.

Portraits gallery

Image: Mary Matthews (1823-1890), Madame de La Chère (05).jpg, Mary Matthews (1823–1890), Mrs. Julien-Francois-Bertrand de La Chère Image: Alice de La Chere.jpg, Marie Louise Geneviève Alice de La Chère (1856–1943), wife of Alfred Joseph Gandolfi-Hornyold (1850–1922) Image: Lord Thomas Strickland Standish (1763-1813).jpg, Thomas Strickland Standish (1763–1813), Lord of

Standish Hall Standish Hall was an estate and country house, built in 1573, owned by the Standish family in the south-west of Standish, Wigan. No standing structures of the hall remain on the former estate, however, some of its wooden-panel interiors have ...

Image: Henriette Rose Peronne de Sercey (05).jpg, Henriette Rose Peronne de Sercey (1770–1849) by

François Gérard François Pascal Simon Gérard (, 4 May 1770 – 11 January 1837), titled as Baron Gérard in 1809, was a French painter. He was born in Rome, where his father occupied a post in the house of the French ambassador, and his mother was Italian. A ...

Image: Thomas Strickland Standish of Sizergh (1792-1835).jpg, Thomas Strickland Standish of Sizergh (1792–1835) Image: Gasparine Ursule Ida de Finguerlin de Bischingen (05).jpg, Ursule Ida de Finguerlin de Bischingen (1805–1846), Mrs. Thomas Strickland Standish of Sizergh

History

The Deincourt family owned this land from the 1170s. On the marriage of Elizabeth Deincourt to Sir William de Stirkeland in 1239, the estate passed into the hands of what became the Strickland family, who owned it until it was gifted to the

in 1950 by Lieutenant Commander Thomas Hornyold-Strickland, 7th

Count Count (feminine: countess) is a historical title of nobility in certain European countries, varying in relative status, generally of middling rank in the hierarchy of nobility. Pine, L. G. ''Titles: How the King Became His Majesty''. New York: ...

della Catena, R.N., a grandson of the 1st Baron Strickland.

Katherine Parr Catherine Parr ( – 5 September 1548) was Queen of England and Ireland as the last of the six wives of King Henry VIII from their marriage on 12 July 1543 until Henry's death on 28 January 1547. Catherine was the final queen consort o ...

, the sixth wife of

Henry VIII Henry VIII (28 June 149128 January 1547) was King of England from 22 April 1509 until his death in 1547. Henry is known for his Wives of Henry VIII, six marriages and his efforts to have his first marriage (to Catherine of Aragon) annulled. ...

and a relative of the Stricklands, is thought to have lived here after her first husband,

Sir Edward Burgh Sir Edward Burgh (pronounced "Borough"; died before April 1533)Linda Porter. Katherine, the Queen. Macmillan. 2010.James, Susan E. ''Catherine Parr: Henry VIII's Last Love'' Gloucestershire, England: The History Press 2009. pg. 60–63.David St ...

, died in 1533. Katherine's second husband, Lord Latymer, was kin to the

dowager A dowager is a widow or widower who holds a title or property – a "dower" – derived from her or his deceased spouse. As an adjective, ''dowager'' usually appears in association with monarchical and aristocratic titles. In popular usage, the n ...

Lady Strickland, Katherine Neville. It was extended in

Elizabethan The Elizabethan era is the epoch in the Tudor period of the history of England during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I (1558–1603). Historians often depict it as the golden age in English history. The Roman symbol of Britannia (a female per ...

times.

Sir Thomas Strickland ''Sir'' is a formal honorific address in English for men, derived from Sire in the High Middle Ages. Both are derived from the old French "" (Lord), brought to England by the French-speaking Normans, and which now exist in French only as part o ...

went into exile with King James II and VII. Around 1770, the great hall was again expanded in the Georgian style.

Gardens

The gardens are registered Grade II. There is a lake, a kitchen garden and a

rock garden A rock garden, also known as a rockery and formerly as a rockwork, is a garden, or more often a part of a garden, with a landscaping framework of rocks, stones, and gravel, with planting appropriate to this setting. Usually these are small ...

. The rock garden, constructed in the 1920s, is the largest

limestone Limestone is a type of carbonate rock, carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material Lime (material), lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different Polymorphism (materials science) ...

rock garden belonging to the National Trust. Sizergh houses part of the

National Collection The UK National Collection is a collection of around 280 historic rolling stock, rail vehicles (predominantly of British origin). The majority of the collection is kept at four national museums: * National Railway Museum, York * National Railwa ...

fern The ferns (Polypodiopsida or Polypodiophyta) are a group of vascular plants (plants with xylem and phloem) that reproduce via spores and have neither seeds nor flowers. They differ from mosses by being vascular, i.e., having specialized tissue ...

s, which are to be seen in the rock garden, the

stumpery A stumpery is a garden feature similar to a rockery but made from parts of dead trees. This can take the form of whole stumps, logs, pieces of bark or even worked timber such as railway sleepers or floorboards. The pieces are arranged artistic ...

and the orchard.

Estate

In 1336 a grant from

Edward III Edward III (13 November 1312 – 21 June 1377), also known as Edward of Windsor before his accession, was King of England from January 1327 until his death in 1377. He is noted for his military success and for restoring royal authority after t ...

allowed Sir Walter Strickland to enclose the land around Sizergh as his exclusive park. The estate covers .

Biodiversity

There are various types of habitat on the estate. For example, in 2014 it was reported that 35 ha of wetland habitat was being created in the

Lyth Valley The Lyth Valley is on the edge of the Lake District National Park in Cumbria, England. Until 2023, it gave its name to an Wards and electoral divisions of the United Kingdom, electoral ward (one of 45 in South Lakeland). As a result of local gove ...

on the western edge of the estate. The project received funding from

Natural England Natural England is a non-departmental public body in the United Kingdom sponsored by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. It is responsible for ensuring that England's natural environment, including its land, flora and fauna, ...

as part of a higher level stewardship scheme. It is hoped to attract

bittern Bitterns are birds belonging to the subfamily Botaurinae of the heron family Ardeidae. Bitterns tend to be shorter-necked and more secretive than other members of the family. They were called ''hæferblæte'' and various iterations of ''rared ...

and other wildlife. Sizergh has received support from the Morecambe Bay

Nature Improvement Area Nature Improvement Areas (NIAs) are a network of large scale initiatives in the landscape of England to improve ecological connectivity and improve biodiversity. They were launched in 2012. At 2015, the NIAs covered 47,000 acres of England in tota ...

which was launched in 2012. It received three years of government grant funding (2012–15). Projects continue under the auspices of the Morecambe Bay Partnership, a registered charity.

Birds

The Sizergh estate is a good place to see birds. For example,

hawfinch The hawfinch (''Coccothraustes coccothraustes'') is a passerine bird in the finch family Fringillidae. It is the only extant species placed in the genus ''Coccothraustes''. Its closest living relatives are the genus '' Eophona'' of East Asia, a ...

es are attracted to

hornbeam Hornbeams are hardwood trees in the plant genus ''Carpinus'' in the family Betulaceae. Its species occur across much of the temperateness, temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere. Common names The common English name ''hornbeam'' derives ...

trees around the main car park, and despite being a shy species can often be seen there in the spring.

Butterflies

Fritillary butterflies (including pearl-bordered and

high brown fritillary ''Fabriciana adippe'', the high brown fritillary, is a large and brightly colored butterfly of the family Nymphalidae, native to Europe and across the Palearctic to Japan. It is known for being Great Britain's most threatened butterfly and is li ...

) live on the estate.

Sizergh Fell

Sizergh Fell is a hill of , about south-west of the castle. It is classified by the

Database of British and Irish Hills The mountains and hills of the British Isles are categorised into various lists based on different combinations of elevation, prominence, and other criteria such as isolation. These lists are used for peak bagging, whereby hillwalkers attempt ...

as a

Tump The mountains and hills of the British Isles are categorised into various lists based on different combinations of elevation, prominence, and other criteria such as isolation. These lists are used for peak bagging, whereby hillwalkers attempt ...

(Thirty and Upwards Metres Prominence). It has been suggested that a group of stones on the fell form the remains of a stone circle.

Literary and media interest

The castle was featured in the ITV documentary ''Inside the National Trust''. The room known as the Inlaid Chamber is the subject of

Letitia Elizabeth Landon Letitia Elizabeth Landon (14 August 1802 – 15 October 1838) was an English poet and novelist, better known by her initials L.E.L. Landon's writings are emblematic of the transition from Romanticism to Victorian literature. Her first major b ...

's poetical illustration ''The Queen’s Room, Sizergh Hall, Westmorland'' to an engraving of a painting by

Thomas Allom Thomas Allom (13 March 1804 – 21 October 1872) was an English architect, artist, and topographical view, topographical illustrator. He was a founding member of what became the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA). He designed many bui ...

, published in Fisher's Drawing Room Scrap Book, 1836.

References

Bibliography

* * * * *"Helsington: Sizergh Castle, Sizergh" (2007
7
Transactions of the Cumberland & Westmorland Antiquarian & Archeological Society (Third Series) 257 * * *

External links

Sizergh Castle & Garden information at the National TrustPaintings at Sizergh
Art UK
wikidata List of paintings at Sizergh CastleThe Cumbria Directory – Sizergh Castle Garden
{{Authority control Houses completed in the 14th century Birdwatching sites in England Towers completed in the 14th century Castles in Cumbria Peel towers in Cumbria Grade II listed parks and gardens in Cumbria Country houses in Cumbria National Trust properties in Cumbria Collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum Historic house museums in Cumbria Grade I listed buildings in Cumbria