Troy House is a Welsh historic house, on a "ducal" scale, north-east of

Mitchel Troy Mitchel Troy (, that is "church of St Michael on the River Trothy") is a village and community in Monmouthshire, south east Wales, in the United Kingdom. It is located 3 miles south west of the county town of Monmouth, just off the A40 road leadi ...

Monmouthshire Monmouthshire ( ; ) is a Principal areas of Wales, county in the South East Wales, south east of Wales. It borders Powys to the north; the English counties of Herefordshire and Gloucestershire to the north and east; the Severn Estuary to the s ...

. The original house belonged to

Blanche Herbert, Lady Troy Blanche Milborne, Lady Herbert of Troy (''fl.'' 1557) was the Lady Mistress in charge of the upbringing of Queen Elizabeth I, Edward VI and also of Mary I of England, Queen Mary when she lived with the younger Tudor dynasty, Tudor children. She ...

, of the Herbert family of

Raglan Castle Raglan Castle () is a Late Middle Ages, late medieval castle located just north of the village of Raglan, Monmouthshire, Raglan in the county of Monmouthshire in south east Wales. The modern castle dates from between the 15th and early 17th cent ...

, who owned great estates in South Wales as Marquesses of Worcester and later

Dukes of Beaufort Duke of Beaufort ( ) is a title in the Peerage of England. It was created by Charles II in 1682 for Henry Somerset, 3rd Marquess of Worcester, a descendant of Charles Somerset, 1st Earl of Worcester, legitimised son of Henry Beaufort, 3rd Du ...

. The present structure, overlooking the

River Trothy The River Trothy () is a river which flows through north Monmouthshire, in rural south east Wales. It is a tributary of the River Wye. The river rises on Campston Hill, northeast of Abergavenny. It flows southwards until Llanvapley, where it ...

was constructed from 1681 to 1684 as a wedding present for Charles Somerset by his father,

Henry Somerset, 1st Duke of Beaufort Henry Somerset, 1st Duke of Beaufort (162921 January 1700) was an English politician who sat in the House of Commons at various times between 1654 and 1667, when he succeeded his father as 3rd Marquess of Worcester. He was styled Lord Herbert ...

. Troy House is a

Grade II* 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, H ...

listed building and its gardens and park are listed, also at Grade II*, on the

Cadw/ICOMOS Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest in Wales The Cadw/ICOMOS Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest in Wales is a heritage register of significant historic parks and gardens in Wales. It is maintained by Cadw, the historic environment service of the Welsh Government and ...

History

In 1667 Henry Somerset succeeded his father to the title of

Marquess of Worcester A marquess (; ) is a nobleman of high hereditary rank in various European peerages and in those of some of their former colonies. The German-language equivalent is Markgraf (margrave). A woman with the rank of a marquess or the wife (or widow) ...

. Henry, a staunch supporter of Charles II, restored the family fortunes and built a series of residences to replace the

slighted Slighting is the deliberate damage of high-status buildings to reduce their value as military, administrative, or social structures. This destruction of property is sometimes extended to the contents of buildings and the surrounding landscape. It ...

. He started with Great Castle House, in

Monmouth Monmouth ( or ; ) is a market town and community (Wales), community in Monmouthshire, Wales, situated on where the River Monnow joins the River Wye, from the Wales–England border. The population in the 2011 census was 10,508, rising from 8 ...

in 1673, continued with

Badminton House Badminton House is a large country house and Grade I Listed Building in Badminton, Gloucestershire, England, which has been the principal seat of the Dukes of Beaufort since the late 17th century. The house, which has given its name to the spor ...

Gloucestershire Gloucestershire ( , ; abbreviated Glos.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by Herefordshire to the north-west, Worcestershire to the north, Warwickshire to the north-east, Oxfordshire ...

, and built the new Troy House as a wedding gift to his son Charles. In Monmouth Museum there is a painting by

Hendrick Danckerts Hendrick Danckerts (c.1625 - 1680) was a Dutch Golden Age painter and engraver, mostly of houses in their landscape settings. After some years in Italy, he spent most of his career in London, working for Charles II and his brother. Biography D ...

, dated circa 1672, which shows Troy House in a panorama of Monmouth. In 1682 Charles Somerset married Rebecca Child and acquired the title of Marquess of Worcester. Between 1682 and 1699 he expanded Troy House and rebuilt the facade in neoclassical style. The house remained the property of the Somersets until the death of

Henry Somerset, 8th Duke of Beaufort Henry Charles FitzRoy Somerset, 8th Duke of Beaufort (1 February 1824 – 30 April 1899), styled Earl of Glamorgan until 1835 and Marquess of Worcester from 1835 to 1853, was a British peer, soldier, and Conservative politician. He served as Mas ...

in 1899. At this time, the family consolidated its estates around

and the descendants of the 8th Duke auctioned off the Troy estate along with most of their Welsh properties. In 1872, a gazetteer reported that the cradle belonging to Henry V together with the alleged armour Henry V wore at Agincourt were said to be at "the mansion" in

. Troy House was purchased by the

Good Shepherd Sisters The Congregation of Our Lady of Charity of the Good Shepherd, also known as the Sisters of the Good Shepherd, is a Catholic religious order that was founded in 1835 by Mary Euphrasia Pelletier in Angers, France. The religious sisters belong to a ...

in 1904 and converted to a convent school. The nuns expanded the estate buildings with a chapel, a hostel and service buildings. In 1935 the institution was converted into an

approved school An approved school was a type of residential institution in the United Kingdom to which young people could be sent by a court, usually for committing offences but sometimes because they were deemed to be beyond parental control. They were model ...

with state financing. The building gradually deteriorated, and in the 1980s the school moved out and the building was closed. A subsequent plan by the

Unification movement The Unification Church () is a new religious movement, whose members are called Unificationists or sometimes informally Moonies. It was founded in 1954 by Sun Myung Moon in Seoul, South Korea, as the Holy Spirit Association for the Unificatio ...

to purchase the property did not succeed. In 2009, proposals were put forward by a property developer to divide the house into residential units. The proposed enabling development would involve the construction of two new wings which were intended to accommodate more units than would be possible in the original house. Conservationists were divided over the proposals: Save Britain's Heritage concurred with the developer's analysis, others, including the

Georgian Group The Georgian Group is a British charity, and the national authority on Georgian architecture built between 1700 and 1837 in England and Wales. As one of the National Amenity Societies, The Georgian Group is a statutory consultee on alterati ...

expressed fears that the plans would constitute significant overdevelopment of the house and site. In 2015

Monmouthshire County Council Monmouthshire County Council (or simply Monmouthshire Council) () is the governing body for the Monmouthshire principal area – one of the unitary authorities of Wales. The current unitary authority was created in 1996 and covers the eastern ...

funded a

protected species An endangered species is a species that is very likely to become extinct in the near future, either worldwide or in a particular political jurisdiction. Endangered species may be at risk due to factors such as habitat loss, poaching, invasiv ...

survey required for consideration of the redevelopment proposals. As of 2017, the house remained empty, except for a caretaker. In June 2019, revised plans for the conversion of the house to flats, with two new blocks of flats as enabling development, which had been approved by the County Council in 2018, were rejected by the

Welsh Government The Welsh Government ( ) is the Executive (government), executive arm of the Welsh devolution, devolved government of Wales. The government consists of Cabinet secretary, cabinet secretaries and Minister of State, ministers. It is led by the F ...

. The reason given was that the location of the property in a flood zone made it "highly vulnerable". According to a June 2019 newsreport, the property had been owned by Peter Carroll of Chepstow since the 1970s. In May 2020, the property was put up for auction, with a guide price between £200,000 and £250,000 but was described as "an almost total wreck" by '' Country Life'' magazine, confirmed by photographs of the interior. Despite its condition, Troy House sold for just over £1.35m.

Architecture and description

The house is very large, "three bays deep but no less than thirteen bays wide", in a style that was very modern for the date of design, "a

hipped roof A hip roof, hip-roof or hipped roof, is a type of roof where all sides slope downward to the walls, usually with a fairly gentle slope, with variants including tented roofs and others. Thus, a hipped roof has no gables or other vertical sides ...

over a regularly fenestrated block." The architectural historian John Newman notes its "ducal scale". Some 19th-century authors wrongly attributed the design of the house to

Inigo Jones Inigo Jones (15 July 1573 – 21 June 1652) was an English architect who was the first significant Architecture of England, architect in England in the early modern era and the first to employ Vitruvius, Vitruvian rules of proportion and symmet ...

. However the Monmouth antiquarian

Charles Heath Charles Theodosius Heath (1 March 1785 – 18 November 1848) was a British Engraving, engraver, currency and stamp printer, book publisher and illustrator. Life and career He was the illegitimate son of James Heath (engraver), James Heath, a su ...

doubted the attribution in 1804, writing, "The house is said to have been built by Inigo Jones but I do not think the report well founded". The historian William Coxe, writing in his ''An Historical Tour In Monmouthshire'' in 1801, was also sceptical; "It does not reflect much credit on the taste of that eminent architect, having a long, straggling front, and being built in so low a situation as to exclude all prospect from the habitable apartments." Local historian

Keith Kissack Keith Edward Kissack MBE (18 November 1913 – 31 March 2010) was a British schoolteacher and historian. He is notable for his many publications on the history of Monmouth and Monmouthshire. Life Kissack was born in Clun, Shropshire, to Rev. B ...

described the house as "not very impressive externally" but the interior contains "three good-quality, typically Jacobean decorated ceilings." John V. Hiling, in his study ''The Architecture of Wales: From the first to the twenty-first century'', describes Troy as "austere and bleak". The building once contained much wood panelling from

but this was subsequently removed to Badminton House. Troy is a

Grade II* 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 ...

. The walled garden has a separate Grade II* listing. A barn in the adjacent courtyard, and the lodge and gates at the head of the drive all have their own Grade II designations. The gardens and grounds have their own Grade II* listing on the

Monmouth Troy House station

In 1857 the Coleford, Monmouth, Usk and Pontypool Railway built a railway station north of Troy House. It was inaugurated as ''Monmouth Troy House'' station, but the name was soon reduced to ''Monmouth Troy''. It was closed to passenger traffic in 1959 and completely shut down in 1964. In 1985 the brick station building was carefully disassembled and in 1987-1999 rebuilt on the site of

Winchcombe railway station Winchcombe railway station is a heritage railway station which serves the town of Winchcombe in Gloucestershire, England. The stations itself is actually located in the nearby village of Greet, Gloucestershire, Greet. It is located on the Honey ...

of the heritage

Gloucestershire Warwickshire Railway The Gloucestershire Warwickshire Steam Railway (GWR, GWSR or Gloucs-Warks Steam Railway) is a volunteer-run heritage railway which runs along the Gloucestershire/Worcestershire border of the Cotswolds in England. The GWSR has restored and reo ...

Gallery

Front View of Troy House (3375600).jpg, Front view of Troy House (1793) A Panorama of Monmouth with Troy House, c.1672.jpg, A view over Troy House towards Monmouth, c.1672 by Henry Danckerts Troy House, Monmouth, Wales-LCCN2002697074.jpg, Troy House, between about 1890 and 1900 Troy House.jpg, Troy House and surrounding countryside (2007)

Footnotes

References

Sources

* * * * * * * * * * {{Authority control History of Monmouthshire Grade II* listed buildings in Monmouthshire Registered historic parks and gardens in Monmouthshire Country houses in Monmouthshire