A castle of curiosities

Chillingham Castle, Northumberland The home of Sir Humphry Wakefield Bt and the Hon Lady Wakefield A castle saved from the brink of ruin is now a memorable home. John Goodall reports

- John Goodall

THE coastal strip of Northumbria between Morpeth and Berwickupon-Tweed enjoys a concentration and splendour of castles without European parallel. In the late Middle Ages, this was the so-called Middle March, a borderland between England and Scotland. Follow- ing the Union of the Crowns under James I and VI in 1603, some of these castles fell into magnificent ruin, such as Norham, Warkworth and Dunstanburgh. Others have survived as living buildings. One such—by the skin of its teeth—is Chillingham Castle.

The remarkable story of its recent rescue from the brink by Sir Humphry and Lady Wakefield has already been described by Jeremy Musson (COUNTRY LIFE, April 22, 2004). Against the odds, they have repaired the fabric and, with a shared interest in collecting and the Arts, turned Chillingham into a castle of curiosity and beauty, every room filled with eye-catching objects. Comparing the images of this article with those taken in 2004, it is possible to see how they have fur- ther consolidated their remarkable achievement over the past two decades.

Chillingham is first documented in the 12th century as a possession of the powerful Vesci family, lords of Alnwick. There is no evidence that a castle existed here at this date, but there must have been a residence by September 1255, when Henry III paused at the site on his travels. His son, Edward I, also stayed there, in 1298. The property was subsequently mortgaged in the 1320s by its then owner, one Nicholas Huntercomb, to a certain Thomas of Heton, who quickly assumed control of it. In 1329, Thomas entailed Chillingham first on his eldest son—who died soon afterwards—and then on an illegitimate son, another Thomas, a settlement that was twice contested, in 1345 and 1352.