Bodelwyddan Castle, close to the village of Bodelwyddan

Bodelwyddan

Bodelwyddan is a village and community in Denbighshire, Wales now bypassed by the A55 road. It has a population of 2,106. The village lies east of Abergele, south of Rhyl, and north west of Ruthin....

, near Rhyl

Rhyl

Rhyl is a seaside resort town and community situated on the north east coast of Wales, in the county of Denbighshire , at the mouth of the River Clwyd . To the west is the suburb of Kinmel Bay, with the resort of Towyn further west, Prestatyn to the east and Rhuddlan to the south...

, Denbighshire

Denbighshire

Denbighshire is a county in north-east Wales. It is named after the historic county of Denbighshire, but has substantially different borders. Denbighshire has the distinction of being the oldest inhabited part of Wales. Pontnewydd Palaeolithic site has remains of Neanderthals from 225,000 years...

 in Wales

Wales

Wales is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain, bordered by England to its east and the Atlantic Ocean and Irish Sea to its west. It has a population of three million, and a total area of 20,779 km²...

, was built around 1460 by the Humphreys

Humphreys

-Places:*Benjamin G. Humphreys Bridge, Arkansas-Mississippi*Camp Humphreys, U.S. Camp in South Korea*Humphreys, Missouri*Humphreys County, Mississippi*Humphreys County, Tennessee*Humphreys County Airport, Tennessee*Humphreys County School District, Mississippi...

 family of Anglesey

Anglesey

Anglesey , also known by its Welsh name Ynys Môn , is an island and, as Isle of Anglesey, a county off the north west coast of Wales...

 as a manor house

Manor house

A manor house is a country house that historically formed the administrative centre of a manor, the lowest unit of territorial organisation in the feudal system in Europe. The term is applied to country houses that belonged to the gentry and other grand stately homes...

. Its most important association was with the Williams-Wynn

Williams-Wynn Baronets

The Williams-Wynn Baronetcy, of Gray's Inn in the County of Middlesex in the Baronetage of England, and of Bodelwyddan in the County of Flint in the Baronetage of Great Britain, are two titles held jointly since 1880.- Creation :...

 family, which extended for around 200 years from 1690. It is now a Grade II* Listed Building.

History

The castle

Castle

A castle is a type of fortified structure built in Europe and the Middle East during the Middle Ages by European nobility. Scholars debate the scope of the word castle, but usually consider it to be the private fortified residence of a lord or noble...

 was bought from the Humphreys by Sir William Williams, Speaker

Speaker of the British House of Commons

The Speaker of the House of Commons is the presiding officer of the House of Commons, the United Kingdom's lower chamber of Parliament. The current Speaker is John Bercow, who was elected on 22 June 2009, following the resignation of Michael Martin...

 in the House of Commons

British House of Commons

The House of Commons is the lower house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, which also comprises the Sovereign and the House of Lords . Both Commons and Lords meet in the Palace of Westminster. The Commons is a democratically elected body, consisting of 650 members , who are known as Members...

 from 1680-1681. The castle which stands today was reconstructed between 1830 and 1852 by Sir John Hay Williams, who employed the architects Joseph Hansom

Joseph Hansom

Joseph Aloysius Hansom was a prolific English architect working principally in the Gothic Revival style, who invented the Hansom cab and was one of the founders of the eminent architectural journal, The Builder, in 1843....

 (inventor of the Hansom cab

Hansom cab

The hansom cab is a kind of horse-drawn cart designed and patented in 1834 by Joseph Hansom, an architect from York. The vehicle was developed and tested by Hansom in Hinckley, Leicestershire, England. Originally called the Hansom safety cab, it was designed to combine speed with safety, with a low...

) and Edward Welch

Edward Welch

Edward Welch was an architect born in Overton, Flintshire, in North Wales. Having been a pupil of John Oates at Halifax, West Yorkshire, in 1828 Welch formed a partnership with Joseph Hansom, designer of the hansom cab. Together they designed several churches in Yorkshire and Liverpool, and also...

  to refurbish and extend the house, though the Williams' family fortunes had started to decline since the 1850s, due to the loss of the main source of income for the estate, lead mining. The castle has been described as one of Hansom's most ambitious projects, "being wildly dramatic and owing nothing to its predecessors". At the same time works were carried out to construct an estate wall and formal gardens.

Further refurbishment work was carried out in the 1880s by Sir Herbert, 7th Baronet

Sir Herbert Williams-Wynn, 7th Baronet

Sir Herbert Lloyd Watkin Williams-Wynn, 7th Baronet was a Welsh politician. He was Member of Parliament for Denbighshire from May to November 1885....

, who inherited Bodelwyddan Castle from his heirless cousin.By the First World War the house had become a recuperation hospital for wounded soldiers. During this time, the grounds of the estate were used by soldiers based at the nearby Kinmel Camp

Kinmel Camp

Kinmel Camp was an army training ground in what was once the grounds of Kinmel Hall, near Abergele, in Conwy county borough, Wales. The Kinmel Camp Railway served the camp from 1915 until 1964...

 for trench warfare

Trench warfare

Trench warfare is a form of occupied fighting lines, consisting largely of trenches, in which troops are largely immune to the enemy's small arms fire and are substantially sheltered from artillery...

 training. Traces of these trenches can still be seen.

By 1920, the cost of maintaining the castle and estate had grown too burdensome, and the Williams-Wynn family leased Bodelwyddlan to Lowther College, a girls private school.

Lowther College

In 1920, the house became a private school for girls, Lowther College

Lowther College

Lowther College was a private school for girls in the late 19th and 20th centuries. The school was originally formed in 1896 at Lytham St. Annes in Lancashire, by Mrs. Florence Morris ....

. The school was formed in 1896 at Lytham St. Annes in Lancashire

Lancashire

Lancashire is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in the North West of England. It takes its name from the city of Lancaster, and is sometimes known as the County of Lancaster. Although Lancaster is still considered to be the county town, Lancashire County Council is based in Preston...

, by Mrs Florence Morris

Florence Lindley

Mrs Florence Lindley was the first headmistress of Lowther College, a private girls school set up in 1896 in Lytham St. Annes, Lancashire. In 1920 she oversaw the college's move to Bodelwyddan Castle in Denbighshire, where she remained as headmistress intil 1927, when the school was sold to Allied...

 (later Lindley

Florence Lindley

Mrs Florence Lindley was the first headmistress of Lowther College, a private girls school set up in 1896 in Lytham St. Annes, Lancashire. In 1920 she oversaw the college's move to Bodelwyddan Castle in Denbighshire, where she remained as headmistress intil 1927, when the school was sold to Allied...

). The school originally moved to Bodelwyddan as tenants of the Williams family, however Lowther College purchased the property five years later, in 1925.

The school is thought to be one of the first private schools for girls to have its own swimming pool. It also had a private golf course. The Lowther College Tableaux were well regarded within the community for their musical excellence.

Boys were admitted from 1977. The school closed in 1982 due to financial problems.

Museum and Arts Centre

In the 1980s, the site was bought by Clwyd

Clwyd

Clwyd is a preserved county of Wales, situated in the north-east, bordering England with Cheshire to its east, Shropshire to the south-east, and the Welsh counties of Gwynedd to its immediate west and Powys to the south. It additionally shares a maritime border with the metropolitan county of...

 County Council

County council

A county council is the elected administrative body governing an area known as a county. This term has slightly different meanings in different countries.-United Kingdom:...

 with the aim of developing the castle as a visitor attraction. Partnerships were formed with several prominent museums and art galleries, such as the National Portrait Gallery and the Royal Academy of Arts, so that the castle could be used to display objects from these collections. In order to house these items, the interior of the castle was restored by Roderick Gradidge

Roderick Gradidge

Roderick Gradidge AA Dipl. ARIBA was a prominent British architect and writer on architecture, former Master of the Art Workers Guild and campaigner for a traditional architecture.- Career :...

, an expert on Victorian architecture

Victorian architecture

The term Victorian architecture refers collectively to several architectural styles employed predominantly during the middle and late 19th century. The period that it indicates may slightly overlap the actual reign, 20 June 1837 – 22 January 1901, of Queen Victoria. This represents the British and...

.

Part of the site was leased to the Rank Organisation

Rank Organisation

The Rank Organisation was a British entertainment company formed during 1937 and absorbed in 1996 by The Rank Group Plc. It was the largest and most vertically-integrated film company in Britain, owning production, distribution and exhibition facilities....

 in 1994 for development into a luxury hotel - Bodelwyddan Castle Hotel and this use remains today. The historic house and grounds are not part of the hotel but are managed by an independent trust and are open to the public.

Ghosts

There have been many reports of ghost

Ghost

In traditional belief and fiction, a ghost is the soul or spirit of a deceased person or animal that can appear, in visible form or other manifestation, to the living. Descriptions of the apparition of ghosts vary widely from an invisible presence to translucent or barely visible wispy shapes, to...

 sightings at the castle, including that of a soldier in one of the galleries. Sir John Hay Williams wrote in 1829 that, during a period of refurbishment, human bones were found near one of the chimneys. They were built back into the wall, which means they remain there to this day. The castle has also been the subject of two episodes of television's Most Haunted

Most Haunted

Most Haunted is a British paranormal documentary reality television series. The series was first shown on 25 May 2002 and ended on 21 July 2010. It was broadcast on Living and presented by Yvette Fielding. The programme was based on investigating purported paranormal activity...

and Sci Fi's Ghost Hunters International

Ghost Hunters International

Ghost Hunters International is a spin-off series of Ghost Hunters that airs on Syfy. The series premiered on January 9, 2008...

.

Gardens

The castle is set within a large area of parkland, and formal gardens, the most recent of which was originally designed by Thomas Hayton Mawson

Thomas Hayton Mawson

Thomas Hayton Mawson , better known as T. H. Mawson, was a British garden designer, landscape architect, and town planner....

 in 1910.

The castle structure seen today is mostly a Victorian

Victorian era

The Victorian era of British history was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. It was a long period of peace, prosperity, refined sensibilities and national self-confidence...

 facade, but that covers a core that is believed to date back to the 13th century. Archaeologists have found Roman

Roman Empire

The Roman Empire was the post-Republican period of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....

 remains on the site, and suspect they relate to a settlement adjacent to the nearby Roman road

Roman road

The Roman roads were a vital part of the development of the Roman state, from about 500 BC through the expansion during the Roman Republic and the Roman Empire. Roman roads enabled the Romans to move armies and trade goods and to communicate. The Roman road system spanned more than 400,000 km...

.

The castle has a distant view of Rhuddlan Castle

Rhuddlan Castle

Rhuddlan Castle is a castle located in Rhuddlan, Denbighshire, Wales. It was erected by Edward I in 1277 following the First Welsh War.-Construction:Rhuddlan was planned as a concentric castle...

 and St. Asaph Cathedral—which was damaged in the 15th century by both the English armies and the Welsh Owain Glyndwr

Owain Glyndwr

Owain Glyndŵr , or Owain Glyn Dŵr, anglicised by William Shakespeare as Owen Glendower , was a Welsh ruler and the last native Welshman to hold the title Prince of Wales...

forces. However, the Bishop was sympathetic to Owain's men, whilst he excommunicated the English.

External links

• Bodelwyddan Castle - official site
• Photos