![Blackborough House Model 2](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/cc/Blackborough_House_Model_2.png)
Blackborough House is a
grade II listed
In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...
privately owned
country house
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 town house. This allowed them to spend time in the country and in the city—hence, for these peopl ...
in
Blackborough, Devon, east of
Cullompton
Cullompton () is a town and civil parish in the district of Mid Devon and the county of Devon, England. It is north-east of Exeter and lies on the River Culm. In 2011 the parish as a whole had a population of 8,499 while the built-up area of t ...
. It was built in 1838 and is currently in undergoing restoration.
Construction
It was built in 1838 by James T. Knowles for
George Wyndham, 4th Earl of Egremont
George Francis Wyndham, 4th Earl of Egremont (30 August 1786 – 2 April 1845) of Orchard Wyndham, Somerset and Silverton Park, Devon, was an English nobleman and naval officer.
Origins
He was the son of William Frederick Wyndham (1763–1828) ...
, of
Orchard Wyndham
Orchard Wyndham is a historic manor near Williton in Somerset, centred on the synonymous grade I listed manor house of Orchard Wyndham that was situated historically in the parish of Watchet and about two miles south of the parish church of ...
, Somerset. Originally designed as an Italianate palace, there were no funds to complete it on such a scale, so it was constructed as two smaller, linked buildings for the Earl and his cousin, the local
rector
Rector (Latin for the member of a vessel's crew who steers) may refer to:
Style or title
*Rector (ecclesiastical), a cleric who functions as an administrative leader in some Christian denominations
*Rector (academia), a senior official in an edu ...
. His other nearby palatial Devon residence
Silverton Park
Silverton Park, also known locally as Egremont House, was a large neoclassical mansion in the parish of Silverton, Devon, England.
History
It was built between 1838 and 1845 by George Wyndham, 4th Earl of Egremont, and demolished in 1901. It wa ...
, (demolished in 1901) was also designed in this style but was never completed.
The house is a square block constructed from
stucco
Stucco or render is a construction material made of aggregates, a binder, and water. Stucco is applied wet and hardens to a very dense solid. It is used as a decorative coating for walls and ceilings, exterior walls, and as a sculptural and a ...
ed brick, with stone dressings and has
hipped slate roofs with red ridge tiles. It has an arched colonnade or
loggia
In architecture, a loggia ( , usually , ) is a covered exterior gallery or corridor, usually on an upper level, but sometimes on the ground level of a building. The outer wall is open to the elements, usually supported by a series of columns ...
around it on three sides and has two separate sets of stairs on either side so that each half of the house could be accessed independently. These entrance towers were originally tall but the top stage of each has been dismantled. There are two service wings around a courtyard and the building is two storeys tall throughout with a total of 60 rooms. There are small square windows on the upper floors designed to resemble the gunports of George Wyndham's ship,
HMS Hawke
Seven ships of the Royal Navy have borne the name HMS ''Hawke'', after an archaic spelling of the bird, the hawk. Two of the later ships were named after Edward Hawke, 1st Baron Hawke, whilst another was planned:
* was a discovery vessel launch ...
. The central court yard, was covered in a glass dome and acted as a great hall but no longer has any sort of roof. The house has of grounds surrounding it.
History of owners and uses
![Blackborough House from West in October 2021](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/de/Blackborough_House_from_West_in_October_2021.jpg)
The Devonshire historian
William Pole
William Pole FRS FRSE MICE (22 April 181430 December 1900) was an English engineer, astronomer, musician and an authority on Whist.
Life
He was born in Birmingham on 22 April 1814, the son of Thomas Pole.
Pole was apprenticed as an engineer t ...
(d.1635) gives the arms of "Bolegh of Blackburgh Bolley" as: ''Argent, on a chevron sable three bezants between three torteaux''. This is the family of "Bolley (or Bolhay)" mentioned by Chalk (1910). The house was used as the rectory until 1894 and for some of that time was also a school for local children.
In the middle of the nineteenth century a group of mostly Irish students studied with the Rev. William Cookesley Thompson at the house. Around the start of the twentieth century it was rented by an old woman and her daughter.
From 1930 to 1939 it was a home for
vagrants
Vagrancy is the condition of homelessness without regular employment or income. Vagrants (also known as bums, vagabonds, rogues, tramps or drifters) usually live in poverty and support themselves by begging, scavenging, petty theft, temporar ...
run by the council and the
Church of England
The Church of England (C of E) is the established Christian church in England and the mother church of the international Anglican Communion. It traces its history to the Christian church recorded as existing in the Roman province of Britain ...
.
It was a
Quaker
Quakers are people who belong to a historically Protestant Christian set of Christian denomination, denominations known formally as the Religious Society of Friends. Members of these movements ("theFriends") are generally united by a belie ...
training centre for
conscientious objector
A conscientious objector (often shortened to conchie) is an "individual who has claimed the right to refuse to perform military service" on the grounds of freedom of thought, conscience, or religion. The term has also been extended to object ...
s doing relief work during World War II. From 1943 to 1946 or 1947, while still owned by the Quakers, it was used a
YHA Youth Hostel known as Spiceland (named after the location of a
Friends Meeting House
A Friends meeting house is a meeting house of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), where meeting for worship is usually held.
Typically, Friends meeting houses are simple and resemble local residential buildings. Steeples, spires, and ...
, several miles away in the parish of
Uffculme
Uffculme (, ) is a village and civil parish located in the Mid Devon district, of Devon, England. Situated in the Blackdown Hills on the B3440, close to the M5 motorway and the Bristol–Exeter railway line, near Cullompton, Uffculme is on the ...
). It became a vehicle breakers' yard in 1951.
Restoration plans
By 2011 the house was semi-derelict and had long been surrounded by a car
scrap yard
Scrap consists of recyclable materials, usually metals, left over from product manufacturing and consumption, such as parts of vehicles, building supplies, and surplus materials. Unlike waste, scrap has monetary value, especially recovered me ...
owned since about 1995 by Ralph Sanders, an amateur racing driver, who operated a car spare-parts business and was said to have old racing cars parked inside the house. The house featured in ''Trials and Tribulations'' an episode of the second series of the TV series
Shed and Buried, broadcast on 24 January 2017 on the
Travel Channel
Travel Channel (stylized as Trvl Channel since 2018) is an American pay television channel owned by Warner Bros. Discovery, which had previously owned the channel from 1997 to 2007. The channel is headquartered in New York, New York, United S ...
, where
Henry
Henry may refer to:
People
*Henry (given name)
* Henry (surname)
* Henry Lau, Canadian singer and musician who performs under the mononym Henry
Royalty
* Portuguese royalty
** King-Cardinal Henry, King of Portugal
** Henry, Count of Portugal, ...
and Sam purchased an old Triumph trials bike (stored within the house) from owner Ralph Sanders.
In 2011 the house and were for sale for £1m, but did not sell, and was subsequently withdrawn.
In 2015 a sale was agreed for the house and to a developer, to be completed by the end of 2016. On 17 September 2016 an auction was held, in preparation for the house sale, of 1,000-plus lots of motor vehicle remains and spare parts that occupied the house and grounds.
In 2018
planning permission
Planning permission or developmental approval refers to the approval needed for construction or expansion (including significant renovation), and sometimes for demolition, in some jurisdictions. It is usually given in the form of a building perm ...
was requested to develop the house and grounds into a 64 bedroom hotel and spa with four linked pavilions and seven detached villas in the grounds.
The developers also plan to restore the seventy-foot towers which originally stood on the east and west sides and put a glass roof on the inner courtyard as well as adding a new low level extension. It will then be used as an events venue holding weddings, corporate events and exhibitions.
As of September 2020, the property had not been sold and was again listed for sale. According to
Country Life (magazine)
''Country Life'' is a British weekly perfect-bound glossy magazine that is published by Future plc. It was based in London at 110 Southwark Street until March 2016, when it became based in Farnborough, Hampshire.
History
''Country Life'' ...
, Blackborough had not yet "lost its roof entirely — something which could have been its death knell, due to the prohibitive costs of replacement".
References
External links
Blackborough House - website by new 2016 owner
{{Authority control
Wyndham family residences
Country houses in Devon
Grade II listed buildings in Devon