Craigweil House was a coastal mansion at

Aldwick Aldwick is a seaside civil parish in the Arun district of West Sussex, England, which contains part of the suburbs of Bognor Regis to the East . The parish includes the smaller settlement of Rose Green. It had, briefly, a home of the constituti ...

near

Bognor Regis Bognor Regis (), sometimes simply known as Bognor (), is a town and seaside resort in West Sussex on the south coast of England, south-west of London, west of Brighton, south-east of Chichester and east of Portsmouth. Other nearby towns ...

in southern England.

King George V George V (George Frederick Ernest Albert; 3 June 1865 – 20 January 1936) was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, from 6 May 1910 until his death in 1936. Born during the reign of his grandmother Que ...

stayed there for three months in 1929. Craigweil House was built for Barbara Kemp, Countess of Newburgh, who died in 1797. She called it 'The Pavilion’. In 1828, The Pavilion belonged to the Reverend

Henry Raikes Henry Raikes (1782–1854) was an English cleric, chancellor of the diocese of Chester from 1830 to 1854. Life He was the son of Thomas Raikes, a London banker and merchant, and Charlotte Finch, daughter of Henry Finch, Earl of Winchelsea. He wa ...

, and later to Sir Alexander Dixie, a Captain in the Royal Navy who served with distinction at the

Battle of Trafalgar The Battle of Trafalgar (21 October 1805) was a naval engagement between the British Royal Navy and the combined fleets of the French and Spanish Navies during the War of the Third Coalition (August–December 1805) of the Napoleonic Wars (180 ...

. From 1850 it was occupied by Colonel Austen, at which time it was still known as The Pavilion. It was purchased by Dr Alonzo Stocker, the proprietor of mental illness institutions in London, and used as a seaside retreat for his patients from the 1870s until 1910, whilst he and his family lived in the house's lodge. Craigweil House was sold to industrialist and Member of Parliament Sir Arthur du Cros in 1915. In 1919 he enlarged it. Du Cros offered the use of the house to

to convalesce from a lung condition, as the house was located just yards from the sea. The king stayed at the house from 9 February until 15 May 1929. On 10 May the king held a

Privy Council A privy council is a body that advises the head of state of a state, typically, but not always, in the context of a monarchic government. The word "privy" means "private" or "secret"; thus, a privy council was originally a committee of the mon ...

meeting at the house in which he dissolved parliament and knighted

Henry Segrave Sir Henry O'Neal de Hane Segrave (22 September 1896 – 13 June 1930) was an early British pioneer in land speed and water speed records. Segrave, who set three land and one water record, was the first person to hold both titles simultaneous ...

, the holder of land speed and water speed records. The house was demolished in 1938 following a fire, and the Craigweil housing estate was built in the grounds over 30

acre The acre is a unit of land area used in the imperial Imperial is that which relates to an empire, emperor, or imperialism. Imperial or The Imperial may also refer to: Places United States * Imperial, California * Imperial, Missouri * Imp ...

References

External links

Photographs of Craigweil House and King George V at Gravelroots Vintage Trail

Craigweil Estate - residential development on the former grounds of Craigweil House

Movietone news clip reporting intended demolition of Craigweil House
Country houses in West Sussex 1938 fires in the United Kingdom Former country houses in England Buildings and structures demolished in 1938 {{WestSussex-struct-stub