NB   For other local history articles and comment, please follow 'Local History' on the main menu. The articles below are reprinted from a now out-of-print booklet produced for an exhibition - mainly of photographs - held in St John's Church in Stanwick in the summer of 2005. 

THE LOST STANWICK HALL  -

REMNANTS OF

The Dowager Duchess Eleanor 

of Northumberland,

her time and people 

1865 - 1911

Born 22 October 1820; 

married 27 August 1842 aged 21; 

succeeded to title 11 February 1847 aged 26; 

widowed 12 February 1865 aged 44; 

died 4 May 1911 aged 90.

Introduction

 The articles in this booklet have for the most part arisen from shorter pieces published in the Stanwick and associated Parishes’ monthly magazine over the year from August 2004, and written primarily as early publicity for the Exhibition in Stanwick Parish Church in August 2005 ‘The Duchess Eleanor of Northumberland – The Stanwick Years’

 Unsurprisingly, as the research got under way and the material expanded many remaindered bits of people’s lives rose into view. Like all memories (as with sight) the brain forms links where perhaps there are none and misses others for the lack of a vital clue. Intuition is a dangerous assistant and you, dear Reader, are asked to question any conclusions drawn or implied below; the sources are themselves at best veiled by the language they use and at worst misled by their own sources. A grandchild reports thirty years later what her father told her: he in turn had it from his mother. A key newspaper report was written by a junior reporter: was he told to ‘make it interesting’? The choice information is a pencilled margin note on a roughly typewritten sheet. A name on a census is placed in the wrong family group – was the girl staying with them and why? or did the census official not wish to spoil his neat layout?

 So if by the time you read this the sands have shifted, do not be disappointed or irritated. Start from here and make your own history.  

 One further point. The available information expands exponentially as the twentieth century approaches and begins. This of course reflects the use of photography and the increasing value of written records especially of trivia. However many records of the Stanwick estate were destroyed as late as the time of the sale. It would be wrong to attribute any untoward motive to this act; they were most probably seen as useless (certainly to the ‘forty thieves’, as those carrying out the demolition and scavenging of the remains were – and are still – known).

Pat Anderson

NB   In what follows sums of money are quoted. To better understand the value of money at the turn of the nineteenth century, we should multiply them (very roughly)by 100.