A Castle That's Not a Castle

On one of our walks with Kevin and Sue, we passed a local landmark, a building known as Highcliffe Castle.  In fact, it is not a castle but a grand manor house, and it does not date from the Middle Ages, but rather from the 1830s.

As we approached the house with its Gothic revival architecture it looked a bit like a cathedral.

 What looked at first like the facade of a church was a grand carriage entrance.

And instead of a cross, there was a statue of a stag with a banner on top.

Originally, a mansion had been built on these grounds by the 3rd Earl of Bute in the 1770s.  It was built on the cliff overlooking the English Channel.  However, the house stood for only 38 years before erosion of the cliff destabilized it.  The Earl's grandson, Lord Stuart de Rothesay built a new house farther in from the cliff's edge.  He imported masonry, stained glass and oak timbers from Normandy and exquisite French furniture that were spoils of the Napoleonic Wars.  The "castle" was completed in 1836.

After Lord Stuart's death the house was passed on to his widow and then his daughter.  A distant cousin later inherited it.  The mansion hosted many notable visitors, including Kaiser Wilhelm of Germany in 1907.  The "castle" was rented out a number of times.  The most famous tenant was U.S.-born entrepreneur Harry Selfridge, the founder of Selfridge's department store in London.  Although he was only renting the house, he installed modern bathroom and kitchen facilities as well as central heating.  The building was eventually sold, and served as a children's home and as a Catholic seminary.

In 1967 there was a devastating fire, and the house deteriorated into a ruin.  By 1998. the house was restored, and today it is used as a venue for weddings and other events.

The is an inscription in Latin from the Roman poet Lucretius along the exterior of the building.  It says, "Pleasant it is, when over a great sea the winds trouble the waters, to gaze from shore upon another's great tribulation."