Fortune’s Many Houses Simon Welfare (Atria, £25)
Inheriting his title unexpectedly in 1872 after the deaths of two impressively wild elder brothers, Johnny Gordon found himself master of Haddo House and 75,000 acres of Aberdeenshire, including the largest parcel of prime arable land in Europe. Mr Welfare, married to a descendant of the Aberdeens, describes how, 60 years later, through a mixture of good deeds, naivety, the expense of Imperial office and a penchant for grandiose property acquisition and improvement that would rival Nicolas Fouquet, Johnny died with £204 to his name. In this, he was ably aided and abetted by his wife, Ishbel Marjoribanks.
At the head of Strathglass stand the ruins of Guisachan House. There, in 1856, a ‘handsome but plain old eighteenth-century house’ was obliterated by a grand pile in the French château style by Ishbel’s father, the fabulously rich brewer Dudley Coutts Marjoribanks, 1st Baron Tweedmouth.
As a ruin, the house has a romantic beauty that, for some, suits its setting better than the great stone edifice it was. But Ishbel adored it, deprecating her marriage to Johnny in ‘dull old St George’s Church, Hanover Square, instead of at my dear beautiful Highland home’. Her father’s flamboyant style left its mark on her.
At Haddo, Ishbel found much to improve, not least the 14 cesspools around the house. It was the first of many expensive construction projects undertaken by the couple. Nos 27 and 37 Grosvenor Square followed, House of Cromar at Johnny’s other Aberdeenshire estate, rented houses outside London and properties abroad all received the same treatment.
Through good deeds, naivety and grandiose acquisition, he died with £204 to his name
Esta historia es de la edición July 14, 2021 de Country Life UK.
Comience su prueba gratuita de Magzter GOLD de 7 días para acceder a miles de historias premium seleccionadas y a más de 9,000 revistas y periódicos.
Ya eres suscriptor ? Conectar
Esta historia es de la edición July 14, 2021 de Country Life UK.
Comience su prueba gratuita de Magzter GOLD de 7 días para acceder a miles de historias premium seleccionadas y a más de 9,000 revistas y periódicos.
Ya eres suscriptor? Conectar
Save our family farms
IT Tremains to be seen whether the Government will listen to the more than 20,000 farming people who thronged Whitehall in central London on November 19 to protest against changes to inheritance tax that could destroy countless family farms, but the impact of the good-hearted, sombre crowds was immediate and positive.
A very good dog
THE Spanish Pointer (1766–68) by Stubbs, a landmark painting in that it is the artist’s first depiction of a dog, has only been exhibited once in the 250 years since it was painted.
The great astral sneeze
Aurora Borealis, linked to celestial reindeer, firefoxes and assassinations, is one of Nature's most mesmerising, if fickle displays and has made headlines this year. Harry Pearson finds out why
'What a good boy am I'
We think of them as the stuff of childhood, but nursery rhymes such as Little Jack Horner tell tales of decidedly adult carryings-on, discovers Ian Morton
Forever a chorister
The music-and way of living-of the cabaret performer Kit Hesketh-Harvey was rooted in his upbringing as a cathedral chorister, as his sister, Sarah Sands, discovered after his death
Best of British
In this collection of short (5,000-6,000-word) pen portraits, writes the author, 'I wanted to present a number of \"Great British Commanders\" as individuals; not because I am a devotee of the \"great man, or woman, school of history\", but simply because the task is interesting.' It is, and so are Michael Clarke's choices.
Old habits die hard
Once an antique dealer, always an antique dealer, even well into retirement age, as a crop of interesting sales past and future proves
It takes the biscuit
Biscuit tins, with their whimsical shapes and delightful motifs, spark nostalgic memories of grandmother's sweet tea, but they are a remarkably recent invention. Matthew Dennison pays tribute to the ingenious Victorians who devised them
It's always darkest before the dawn
After witnessing a particularly lacklustre and insipid dawn on a leaden November day, John Lewis-Stempel takes solace in the fleeting appearance of a rare black fox and a kestrel in hot pursuit of a pipistrelle bat
Tarrying in the mulberry shade
On a visit to the Gainsborough Museum in Sudbury, Suffolk, in August, I lost my husband for half an hour and began to get nervous. Fortunately, an attendant had spotted him vanishing under the cloak of the old mulberry tree in the garden.
