England

South Yorkshire

Wentworth, Rotherham

53.474241

-1.404706

1725

1804

Fully Extant

Grade I

Grade II*

No

C. IVth. pls. 79-81, 1739.

2.S. Vol. I, p. 109, 1854.

XIX, 450, 1906. LVI, 436, 476, 512, 554, 1924. LXXVI, 248, 1934. XCIX, 854, 1946. CLXXIII, 624 plan, 708 plan, 1983.

Vol. V, 1822.

Limited Access

01226-351-161

Individual / Family Trust

Private Home

The leasehold of the House was sold in 1999 for £1.5 million to Clifford Newbold; his sons, Giles, Paul and Marcus, have owned the freehold since 2005. The Fitzwilliam family continues to own the surrounding Estate.

Newbold family.

Thomas Watson-Wentworth, Wentworth family, Earl of Stafford, Earl of Malton, Marquess of Rockingham; then inherited by Earl Fitzwilliam, who descendants were here 1782-1946. Wensley Haydon-Bailley, late 20th century.

The Yorkshire estates of the 2nd Earl of Strafford (Wentworth family), son of Charles I's loyal ally, were inherited, upon his death in 1695, by a nephew, Thomas Watson, of Rockingham Castle in Northamptonshire. This inheritance so upset the senior branch of the Wentworth family that they famously took to rebuilding Wentworth Castle, in an attempt to outshine and outsize the upstarts at Wentworth Woodhouse (the folks at Wentworth Castle lost the building war when Wentworth Woodhouse morphed into the longest façade in Britain for a private house). It took the majority of the 18th century to complete the huge remodeling initiated by the 1st Earl of Rockingham, with the result that Wentworth Woodhouse today contains 365 rooms, 1,000 windows, and five miles of underground passages. The House cost the immense sum of £80,000 to complete, worth approximately £9 million in 2010 inflation-adjusted values using the retail price index. The enormous house was filled with great treasures: one magnificent room after another overflowed with art, capped off by the amazing two-story Great Hall, which was inspired by Inigo Jones's Queen's House in Greenwich. In 1949 the family left the House after the death of the 8th Earl Fitzwilliam, selling much of the contents in the process, though the remnants of the collection, now called The Fitzwilliam Collection and owned by The Trustees of the Rt. Hon. Olive, Countess Fitzwilliam’s Chattels Settlement, went with the 8th Earl's daughter, Lady Juliet Wentworth-Fitzwilliam, to St. Osyth's Priory in Essex. Lady Juliet later remarried (she became Lady Juliet Tadgell, after marrying architectural historian Dr. Christopher Tadgell) and lives with her husband at Bourne Park, near Canterbury. After the family decamped the Stables were leased in the 1960s to West Riding County Council for Lady Mabel College of Physical Education, a purpose which they served until the 1980s, when the College vacated. By 1974, the majority of the House itself was leased to Rotherham Borough Council, which sublet it to Sheffield Polytechnic. After the death of the 10th and last Earl in 1979, the leasehold of the House was sold (1989) to businessman Wensley Haydon-Bailley; Mr. Haydon-Bailley declared bankruptcy in 1998 and the leasehold of the House was taken over by Bank Julius Baer. In 1999 the Bank sold Wentworth Woodhouse to architect/developer Clifford Newbold for £1.5 million. Mr. Newbold and his sons are carefully restoring the House, which also serves as their family home. At the time of the 10th Earl's death the Park and Village came under the care of the Wentworth Amenity Trust, which is associated with the original family. The 2008 book by Catherine Bailey, "Black Diamonds: The Rise and Fall of an English Dynasty," focused attention on Wentworth Woodhouse, particularly regarding the death of the 8th Earl in a 1948 plane crash en route to the south of France. The Earl was traveling with the woman he intended to marry -- Kathleen "Kick" Kennedy (sister of JFK), who also died in the crash. In 2012 the Newbold family sued the Coal Authority for £100 million, claiming that the House's fabric has been devastated by mining subsidence.

Wentworth Woodhouse was the repository of one of Britain’s great private art collections and included works by Van Dyck, Reynolds, Mytens, Hoppner, Lawrence, Lorraine, and a major collection of Stubbs's work. The collection was begun in the 1630s by Thomas Wentworth, 1st Earl of Strafford, and continued by his descendants, most notably the 2nd Marquess of Rockingham, who greatly enriched the collection. The 2nd Marquess was a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries and the Royal Society, as well as a Whig prime minister. Among his acquisitions were 36 silver and copper medals and four “vase candlesticks,” which he purchased between 1762 and 1763 from James “Athenian” Stuart. An ormolu tripod perfume burner, designed by Stuart circa 1760 for Wentworth Woodhouse (made in London by Diederich Nicolaus Anderson), is today in the collection of the Victoria & Albert Museum (see photo in “Images” section). Stuart also designed some interiors at Wentworth Woodhouse. In 1765 Lord Rockingham paid Stuart a further £75 (equivalent to approximately £8,000 in 2010 values, using the retail price index) for a bronze lamp and an antique marble of Silenus riding a goat, both of which were shipped from Rome to Wentworth Woodhouse. When the 2nd Marquess died without children the House and its great collection passed to his nephew, the 4th Earl Fitzwilliam (the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge was begun by a distant relative). The Earls Fitzwilliam added to the collection and maintained some of it at Wentworth Woodhouse until the death in 1979 of the 10th Earl Fitzwilliam. Upon his death part of the collection, including the Stubbses, was inherited by his daughter, Lady Juliet Wentworth-Fitzwilliam, who moved the collection, now owned by a family trust (The Trustees of the Rt. Hon. Olive, Countess Fitzwilliam’s Chattels Settlement) to St. Osyth’s Priory, Essex. In 1999, two years after the death of Lady Juliet’s second husband, Conservative MP Somerset de Chair, she sold St. Osyth’s Priory and married architectural historian Dr. Christopher Tadgell. The Fitzwilliam Collection then moved to Bourne Park in Kent, where Lady Juliet, an ambitious collector, continues to add to it. Probably the most famous painting in the collection was the 2nd Marquess's life-size painting of his championship racehorse, “Whistlejacket,” purchased in 1997 for £11 million by The National Gallery, London. Wentworth Woodhouse also contained a large collection of antique and modern sculpture, including Nollekens's statue of a Greek goddess, which was sold to the Getty Museum. Much of contents of the House were sold in 1949, after the death of the 8th Earl, though subsequent auctions have followed. A late Renaissance ewer and basin was sold at Christie’s on Jul 7, 1982 for £118,800. On Jul 15, 1986 Christie’s sold Joseph Nollekens’s "Diana" (1778) to the Victoria and Albert Museum. A group of four statues making up "The Judgment of Paris" was sold to the Getty Museum in May of 1987 for a total of £1.35 million. A pair of George II white side tables was sold at Christie’s on Nov 17, 1988 for £330,000; at the same sale a pair of George II white console tables sold for £187,000. R.J. Wyatt’s "Huntress with Leveret and Greyhound" was also sold for £91,800. David Willaume I’s rosewater ewer and sideboard dish of 1726, with arms of Lord Rockingham, was sold at Christie’s on Nov 27, 1991. Also in 1991 Vincenzo Foggini’s "Samson and Two Philistines" of 1749 was purchased by the Victoria and Albert Museum for £350,000. On Jul 8, 1998 Christie's sold a further consignment of goods (for a total of £15 million) from Wentworth Woodhouse, including “Bay Malton with John Singleton Up" by George Stubbs for £3,026,000; a portrait of Thomas Wriothesley, 4th Earl of Southampton, by Sir Peter Lely, for £25,300; “The Infant Hercules” by Sir Joshua Reynolds for £199,500; “A Wedding Feast at an Inn” by Adriaen Jansz van Ostade for £221,500; a 1766 silver-gilt version of The Richmond Cup, designed by Robert Adam, for £122,500; another silver-gilt Richmond Racing Cup, this one of 1769, also designed by Adam, sold for £95,000; a silver wine cistern by David Willaume, commissioned by Thomas Watson-Wentworth, 1st Marquess of Rockingham, sold for £1.4 million; one of a pair, formerly at Bothwell House, Lanarkshire, of George III ormolu and blue john two-light candelabrum by Matthew Boulton for £51,000; a suite of giltwood Rococo seat furniture by Gillows made for the Whistlejacket Room; and a collection of early English printed books, including five printed by Caxton from the 2nd Marquess of Rockingham's library, and a first edition of "The Canterbury Tales," printed in 1477, which sold for £4,621,500; a very fine George II chinoiserie mahogany and fretwork secretaire-cabinet, known as the Marchioness of Rockingham’s Cabinet, sold for £507,500, against a high estimate of £300,000; Van Dyck's celebrated portrait of Lady Lucy Percy, Countess of Carlisle, was withdrawn from the sale. In 2002 Stubbs’s “The Marquess of Rockingham’s Arabian Stallion” was offered in lieu of inheritance tax and subsequently entered the collection of The National Gallery of Scotland. A fine Gillows sofa from the Whistlejacket Room at Wentworth Woodhouse, mostly recently in the collection of The Preservation Society of Newport County at The Elms in Newport, Rhode Island, was sold by the Preservation Society into private hands at auction in 2003 (the sofa returned to England). In 2006 an exhibition of paintings from Wentworth Woodhouse entitled “Masterpieces from an English Country House: The Fitzwilliam Collection” toured two museums in the United States: The Chrysler Museum of Art in Norfolk, Virginia, and the Memphis Brooks Museum in Memphis, Tennessee.

Wentworth Woodhouse is considered one of the finest Georgian houses in Britain. Pevsner wrote that the interiors are “quite exceptional.” Michael Hall, writing in "The English Country House from the Archives of Country Life, 1897-1939," states that Wentworth Woodhouse is "One of the wonders of English architecture." Writing of the Great Hall in 1768, Arthur Young leaves us with this description: "Beyond all comparison, the finest room in England."

Open-cast mining, which did great damage to the historic landscape, began in the Park in 1946 after the nationalization of the coal industry; this was happily reversed in the late 20th and early 21st century, when the Fitzwilliam Wentworth Amenity Trust began a program of restoration. The Stables, by Carr of York, served in the 1960s, 70s, and 80s as Lady Mabel College, a teacher training college. The Stable Block, Riding School, and Camellia House are on English Heritage's Buildings at Risk Register (2004). The Park, which contains a large collection of monuments and follies, and the Village, are under the care of the Amenity Trust, which is associated with the Fitzwilliam family. One of the highlights of the park is the Rockingham Monument, erected in 1788 by the 4th Earl Fitzwilliam in memory of his uncle, Charles, 2nd Marquess of Rockingham (the Monument is often mistakenly referred to as a mausoleum; this is incorrect, as it does not contain the remains of a body). The Earl’s architect for the project was John Carr, who designed a three-story building of 90 feet comprised of a Doric base, an Ionic second story, and a cupola on the third level. The Doric base provides entry to a circular room supported by eight fluted columns with a decorated dome above. The room has niches that contain busts of friends and political allies of the Marquess: Frederic Montagu, the Duke of Portland, Edmund Burke, Sir George Saville, Charles James Fox, Lord John Cavendish, John Lee, and Admiral Keppel. In the center is a life-sized marble statue of the Marquess by Joseph Nollekens, RA, carved for the enormous sum of £3,000 (equivalent to approximately £300,000 in 2010 values, using the retail price index). The pedestal supporting the statue contains tributes to Rockingham’s memory, most notably by Edmund Burke (once Rockingham's secretary and later a noted MP and orator). The Ionic second story contains an open arch on each side that allows a view of the faux sarcophagus, which sits in the center. The third story is a cupola supported by 12 Doric columns. An iron railing encloses the base with four 50-foot tall obelisks at each corner crowned with urns. The Monument is open to the public on a limited basis. In 1746 Henry Flitcroft designed for Thomas Watson-Wentworth, Earl of Malton and Lord Lieutenant of the West Riding of Yorkshire, Hoober Stand, a 98-foot-tall tower with a viewing platform to commemorate the Scottish Jacobite defeat of 1746 at Culloden Moor. During the Jacobite uprising of 1745 Watson-Wentworth successfully fought with the government forces, and, when the Jacobites were defeated, King George II elevated him to the Marquessate of Rockingham for his contribution. To show his gratitude for his elevation, Watson-Wentworth ordered the construction of Hoober Stand and dedicated it to George II. The tower was completed in 1748 at a cost of £3,000 (approximately £367,000 in 2010 inflation-adjusted values using the retail price index) and was a forerunner of Flitcroft’s more famous Alfred's Tower at Stourhead (1762-72). Arthur Young, in 1768, uttered the now-famous quote about the view from the top of Hoober Stand: "This view is perhaps the most beautiful in Yorkshire; for the house, park, and woods form a circular connected landscape, more elegantly beautiful than the brightest paintings of Zuccarelli, and more noble than the grandest of Poussin's ideas; while the surrounding country exhibits Arcadian scenes smiling with cultivation, and endless in variety."

"Wives and Daughters" (2000 - TV mini series, as Cumnor Towers).