Seaton Deleval Mausoleum

[taliesin]

The house itself is very interesting if you havent been aswell. Most of the main building was gutted by fire and the family lived since then in one of the wings, It wasnt open to the public very often but it was put up for sale this year. Not sure if the National Trust have bought it or not, Theres a good ice house, large stable block and a Norman church on the site, with one large cleopatras needlea type pilar also on the estate and the remains of another. Well worth a vist.

"An appeal by the National Trust to buy Seaton Delaval Hall, one of the grandest baroque house in Britian, has raised more than £1.5m in public donations and is just £500,000 short of its target from the public appeal. The house, near Whitley Bay, Tyne and Wear, is for sale following the recent deaths of the last private owner and his widow, Lord and Lady Hastings. If the trust – which will match the funds raised with an endowment to maintain the property – can't at least secure promises for the total purchase price by the end of the year, the house could be placed on the open market."

 

[Foxylady]

Wow, that is gorgeous! Love the spiral staircase. Excellent photos too, taliesin.

 

[BigLoada]

Good pics man. If Hastings sells this it could be turned into flats or hotel or whatever, Hastings is an utter ****, I'd hate to see this brilliant Vanburgh building decimated.

 

[Sabtr]

There is more to the house sale than meets the eye. The house was actually used as a "holliday home" by the lord. His true home was in Melton Constable. The Lord has quite a bit of family left behind and this house is basically being sold because the family can't be bothered - instead they want to concentrate on stuff closer to home. I suppose it is like us if we inherit our parents old static caravan on a minging site - we would probably have our own life to live and would sell. This is the opposite end of the scale!

Farmers in the area who rent much of their land from the estate still have no idea what is to happen to the land they rent. There are several ideas in the pipeline being considered by a " focus group " including planting every field up with fruit trees and allotments. Quite barmy stuff really.

The estate also owns quite a lot of private housing. These houses are intermingled throughout the area with others and if you didn't know already then you would never guess where they are! Not so long ago an attempt was made to build housing on land which last had dwellings on 250 years ago. It was claimed to be brownfield land and so could be built on. In a way I would say it was to a certain extent but the locals there were furious! Eventually it was discovered that housing was to be built to provide some income for the Lords Grandchildren....

The Lord was quite a bug**r when it came to buisness and how he treated local folk around the hall. I know of one story (true cos I was involved via advising the farmer) where the rental agreement on a field came to an end. The farmer who had put in many years of hard work with this field obviously wanted to keep hold of it. He was actually forced to take a medical to prove he was " fit and of sane mind " to continue with the rental of the field. We all knew that the field was wanted for housing, it had been for years, but the farmer got the land in the end.

Man I've got my back up now and I've only just started! I'd better stop....

 

[taliesin]

From what I recall of the open hours for the house, they were very poorly advertised, not very lon and very variable. I assume the reason for that is he would get some sort of heritage grant from English Heritage or NT for having it open but then wanted to actually do the bare minumum.
Probably with the market as it is now, its less likely to be sold for any sort of development, so fingers crossed for National Trust

 

[Sabtr]

From what I recall of the open hours for the house, they were very poorly advertised, not very lon and very variable. I assume the reason for that is he would get some sort of heritage grant from English Heritage or NT for having it open but then wanted to actually do the bare minumum.
Probably with the market as it is now, its less likely to be sold for any sort of development, so fingers crossed for National Trust

Aye - there's always two sides to stories like this. I come from the area, New Hartley, and know quite a few folk.
I now live in Ponteland but still go back to my roots on a regular basis.

 

[Goldie87]

Nice one, not seen any pics of that place for a long time

 

[the|td4]

Aye you can just about see where the old mill was but theres nowt left really. What we have to find is the old tunnels under where the bottleworks was. Now that would be quite a find but I reckon they are sealed up and buried now.

The entrance is under a manhole cover infront of the church looking thing? I too believe they are sealed as myself and my mate have been searching for years for some supposed tunnels from deleval hall to the sluice. Quite frankly I now believe that rumor to be a mixbag of Roberts Battery and the old Bottleworks ( / WW2 shelter).

Interestingly enough (I'm sure this one has been covered as well) there's the remains of some strange semi sunken bunkers to the north north west front face of deleval hall, in the copse of trees next to that layby on the corner.

Careful under the Mausoleum as I came across a couple of needles down there once. Tread lightly!

Cool pics !

 

[taliesin]

Are you sure this semi sunken bunker, isn't the foundations of the second piller? Is it near the edge of the tree lined avenue, from the house to Delaval

 

[the|td4]

No it's across the road from deleval hall and almost certainly some form of WW2 thing. Bigloada has more on this.

EDIT - having re-read your post I know exactly what you mean, yes that is the foundation for the pillar but the 'bunker' is a seperate entity it's on that side of the road but further along.

 

[BigLoada]

Are you sure this semi sunken bunker, isn't the foundations of the second piller? Is it near the edge of the tree lined avenue, from the house to Delaval

I just remembered me and Sausage went a while back in daylight and did this report on it:

http://www.derelictplaces.co.uk/main/showthread.php?t=5242

 

[Wile-E]

Thanks BigLoada, is there a track from the Dene through to it? Might have a looksee next time I can persuade the GF to take a walk along that way.

If you go down to the harbour on the north side of the dene (ie the track down on the right of the Melton constable pub with the boat slipway at the bottom of it) turn right and follow that track along, Starlight is on the top of the hill just after you cross a small bridge, bit of a scramble to get up there especially if it's muddy, basically as Big Loada say's it's just a section of wall left now but gives a nice view over the dene looking back to the harbour from there.