11 - Country house rescue

Summary

By the early 1990s, country houses were in a better position than they had been a decade or so previously, but their future remained far from secure. This chapter returns to the pivotal question of how houses have been rescued and restored over the last half century, and the changing contexts within which this has happened, particularly in the last few decades.

The fate of Pitchford Hall in Shropshire, a half-timbered house held by the Colthurst family for nearly five hundred years, was a reminder of how wider political and economic events could have implications for heritage. The family was hugely invested in Lloyds of London, which suffered catastrophic losses in the aftermath of the Piper Alpha oil rig disaster of 1988. The losses forced the family to sell Pitchford and its contents, but not before they offered it and seventy-six acres of grounds ‘to the nation’ for just under two million pounds. The house was arguably of some significance: it had been selected as one of the residences to which the royal family might be taken in the event of evacuation during the war. The National Trust expressed an interest, but that year had already offered to take on Chastleton in Oxfordshire with support from the National Heritage Memorial Fund. The Conservative heritage minister, David Mellor, rejected the idea that Pitchford might be saved by direct government intervention, which led to the arrival of Christie's auctioneers in September 1992.

As with Mentmore fifteen years earlier, the government had passed up on a bargain. Those who came to watch the auction get underway in the marquee could see the quality and significance of the collection. The sales catalogue featured paintings by Hoppner, Reynolds, and Cornelius Jonson, as well as furniture, silver, ceramics, glassware, and books. Rowena Colthurst, the daughter of the owners, was studying at Bristol University at the time. She later described the loss of Pitchford as “like a bereavement”. Her husband James recalled people “sitting in a tent bidding for paintings by Reynolds, or the lumpy bed that Queen Victoria had slept in … And then a porter would just carry them to the front of the house to be put in vans and cars and driven away. It was surreal.”