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CITY | HISTORY
The ace of castles With its distinctive trefoil shape, Midford Castle is a distinctive mark on the South Stoke landscape – Catherine Pitt investigates its history and discovers personal, legal and financial dramas
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hree miles from Bath in the Parish of South Stoke, Somerset, overlooking Midford Valley and surrounded by woodland, stands a castle. To some it looks like a fairy tale castle; to others it’s “an anomaly in building, equally at war with taste and comfort,” (The Gentleman’s Magazine, 1801). The truth is that it’s a home with a chequered past. Part of a Roman road has been discovered in the grounds, and the estate’s Priory Wood alludes to the past provision of wood to the monks of Bath. Although small settlements developed in the area, it wasn’t until the Turnpike Improvements of 1770–1775 that the area was made more accessible. Recognising the potential, Henry Woolhouse Disney Roebuck (1733–1796) chose to construct Midford Castle here in 1774–1775. According to local legend the building’s unusual trefoil shape is said to have been based upon the ace of clubs, the winning card that gave Roebuck his wealth. The truth is less glamorous. Roebuck was indeed a man of some wealth, but this was because he had inherited land and property from his grandmother and maternal uncle (£2,000 per year, about £200,000 today). 72 TheBATHMagazine
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His surname was originally Disney (or D’Isney), but he assumed his uncle’s name as proof to his right to the will. The castle design is unusual, but not unique. In Bristol you’ll find Blaise Castle (1766), a circular design with cylindrical turrets, and near Dumfries in Scotland the 13th-century Caerlaverock Castle is also triangular. Midford Castle’s design is likely to have been inspired by John Carter’s plans in The Builder’s Magazine of 1774. Midford Castle was erected on the slope of a hill and so a terrace was created on the lower side. Beneath the terrace lay the domestic servants’ quarters, and the stabling area. The 1788 sales listing explains that it comes with “107 acres of Meadow and Pastureland, about 7 acres Arable, and 15 of Woodland.” Roebuck owned Midford for around 10 years. It was rumoured he sold Midford because his wife, Elizabeth, left him after an alleged affair with a footman. Roebuck did try to besmirch her name, taking out adverts requesting people not to offer her credit. In November 1787 Elizabeth took Henry to court for libel, clearing her name and securing from him a comfortable annuity of £600 per year. Yet the couple never divorced.
In Roebuck’s will of 1796, at the time of his death at Ingress Abbey, Kent, he had still made provision for “my wife, Elizabeth.” Before Roebuck’s death he sold Midford (in 1788) to Dr Benjamin Pugh (1715–1798). Dr Pugh was a famous gynaecologist and the inventor of the curved obstetric forceps which revolutionised childbirth. After Pugh’s death in 1798 a long legal wrangle over his will resulted in the castle lying empty for 10 years. In 1808 it was sold to eminent Irish barrister and supporter of Catholic emancipation, Charles Conolly (1760–1828). Under Conolly the castle enjoyed its most stable period. In his will he tied up the estate and lands not just for his son but his grandson as well. In 1810 Conolly added the porch which led to the building’s comparison to the ace of clubs since the porch created a stalk to the shape. Conolly invested in local schemes like the Somerset Coal Canal. On his estate was Kingham Field, a working stone quarry, and around 1814 he was persuaded by his neighbour, William ‘Strata’ Smith (later regarded as the father of geology) to invest in a rail track to transport the stone from the quarry to Smith’s Mill for cutting, and then move it onto the canal.