Cambridgeshire, England

Kimbolton Castle is in Kimbolton, Cambridgeshire, England. In Norman times, a wooden motte and bailey castle was built on a different site. Geoffrey Fitzpiers, Earl of Essex was granted permission by King John to hold a fair and market in Kimbolton thus creating a market place. There was a church built at one end and a new castle which was more like a fortified manor house, at the other. Nothing is left of this castle.

A new castle was built and it had several owners until it finally belonged to the Wingfield family in the 1520's. At that time it was rebuilt as a Tudor manor house. Parts of it have survived and still stand. It served as the final home of Catherine of Aragon who was imprisoned there by her husband King Henry VIII. She was his first queen. She was sent here in April 1534 for refusing to give up her status or deny the validity of her marriage. The fenland climate damaged her health, and she died here in January 1536. Her body was carried in procession to the Peterborough Abbey (now Peterborough Cathedral).

Sir Henry Montagu bought the castle in 1615. He later became the 1st Earl of Manchester. His descendants owned the castle for 335 years until it was sold in 1950.

Much more reconstruction was done on the castle between 1690 and 1720 by Charles Edward Montagu, the 4th Earl who became 1st Duke of Manchester in 1719. Sir John Vanbrugh and his assistant Nicholas Hawksmoor redesigned the facades of the castle in a classical style, but with battlements to evoke its history as a castle. The Venetian painter Giovanni Antonio Pellegrini redecorated some of the reconstructed rooms in 1708, including the main staircase and the chapel. Rich, gilded furnishings in a Louis XIV-inspired style were commissioned from French upholsterers working in London.

Duke Robert Adam produced plans for the castle gatehouse and other garden buildings, including an orangery. The gatehouse was built about 1764. Mews buildings were added to provide stables, and an avenue of Giant Sequoias was planted in the 19th century.

The castle was used by the Royal Army Medical Corps during World War II, and the 10th Duke of Manchester sold the castle to Kimbolton School in 1950.

(Information from Wikipedia.com)

Above picture of Henry VII - The work of art depicted in this image and the reproduction thereof are in the public domain worldwide. The reproduction is part of a collection of reproductions compiled by The Yorck Project. The entire collection is copyrighted by The Yorck Project and licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.

Above picture of Catherine of Aragon - The two-dimensional work of art depicted in this image is in the public domain in the United States and in those countries with a copyright term of life of the author plus 100 years. This photograph of the work is also in the public domain in the United States.

HOME