Godolphin House

Mention of Poldark in yesterday's post about Kynance Cove leads me to write about Godolphin House, which I visited on Saturday and which served as Ross Poldark's house in the original 1970s BBC TV series.

The Godolphin Estate, lying around 4 miles north-west of Helston at Godolphin Cross, is the former seat of the Dukes of Leeds and the Earls of Godolphin. It contains a Grade I listed Tudor/Stuart mansion, complete with early formal gardens (dating from circa 1500) and Elizabethan stables (circa 1600). 

The present house is a remnant of a larger mansion. From 1786 it was owned by the Dukes of Leeds who never lived there. In 1920 the 10th Duke of Leeds sold it to the sitting tenant Peter Quintrell Treloar. After Treloar died in 1922, his wife sold it to James Penna, an agricultural engineer. Penna died in 1926 and his son James inherited the estate and lived there until his death in 1935. In 1935 it was sold to a local man called Stevens, but he then sold the house and estate to artist Walter Elmer Schofield and family in 1937. Schofield's architect son Sydney restored the mansion, and received it as a wedding present from his parents. In 2000, Mary Schofield, widow of Sydney, sold the estate to the National Trust. Since then more renovation work has restored the stables, dairy and other outbuildings.

The Godolphins made their fortunes from the tin and copper mines but, despite their great wealth, the house is curiously plain with few embellishments even though, at one time, it was considered the biggest and grandest house in Cornwall. 

The Godolphins, then called Godolgun or Godolghan acquired the land in the 12th century and built a house with a moat and walls to protect stock, produce and portable wealth from common thieves. As the family became richer and more powerful, they changed their name to the more English-sounding Godolphin and installed a deer park and rabbit warren. Major and minor roads were diverted, the house was rebuilt and an ambitious garden laid out with box hedges that shelter the primroses flowering below them in the spring. In the summer it becomes a sun trap where you can breathe in the perfume of highly scented roses and lavender.

Some of the boundaries surrounding the estate are particularly interesting as they were built by prisoners of the Napoleonic war. The Duke of Leeds had connections with prisoner of war camps and so it was easy for him to source cheap labour. These boundary styles are very rare but can also be found around Dartmoor prison, where other prisoners were held captive. My favourite part of the visit (apart from the excellent tea room) was visiting the stables where old coaches, wains and waggons are displayed.

The National Trust's Godolphin site is here. If you're in Cornwall, pay a visit.

Did I mention the excellent tea room?