Appuldurcombe House
Appuldurcombe House is the most impressive shell of a grand 18th-century baroque style stately home of the Worsley family. It is near Wroxall on the Isle of Wight.
It is now managed by English Heritage and is open to the public. A small part of the large and magnificent 1.2 km² estate which once surrounded it is still intact, but other features of the estate are still visible in the surrounding farmland and nearby village of Wroxall, including the grand entrance to the park, the Freemantle Gate, now only used by farm animals and pedestrians.
Appuldurcombe began as a priory in 1100. It became a convent, then the Elizabethan home of the Leigh family. From here, the site came into the ownership of the Worsleys.
The present house was begun in 1702, replacing the large Tudor mansion left to Sir Robert Worsley. The architect was John James. Sir Robert never saw the house fully completed. He died on 29 July 1747.
The house was greatly extended in the 1770s by his great nephew Sir Richard Worsley. The newly extended mansion was where Sir Richard brought his new wife, whom he married ‘for love and £80,000’. The famous Capability Brown was commissioned in 1779 to design the ornamental grounds at the same time as the extensions. A romantic ‘ruin’ called Cooke’s Castle was built on the hill opposite to improve the view.
During Sir Richard's time the house held a magnificent collection of works of art, and played host to some of the most eminent figures of the age.
The subsequent owner, Charles Anderson-Pelham, the 2nd Baron Yarborough (later first Earl of Yarborough), founder of the Royal Yacht Squadron at Cowes, made few changes to the house, and was quite happy to retain the property as a convenient base for his sailing activities. In 1855 the estate was sold. An unsuccessful business venture ran Appuldurcombe as an hotel, but with its failure, the house was then leased for use as a college for young gentlemen.
The house was inhabited for a few years in the early 20th century by the large community of Benedictine monks who had been exiled from Solesmes Abbey in France and were shortly to settle at Quarr Abbey on the Isle of Wight. Troops were billeted in the house during both world wars. It was badly damaged in the Second World War, when a Dornier Do 217 that was engaged in a mine laying mission turned inland and dropped its final mine very close to the house on February 7, 1943 before crashing into St Martin's Down.
Although the house is now mainly a shell, its front section has been re-roofed and glazed, and a small part of the impressive interior recreated. Even in its present state, Appuldurcombe still retains an air of its baroque grandeur—when it was justly called the "grandest house on the Isle of Wight".
