Calke Abbey House

Calke Abbey was built on the site of an Augustinian priory that operated from the 12th century. There’s no evidence of an abbey still remaining. I never got to the bottom of why the House was called Calke Abbey, rather than Calke Priory. The House was built between 1701 and 1704. The owners were the Harpurs (later known as the Crewes) and had lived at Calke from 1622. They were one of Derbyshire’s wealthiest families. They made their fortune through legal careers, advantageous marriages and land ownership. They weren’t so wealthy in 1981 when an £8 million tax bill was demanded by HMRC. Henry Harpur-Crewe didn’t have enough money to pay the tax and certainly didn’t have enough to restore the crumbling estate and so he gave the Government the keys in lieu of payment of inheritance tax. The Government in turn gave it to the National Trust to maintain in 1984. The National Trust probably made a collective groan when they saw it.        

When I say the estate was crumbling, I do  mean that in a literal sense. Some of the rooms in the house have been deliberately left in the same derelict state as when the keys were handed over. Some of the rooms and corridors in the building have peeling wallpaper and a whiff of dereliction. It feels more like Gormanghast than Chatsworth House.

Saloon

I climbed the main staircase and entered the Saloon. This room definitely had a ‘wow’ factor too. There was no second floor above the room and so it felt quite voluminous. There were a number of oil portraits that circled the room at a higher level, but they were so high up that you’d need a telescope to study them. In fact I was surprised that I couldn’t find a telescope in the room since it seemed to contain everything else. Rather bizarrely there was a billiard table in the centre of the room with the fossil (or actual skull) of an Alligator in a glass box at the centre of the baize. I’d already been acquainted with the stuffed heads of various animals on my introduction to the house, and this room continued the theme with plenty of them  being hung on any spare space on the walls. There were glass cases of stuffed birds, large and small. There were glass cases of shells. In fact, there were glass cases of anything you could think of. The main propagator of these collections was Sir Vancey Harpur Crewe (the 10th Baronet). He was a passionate collector of natural history specimens like eggs, shells, insects and taxidermy. The collections were in every room of the house and went from the sublime to the ridiculous. Vauncey was the main collector, but the rest of the Harpur Crewes were of a similar ilk. It looked like they never threw anything away. I guess the 10th Baronet would appear in a Channel 5 series about hoarders if he was alive in the modern day. At least he had plenty of rooms to fill. 

Library, Boudoir And School Room

I stepped into the Library and reviewed some of the titles in the nearest bookcase. ‘Voyage Of The Challenger’, ‘The South Pole’ and ‘In Darkest Africa’ were a few of the titles dedicated to world travel. At last, I’d found a National Trust bookcase that contained books that I would actually like to peruse. Well, maybe not the ‘Elephant Hunting In Equatorial Africa’, but with most of them I reckon I could easily have spent an enjoyable evening. I overheard a chap trying to make conversation with the room’s Greeter.
‘Most of these books are so dry. They must have only bought them for show’ he moaned. I could show him some dry books in other National Trust properties, if he wanted. This library was a treasure chest in comparison.

The Boudoir was next door and looked quite cosy, almost like a snug in a pub. Even this small room was filled with 600 objects an information board told me. It had hidden door secreted somewhere in one of the walls, although I couldn't detect it.

Before the kids went to Harrow, Rugby or Westminster they were schooled at home and the School Room contained the detritus of that room. It was even more chaotic than the other rooms. There were dolls houses, a rocking horse and various toys. There were even some old newspapers from 1939. The room Greeter told me that the military took over Calke Abbey at the start of the Second World War which explained some of the newspapers of that era. 

State Bed And Cups

The State Bed room was quite a contrast with the rest of the rooms. A glass barrier was placed around the bed. I’d never seen this before on a National Trust item. The room was nearly in total darkness and you couldn’t actually see a lot. The hangings around the bed were dark too. An information board said they were made from Chinese silks and were thought to have been given to the newly married Sir Henry Harpur and Lady Caroline Manners in 1734. It said they were in near-perfect condition and given that they are now hermetically sealed, it looks like they’ll remain that way. 

Rather oddly, the room containing the State Bed also contained a glass cabinet with what looked like silver trophies from horseraces. To be honest, they looked more like gold since the silver was quite tarnished. The room  was too dark to read anything about them and so I moved on. 

Rectangular Cows And The Kids Bedroom

I think the next room was the ‘Butler’s Pantry’, but there weren’t any items in there indicating that it had been a pantry. There were quite a few paintings on the wall of cows. It is a curious thing that the artistic style of painting cows in the 19th century was to give them a rectangular shape. Apparently the artists exaggerated the dimensions to signify the wealth and status of the landowners during the 1800s. They look like a farmer’s fantasy to me.    

The kid’s bedroom looked as dirty, messy and chaotic as you’d expect a kid’s bedroom to look. Well, maybe except for the half a dozen stag’s heads on the bed and all the other junk littered about the room. It makes you wonder whether the Harpur-Crewes might have benefitted from attending a Cart Boot Sales, if they existed in those days. Having said that, I think they’d be the type of punters that would have returned with more items than they sold.

Bird Room And Conkers

As might be expected, in the Bird Room all the walls of the room were covered in glass boxes of stuffed birds. A few stuffed mammals were also included for good measure. I asked the room Greeter whether they caught the birds and gassed them. She didn’t know. I told her that I was a member of the RSPB and preferred to see birds flying rather than in boxes.
‘Oh, you are a member of the RSPB! Then you’ll be interested in the Albino Robin in that box up there,’ and she pointed to a small box on one wall containing a white bird. Poor old Robin; it didn’t have the best start in life, and then it ended up in one of these boxes.    

The room next door was a bedroom I think. It was hard to tell since it contained so much junk. I examined one of the boxes and found a treasure trove of curiosities. The Harpur-Crewes were the most dedicated collectors I’ve ever come across. One of the items in the box contained a conker and this had been used as the body of a toy horse. Four pins had been inserted into the conker as legs, and paper drawings slotted into the conker as a head and tail. Why aristocrats would spend their time collecting items like this is beyond me. There must have been some sentimental value, I guess.  The room also contained a Moule’s patent “Pull-Up” earth-closet. It looked comfortable enough, but I guess it whiffed a bit on a busy day. I wondered what might potentially go wrong with a contraption when I read this notice on the sign from the purveyors in Covent Garden:
“N.B. It is particularly requested that in all cases where a difficulty arises in the working of the Earth System, the Company may be communicated with, as from their vast experience they are always able to give such information as leads to perfect success.”
I wondered how good the post service was in those days, and how quick they’d be able to respond to a ‘problem.’ 

Kitchen

The direction signs pointed me down the stairwell and I ended up back in the Entrance Hall, much to the amazement of the two Greeters there.  
'You aren’t supposed to come out from there! Where have you been?’ Well, I did warn them that if there was a flaw in their new route direction system, then I’d find it. They said that I should have come down another stairwell and had consequently missed out on the Kitchen. One of the Greeters led me in the opposite direction of the more intelligent House Leavers in order that I shouldn’t miss out on this room. 

The Kitchen turned out to be another room with an eclectic mix of items. It was another room that was two storeys high and so seemed quite voluminous. In terms of cleanliness, I don’t think it would be winning any hygiene awards, but I guessed that its serving days were over. I returned to the Entrance Hall and thanked the Greeters.   

It had been a very unusual tour of a National Trust House. Looking at the neo-classical design from the outside, you couldn’t imagine the curiosities and chaos on the inside. It made for a very interesting tour. It was unusual to see some of the exhibits displayed in a fashion in which they were probably found. It would be worth a second tour in the future since I almost certainty missed out on viewing some amazing curiosity. 

Postscript

There’s a tunnel that goes from the House to the Stables. Unfortunately this was closed for maintenance during my visit. It will definitely be on my agenda to walk along it, the next time I visit Calke Abbey.