Sizergh Gardens

It turned out to be sunny and quite hot for northern England as we began the guided tour of Sizergh Gardens, which for many people may have greater appeal than the castle itself.

I can't claim to remember too many details about its horticulture, but our stroll through the garden was a pleasant experience.

Our guide mentioned that like most great gardens, Sizergh is planted to provide different blooms as seasons change.

Over the centuries, the gardening philosophy itself has adapted with different generations.

According to the guide book Jay gave me, "The oldest part of the garden is the terraced lawn that extends south-westwards from the house, bounded on one side by a brick-faced fruit wall and on the other by a stone retaining wall."  The brick wall was built in 1739.

I would guess that in medieval times, the practical Stricklands would have used gardens for growing food almost exclusively, and of course raising "stirkes" (cattle) rather than ornamental flowers.  Much of the garden today remains dedicated to herbs, fruit and vegetables.

Regardless of whether they indulged in croquet and flower gardens before the mid-18th Century when the lawn was laid out, they would have undoubtedly been forced to cut back on frivolity when Parliamentarians made Oliver Cromwell essentially a dictator of England following the execution of King Charles I, for whom the Stricklands sacrificed so much to defend.

Despite paying substantial fines that put the family deeper into debt, the Stricklands managed to hold onto their ancestral home.

Upon Cromwell's death, King Charles II returned from nine years in exile in France to claim his throne in 1660.

The Stricklands tied their fate to the Catholic younger brother of King Charles II, who himself had no sons.  When Charles II died in 1685, that younger brother became King James II.  He was married to Mary of Modena, princess of very Catholic Italy, and soon Protestant plots sprung up to depose him.

When King James II had a Catholic son in 1688, Lady Strickland was present, indicating how close they were.  She was honored to be named Under-Governess for the Prince of Wales, who would be King James III, if all went well.

Concern over a now very Catholic dynasty prompted the Anglican (Protestant) opposition to encourage Mary, the older sister of King James II, and her husband William of Orange (Orange is in modern day France near Avignon), who already ruled what's now known as the Netherlands, to usurp the crowns of the British Empire from James II and Queen Mary of Modena.

The coup worked, and while William and Mary turned out to be benevolent rulers, that was a disaster for the Stricklands, who subsequently followed King James II and Mary of Modena into exile in France.   King Louis XIV of France also considered William of Orange a threat, so he generously accepted the deposed monarchs and their entourage as his guests at his Chateau of Saint-Germain-en-Laye until they could re-claim the crown.

This contingent of British royal ex-patriots became known as Jacobites.

While the Jacobites were never destined to rule the British Commonwealth again, the Stricklands returned to their ancestral home in the Lake District, which had been cleverly protected by putting it in trust with two of their servants rather than allowing it to be seized.

The Strickland family's love for the exiled monarchs is revealed by the treasured portraits of the Stuart family members still on display in Sizergh Castle.

Decades later, Francis Strickland, who as a younger brother was never in charge of Sizergh Castle, joined the Stuart Court in exile in Rome.  Francis was one of only seven men present with "Bonnie Prince Charlie" in Moidart, Scotland, when the disastrous Jacobite Rebellion kicked off.


The Strickland family somehow managed to navigate through all the political intrigues of the centuries with one dramatic comeback after another, returning to true prominence by the 20th Century.

In the 20th Century Baron Gerald Strickland (1861 through 1940), was a Member of Parliament of the United Kingdom but also had an international career that included stints as Governor of the Leeward Islands in the Caribbean, Tasmania, Western Australia and New South Wells, as well as Prime Minister of Malta, the Mediterranean island nation where he was actually born and died.  He did return to Sizergh Castle periodically, including on one occasion when a newsreel was filmed.

When Great Britain's top marginal tax rates reached 99.25% following World War II, however, the family couldn't pull enough strings to avoid turning the estate over to the National Trust in 1950.

That gambit, however, allowed Sizergh Castle and the Strickland family history to be preserved for posterity while still allowing his ancestors to reside there with the government caring for the castle and gardens.  All factors considered, not a bad deal.