architecture, Bath and North East Somerset, belvedere, eyecatcher, Folly, Grotto, Observatory, Tower

Beckford’s Tower, Bath, Bath & North East Somerset.

In April 1826 a visitor to Bath noted that William Beckford, a ‘wealthy and capricious voluptuary’, had bought land on Lansdown Hill ‘with the design of erecting a magnificent tower with drest grounds about it’. The visitor knew that this had been planned since soon after Beckford’s move to the city in 1822, but he could see no sign of any progress on the project. Had he arrived just a few months later he would have found builders hard at work.

Beckford (1760-1844) had been the subject of gossip and press speculation throughout his adult life. He was initially of interest simply because he was immensely rich from his family’s interests in the Slave Trade. Then, in 1784, came accusations of sexual activity with a 16 year old boy which soon became the talk of the town, and Beckford and his wife fled to the continent. He would later be famed for his exuberant and extravagant building projects.

Charles Wild. The exterior of Fonthill Abbey, the seat of William Beckford. Great Britain, c.1830. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

On his return to England Beckford built the gothic palace called Fonthill Abbey, in Wiltshire, to a design by James Wyatt. The magnificent house was widely known from prints and books, and so there was much interest in December 1825 when the fall of the ‘fine (but flimsy) architectural structure’ was announced in the press. Although Beckford had sold the estate some three years earlier, it would forever be known as his creation, and Wyatt would be blamed for the inadequate foundations.

‘Alas! It has fallen’. John Buckler’s view of Fonthill, taken immediately after the tower collapsed, as featured in The History of Modern Wiltshire. Hundred of Dunworth… by James Everard, Baron Arundel, and Sir Richard Colt Hoare, Bart. (London: John Bowyer Nichols and Son, 1829), Plate V, facing p. 27.

After selling the Fonthill estate Beckford moved to Bath. In 1823 the newspapers were reporting that Beckford had three or four hundred men enclosing his estate with a wall, and laying out grounds for plantations where upwards of two hundred trees were to be planted. As the finishing touch, Beckford was said to be intending to build a lofty tower. Progress was slow, and in January 1825 the papers were wondering why it had not materialised. In the autumn of 1826, work eventually began to a design by H. E. Goodridge (1797-1864), a Bath-based architect.

The tower as seen in Views of Lansdown Tower, Bath by Willes Maddox, published in 1844.

There were those who questioned Beckford’s decision to ‘make new efforts to scale the skies’, given his experience at Fonthill, and in October the papers reported that ‘Mr. Beckford, undismayed by the falling of his celebrated tower at Fonthill, has now above a hundred men employed in the erection of a somewhat similar edifice on Landsdown [sic] Bath’. But some lessons had been learned, and work on the tower was paused in November and not recommenced until all risk of a frost was over.

In 1841 the newspapers, interested in every move Beckford made, reported that he was planning to pull the tower down and sell the collection, as he was so fed up of thieves and vandals breaking in. Happily, the tower was given a reprieve, but the contents were dispersed only a few years later following Beckford’s death in 1844. The tower too was sold, but soon afterwards Beckford’s daughter, Susan, Duchess of Hamilton, was horrified to learn that the grounds were being used as a beer garden. She repurchased the tower and presented it to the parish for use as a cemetery and chapel.

The chapel remained in use until the 1960s, when it was deconsecrated and put up for sale. It was bought by Drs Elizabeth and Leslie Hilliard who established a museum of Beckfordiana in the tower and set up the Beckford Tower Trust to secure its future. Major restoration was carried out in 1997-2000, and again in 2022-2024.

The entrance gates as seen from inside the cemetery.

William Beckford and his buildings have been the subject of many excellent books and papers, and this brief account is really just an excuse to say that the newly-refurbished tower is well worth a visit. See the fascinating museum, now with many new items of Beckfordiana on show, then limber up and climb the spiral stairs to the belvedere for views over the city and countryside. You can then enjoy wandering in the cemetery to find both Beckford’s and Goodridge’s resting places, and walk down to the newly-revealed grotto tunnel which Beckford built on the carriage drive to his home in the valley below.

There’s lots more on the Beckford’s Tower website and if you’d like to linger a little longer the Landmark Trust has an apartment in the tower to rent.

Comments are always welcome and you can get in touch via the box at the foot of the page. Thank you for reading.

 

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8 thoughts on “Beckford’s Tower, Bath, Bath & North East Somerset.”

  1. James says:

    I was there just 2 months ago, during the Bath Jane Austen Festival. I haven’t been in about 20 years and was pleasantly surprised by the interpretation and presentation of the tower and the life of William Beckford. You can even wear a viewer to show the rooms as they would have looked in 3D!

    1. Editor says:

      Good morning James. I’m pleased to hear you have visited the tower. The museum packs a lot into the very elegant space it occupies. There was a queue for the viewer so I missed out on that, but I will try it next time I am in the area.

  2. John St B H says:

    Oh Karen! How I wish I were a “capricious voluptuary” Alas I think it could never be.

    1. Editor says:

      Hello John. Surely it’s never too late to try? I look forward to hearing how you get on!

  3. Iain KS Gray says:

    The buyer of Fonthill Abbey, a Mr Farquarson I think, was said to have been warned by one of his staff that the tower was about to fall to which he is supposed to have replied “Impossible, I have the key in my pocket”.

    1. Editor says:

      Good morning Iain. Yes, and another story is that Wyatt confessed on his death bed that the foundations of the tower were inadequate. Fonthill is endlessly fascinating.

  4. TOM GARDNER says:

    TOM – NYC
    NOW THAT TRUMP IS OUR ‘PRES. ELECT’ … ‘MAR-A-LAGO’ IS SAFE FOR AT LEAST ANOTHER FOUR YEARS.
    HAVING BEEN – THE FOURTH FOOTMAN, AKA JR. BUTLER (C. 1967) – ONE OF 45 IN STAFF, FOR: ITS ‘ORIGINAL’ OWNER -BUILDER: MRS. MERRIEWEATHER POST – I FULLY APPRECIATE, VIEWING THE HISTORY OF MASTERPIECES IN STRUCTURES.
    TRULY, ‘A MAN’S GRASP (FEMALES TOO) SHOULD EXCEED HIS REACH, OR …
    WHAT’S A HEAVEN FOR?’

    1. Editor says:

      Hello Tom. Like William Beckford, your President Elect is also a builder of towers and always in the newspapers. I hope NYC is looking as lovely as Britain this autumn/fall.

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