The hamlet of Racton, in a quiet corner of West Sussex, is little more than a church and a cluster of cottages. What catches the eye is the dramatic ruin, with tapering central tower, that stands above the settlement. This is the belvedere erected by George Montagu Dunk, 2nd Earl of Halifax, as an ornament to his Stansted Park estate.

The earl’s principal seat was at Horton in Northamptonshire, and Stansted (sometimes Stanstead) came to him via his mother’s side of the family in 1766, around the time this portrait was painted. Lord Halifax (1716-1771) must have built the tower soon after he inherited the estate, for it was seen by Horace Walpole in 1770. Walpole was no admirer of the new building, dismissing it simply as ‘very ugly’. Three early views survive, so readers can decide for themselves if they agree with Walpole’s judgement.

The tower is triangular in form, with a central round tower flanked by three smaller turrets. Fragments of moulding and plasterwork seen in the 20th century suggest that the interior was very fine. The work is now attributed to the architect Henry Keene: he designed a spire for Westbourne church for Lord Halifax in 1770, and was also working on a prospect tower at nearby Uppark around the same date. But it seems likely he was assisted by his son Theodosius, who was still a youth when the tower was built, for it was Theodosius who submitted a finished drawing (above) to the exhibition of the Society of Artists in 1772 under the title A view of Stanstead Castle, near Emsworth.

An unknown artist sketched the tower in 1771 (above). Although the tower is known to have been complete at that date, and the artist noted detailed dimensions, this drawing does not show the tower as built. The dimensions are only partially correct, so the only explanation that comes to mind is that the artist produced this finished sketch from rough drawings and measurements made on-the-spot and, basically, got it wrong. Two watercolours by Samuel Hieronymous Grimm, executed in 1782, confirm that tower was built to the original design by Henry Keene.

From the top of the tower there were views down to the coast and out to sea over the naval base at Portsmouth, and to the Isle of Wight and the bustle of ships in the English Channel. There was also a fine view of Chichester Cathedral. But these views could also be appreciated from the house and from Lumley Seat, a temple in the garden at Stansted, so a writer in 1784 was somewhat disgruntled that having climbed all the steps there was ‘little variety in the prospect’. He concluded that ‘the elegance […] of this edifice is in no means proportionate to the prodigious expense which the raising of it cost his lordship’.

The earl had little time to enjoy his new tower, as he died in June 1771. However lurid local legends suggest he packed a lot into his brief period of ownership (remembering he also had a busy life in Northamptonshire and London). When he wasn’t indulging in wild orgies at the tower he was up on the roof frantically signalling the all-clear to ‘the big smuggling gangs who swarmed the coast’: apparently the earl was ‘the head of one of the biggest gangs’. A writer contributing to a local paper in 1938 was told that the folly was built by the earl so he could watch for Napoleon’s armies landing. Thankfully, the journalist had a better grasp of British history than his informant, and did not pass on this anachronism. He concluded instead that the ‘tower is another good instance of how legend gains momentum with the passing of time’.

Lord Halifax left no legitimate issue, so the title expired. His natural daughter, Anna Maria Montagu, was the beneficiary of the estate, but it was sold soon after Halifax’s death to raise capital. The new owner was a wealthy merchant called Richard Barwell (1741-1804) and the tower was regarded as an elegant object during his ownership. After his death the estate changed hands a number of times, before becoming dispersed in the early years of the 20th century.

The tower stood in attractive landscaped grounds, and became a popular destination for day trippers. The earliest accounts call it the ‘Stansted Tower’, or ‘Stansted Castle’, and in 1826 it was described as standing upon ‘a piece of land called Castle Field’. This name was soon lost and on 18th century county maps it is named simply as ‘Tower’. The First Series Ordnance Survey map of 1810 calls it ‘Stansted Tower’, and the First Edition map of 1875 marks it as ‘Racton Monument’, with the ominous words ‘in ruins’ in parentheses.

By 1862 the tower was described as ‘the old ruin’, suggesting it had been in decay for some time by that date, and an account of 1888 noted that the three turrets ‘were gradually diminishing in height from the effects of storms’. The staircase and windows had by then gone, and there were only vestiges of the old garden.

Inevitably there were issues with damage to the tower, and in 1933 the then owners threatened to ban public access if the problems didn’t stop. Sadly, the wilful damage has continued over the decades, and fences and ‘keep out’ signs have been pulled down as quickly as they were erected. A solution was proposed in 2020 when architect Mark Talbot, who bought the tower in 1987, attempted to obtain planning permission to restore the grade II listed tower as a private house (planning permission had been granted some years before he bought the tower, but had expired). The application was rejected on the grounds that it was ‘an unsympathetic form of development’ which would detract from the tower’s special architectural and historic interest.

The tower is on private land but can be seen from the lovely track called Monument Lane: there are good views of the tower across arable land as one ascends. The tower is in a sorry state, but somehow remains dignified and undeniably dramatic.

Perhaps the best way to appreciate the design of the tower today is from high above, as Nic Orchard did in 2019 when she soared over in her light aircraft.

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High on the Sussex Downs, near the village of South Harting, stand some curious ruins. The jagged and dilapidated stonework is all that remains of the wonderful ornate tower built by Sir Matthew Fetherstonhaugh of Uppark (or Up-park) in the 1770s and later known by the curious title of the Vandalian Tower.

Sir Matthew (1714-1774) commissioned architect Henry Keene (1726-1776) to design the tower in the early 1770s. The site was a pre-existing prospect mount in the park, and this he topped with an exquisite pinnacled pavilion. It is square in plan, and originally there was a kitchen in the basement where the servants could prepare meals, and above it a grand room for entertainment.

Few contemporary accounts of the tower survive, although happily a number of images are extant, including the two shown here. A tourist saw the ‘new building’, which he called ‘Uppark tower’, when visiting in 1771, so it must have been substantially complete by that date. The estate archive showed that bills were still being settled in 1775, so either work continued on the finishing touches for many years, or Sir Matthew was a tardy payer, with things further delayed by his death in 1774.

The builder was Mr Brooks, and the sculptor Mr Carter also submitted a bill: this was presumably Thomas Carter who specialised in ornamental fireplaces. Mr Rose was paid for plasterwork: the Rose family, Joseph senior and junior (uncle and nephew), were amongst the preeminent ornamental plasterwork specialists of the day, and created the ‘neatly decorated ceiling’ of the upper apartment. The windows were ‘partially filled with stained glass’, which must have cast an enchanting light on the interior of the ‘elegant picturesque erection’, as it was later remembered.

The bills call the structure the ‘Gothic Tower’, and it is not clear when it first became known as the Vandalian Tower. It is just named as ‘Tower’ on Ordnance Survey maps, and no references to the ‘Vandalian Tower’ have been found before Christopher Hussey’s articles on Uppark in Country Life in 1941. The name has nothing to do with our modern use of the term vandal to refer to persons causing wilful damage, but instead ‘Vandalia’ was the name given to a proposed settlement on the banks of the Ohio, America (although it does not seem to have been widely used outside the circle of investors). Sir Matthew had given his support to the project in 1769, although the plans were abandoned after the outbreak of the American War of Independence in 1775. Sir Matthew is said to have built the tower to commemorate his involvement in the scheme (he died in 1774 so would never have known that the scheme had failed).

Sir Matthew was succeeded by his son, Sir Harry (1754-1846). It has been suggested that the tower was built to mark his coming of age, although there seems little evidence. But he did put the tower to good use, throwing lavish parties there. In her book Uppark and its People (1965) Lady Meade-Featherstonhaugh recalls the tale that the feasts were on such a gargantuan scale that diners had to be carted back to the house in wheelbarrows.

Curiously, a writer in 1877 knew the tower by a different name. Mr Weaver, who contributed a chapter to Revd. Gordon’s History of Harting, told the story of the proposed settlement and the tower commemorating it. However he recorded that it was ‘fancifully named Daedalia’. Perhaps Weaver had just misheard verbal reports and assumed the tower was named after Daedalus, the skilful architect of Greek mythology? After all, the adjective ‘daedalian’, perfectly described the tower: ingenious, or intricate. This name was repeated in a couple of later texts and then seems to have disappeared from the tower’s history.

Unfortunately the glorious tower would have a short life: on midnight of Monday 27 June 1842 the ‘beautiful belvidere’ was discovered in flames and the county for miles round was ‘soon roused from their slumbers to witness its destruction’. The blaze was initially believed to have been caused by a fire that had not been adequately put out, but the Brighton Guardian concluded darkly that ‘we fear it will turn out the fire was not altogether accidental’. The damage was later attributed to a ‘notorious gang of poachers’.

Gordon’s History of Harting (1877) included a view of the ruined tower, and Weaver concluded that the structure had been so substantially built that ‘many years may yet elapse before it becomes a heap of ruins’. The tower did indeed stand strong, and a postcard dating from around 1920 shows little had changed in the forty or so years since Gordon’s history was published.

By 1934 Sir Harry Meade-Fetherstonhaugh was having problems with trespassers, and reluctantly he closed the gates to Uppark. He was at pains to stress to the people of Harting that they would always be given a ‘hearty welcome’, but that he had to act to stop the ‘foreigners’ who had been damaging the tower and other buildings in the park. More day-trippers would no doubt have arrived at Sir Harry’s gates a couple of years later: in 1937 the Shell petrol company featured the folly on a poster encouraging motorists to jump into their cars (after filling up with Shell fuel of course) and visit such sights.

The grade II listed tower was consolidated in 1982. It stands on private land and can now only be viewed from a distance as, ironically, it is fenced off to deter… vandals.

Most readers will know that another devastating blaze features in the history of Uppark (a National Trust property). In August 1989 fire swept through the house, causing terrible damage to the interiors and although some of the contents were saved many more were lost, including archival and pictorial references to the tower.

F.G. Aldsworth investigated the tower in 1982, when consolidation was underway, and fortunately recorded archival materials later lost in the fire, including the building accounts noted here. His account, with reconstructions of the plans and elevations, is in Sussex Archaeological Collections Vol. 121 (1983), pp. 183-224.

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