Raby Castle, North East England

The first mention of Raby, or ‘Rabi’ at the time, was when King Cnut, in the early 11th Century, gifted the estate to the Prior of Durham. It is thought that at the time of the Norman Conquest, that Raby was in the possession of Sigurn, who was Cnut’s niece. The estate then seems to disappear from history, with much of the written history of Raby castle focusing on the period from the 14th Century to modern day.  Raby for much of the middle ages was the ancestral home of the Neville family, so that is where our history begins.

A legend tells us, that a man named Gilbert de Neville had been a steward of William the Conqueror, and came to England in 1066 to fight at Hastings, but there is no actual evidence for this. It is much more likely that the first Neville to raise his head above the masses, was Alan de Neville. He was chief justice of the forest and was granted Marlborough Castle by Henry II. From this appointment, and for the next three hundred years, the Nevilles held offices having to do with royal forestry. Royal service was how they began to climb the ladder, to eventually become one of the wealthiest families in the north of England. Gilbert’s son, Geoffrey de Neville, married Emma de Bulmer (approx. 1175). She brought to the marriage several estates, including Brancepeth, Sheriff Hutton and Raby. Their son, Henry, died without issue and the estates were inherited by their daughter, Isabel de Neville.  She married Robert Fitz Maldred, but their children took the Neville surname.  It is this branch of the Neville family who continued to hold Raby Castle until 1569.

Ranulph Neville, the 1st Baron Neville, married Euphemia de Claverine, heiress of John de Claverine of Warkworth Castle. Together they had fourteen children. He later married Margery de Thwenge. When he died in 1331, his estates were inherited by his son, Ralph, the 2nd Baron Neville.  Ralph married Alice de Audley and they had thirteen children before Robert died in 1367.  Their son, John, who was the 3rd Baron Neville, married Maud Percy, and later, Elizabeth Latimer, who between them gave him nine children. You can see how the Nevilles gained lands though marriage, it would seem everyone in the north was related to a Neville. During John’s career, he fought against the Scots at the Battle of Neville’s Cross and was Knighted in 1360.  He fought in Aquitaine in 1366 and again in 1373. John was appointed Admiral of the North in 1370 and Steward of the King’s Household in 1372.  In 1378, he was given a licence to crenellate and Raby castle was fortified.  At this time, the castle was most likely entirely rebuilt. We don’t know what was there previously, but what we see today is primarily the later 14th Century castle that was built by John Neville. John was succeeded by his son, Ralph Neville.

King Richard II raised Ralph Neville, Lord of Raby, to Earl of Westmorland. Although he had always been loyal to the King, he was quick to switch teams when Henry of Bolingbroke landed in England to overthrow Richard II in 1399. Ralph was married to Margaret Stafford, who was the daughter of the 11th Earl of Warwick. They had two sons and six daughters together, before Margaret died in 1396. Once Henry IV had been crowned King, he supported the Neville’s in gaining power, as they acted as a counter measure to the also powerful Percy family in the north. Earl Ralph was rewarded with a second marriage to the new King’s half-sister, Joan Beaufort, who was also the daughter of John of Gaunt, and the grand-daughter of King Edward III. Joan was the youngest of four children who John of Gaunt had with his mistress, Katherine Swynford, who he later married. The children were all made legitimate at the time of their marriage, by papal bull, with the one exception being that they and their descendants could not succeed to the throne of England. Joan was also a widow when she married Ralph, but together they went on to have fourteen surviving children, nine sons and five daughters. Their youngest child was Cecily Neville.

Cecily Neville was born at Raby Castle on the 3rd of May 1415. She was said to have been quite beautiful and was given the nickname the Rose of Raby. In 1424, when Cecily was nine years old, she was betrothed to Richard Plantagenet, the 3rd Duke of York, who was 13 years old. They were married in 1429 and they had their first child Anne in 1439.  Richard of York, became Lieutenant Governor General of France in 1441 and the family moved to Rouen, where their son Henry was born but did not survive infancy.  Their next son, Edward, who would later become Edward IV, was born at Rouen in 1442. Their next child was Edmund, born in 1443, followed by Elizabeth in 1444, Margaret in 1446, William in 1447 and John in 1448. Both William and John died young. George was then born in 1449, Thomas, who also died young, was born in 1450. Next, Richard, who would later become Richard III, was born in 1452 and finally Ursula, born in 1455, died young as well. Cecily, like most of the Neville family before her, succeeded in her childbearing duties and gave birth to 12 children, of which only seven survived childhood. 

Cecily Neville was a descendant of King Edward III but her husband, Richard the Duke of York, had much closer links to the throne. When Henry IV, who was descended from Edward III’s third son, deposed Richard II who was descended from Edward III’s first son, this act ignored any other heirs from Edward III’s second son, Lionel, Duke of Clarence. This didn’t seem to be an issue as Lionel had only had one child, a daughter named Philippa, who was the 5th Countess of Ulster. Philippa married Edmund Mortimer and their eldest son had been considered the heir presumptive to King Richard II, before he was deposed. His line would have still held a strong claim to the throne. His son, Edmund Mortimer, died without issue but his daughter, Anne, married Richard of Conisburgh and their son was Richard Plantagenet, the Duke of York.  Now, why this matters is that after the death of Henry V, when Henry VI was on the Throne of England, and proving himself unfit to rule when he would have his mental breakdowns, the person with an arguably better claim to the throne of England, was Richard the Duke of York. For him to have this better claim though, we have to follow the female line, which was not often done.  However, and I really don’t want to lose you here, if we follow the male line, he would still be next in line to the throne, as he was also descended from Edward III’s fourth son, Edmund of Langley, the 1st Duke of York. That is of course, until Henry VI’s son, Edward, Prince of Wales, was born.

Both the Duke and Duchess of York were the grandchildren of King Edward III. Despite all his titles, Richard, Duke of York was denied a place in the government by the King’s advisors. When King Henry VI suffered a mental breakdown in 1454, Richard of York established himself as Lord Protector, because of his claims to the throne. Once the King, recovered Richard’s protectorship ended and he was ousted once again. Richard originally aimed only to remove his opponents from their position of influence over the King, which prevented him from leading any important role. When the Duke of York fled to Ireland, it was Cecily who travelled to London to plead for her husband, however his lands were confiscated and Cecily was given a grant of £600 to support herself and her children. When the Duke returned, he led the Yorkist army to victory at the Battle of Northampton in 1460, but he and his son Edmund were both killed at the Battle of Wakefield later in the same year. 

By the end of 1460, Cecily Neville, the Duchess of York, had already lost a husband and five of her children.  However, the events of the Wars of the Roses would have her watch her own sons fight each other, with one finally executing another, her nephew turning against her family and even her grandchildren would eventually end up on opposing sides of the  battles.  Cecily lived to be 80 years of age. She died in 1495 and was buried next to her husband, in the Church of St Mary and All Saints, at Fotheringhay, in Northamptonshire. She had been born into every privilege the 15th Century allowed, but she outlived all but two of her twelve children and, as much prestige as her family had, she also must have known great suffering in her life. Her granddaughter, Elizabeth of York, was married to King Henry VII in 1486 and, through this lineage, she is related to the monarchy even today. 

The medieval chapel dates from the end of the 14th Century and was, at that time, a completely separate building, which has now been incorporated into the castle itself. As part of the restoration at the end of the 19th Century, the 9th Lord Barnard uncovered the medieval stone arcade and commissioned portraits of famous people associated with Raby Castle during the middle ages.  Their likenesses are said to have been taken from tomb effigies and stained-glass windows.  On the far right is the painting of Cecily Neville, the Duchess of York. 

Raby Castle has managed to retain its medieval appearance, despite the massive alterations it underwent between the mid-18th-19th Centuries. Most of the south range was rebuilt, the great hall and chapel were entirely altered and the windows changed.  Little remains of the medieval great hall of Raby Castle.  There is still a hammerbeam roof but it also has been renewed. The room was extended by over 17 meters (55.7 feet).  Only the gothic window remains from the Neville’s castle.

The Neville family continued to serve from their seat at Raby Castle, until it was forfeited in 1569, when Ralph and Charles Neville supported the Rising of the North, a rebellion against Queen Elizabeth. The intention was to overthrow the Queen and put Mary, Queen of Scots, on the throne of England. As Mary was the niece of King Henry VIII, she was next in line to the throne after Elizabeth I. Once the rebellion failed, the castle was confiscated by the Crown and remained in the care of the monarchy until 1626, when it was purchased by Sir Henry Vane, who was Treasurer to King Charles I. There is a story, that in the early 18th Century, Thomas Vane was so enraged by his son Gilbert’s inappropriate marriage, that he stripped Raby Castle of all its useable materials, selling off it’s furniture and killing the estate’s livestock.  When Gilbert finally inherited the castle in 1723, he started on a rebuilding program, very possibly due to necessity, if his father’s destruction was as thorough as proclaimed. 

The kitchen at Raby, while entirely altered in appearance to work as a Victorian kitchen, remains structurally unchanged from the middle ages, and the building itself still retains its medieval form.  For over 600 years this was a working kitchen and, while cooking would have originally been done on open fires using cauldrons and spits, the fireplaces where later filled in by ranges.

Raby Castle is one that I had wanted to see for a long time.  I was first there in 1992 and made it as far as the car park. However, it was raining, I had a sleeping baby with me at the time, and it was a long walk to the front door, so I never made it inside. It took me two and a half decades to return. Raby is not the type of castle I usually cover. As a result of the extensive alterations and rebuilding that it has endured to make it a comfortable home through the centuries, it has inevitably lost some of its medieval essence.  Yet, there are places where the medieval castle still shines through, we just have to pay closer attention in order to discover them.