Ruperra Castle March 2011

[astro23]

Ruperra Castle is a Grade II* Listed building and Scheduled Ancient Monument, situated in Lower Machen in South East Wales. It is currently in a ruined condition, and up for sale.

Built in 1626 by Sir Thomas Morgan, Steward to the Earl of Pembroke, it was one of the first of the 'mock' castles to be built in Wales. King Charles I spent two nights at Ruperra Castle in 1645 shortly after the Battle of Naseby.

It was later absorbed into the Tredegar Estate and became home to the Morgan family. Evan Morgan , 4th Baron, 2nd Viscount Tredegar. One of the more interesting members of the Morgan family. He was a poet and noted eccentric with links to The royal family, Aldous Huxley, Lord Alfred Douglas, Aleister Crowley, Augustus John, Nancy Cunard and HG Wells amongst many others. The Duke of Bedford described the Morgans as "the oddest family I have ever met"; his mother is rumored to have built bird nests big enough to sit in! Ruperra was his childhood home and he held wild weekend parties there in later years. Evan's weekend garden parties were quite notorious in their day, and entertainments included Evan's menagerie of exotic pets, including lots of birds that seemed to do his bidding, a honey bear called Alice, Somerset the boxing kangaroo and a talking parrot called Blue Boy.

A friend of Aleister Crowley, Evan Morgan was actually a practitioner of occultism. They seem to have been friends for many years, as Crowley once inscribed a book to Evan, calling him 'old friend and adept of adepts' and proclaiming his right to bear Excalibur (with Crowley seeing himself as the rightful heir to Merlin.)

In his younger days, the then Hon. Evan Morgan was involved in a private occult society in London called the 'Black Hand'. It had 13 members only and Evan was known as the 'Black Monk'.

Evan Morgan was the last member of the Morgan family to live at Tredegar House. In 1941 the Castle was destroyed by fire when British troops were billeted there. After the War the estate was sold as a farm. The castle has stood a ‘romantic ruin’ overgrown with vegetation and deteriorating for over 50 years.





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Thanks for looking

[joybee]

Sweet Like the abc room.

[MJS]

Very nice

[boxerheaven]

fantastic

[TCCI]

Astonishing looking place this if only walls could talk. thanks for sharing

[astro23]

Astonishing looking place this if only walls could talk. thanks for sharing

Indeed! The things that must of went on inside that place!

[BA]

Nice

[astro23]

Here is an interesting pic from Dec 07, when I first went to the site. Unfortunately its the only picture I took of the inside, I think the residents moved out in 2003/04 ish and the whole house still seemed lived in when I vistied, hence the lack of photos. Anyway hope you find it interesting!

[Nicola]

Love that!

[SilentHill]

Thanks for posting this mate. I've been wanting to visit here for some time now. Love it