One camera … a castle … a bit of Dorset

The romantic in me would like to think that in the summer of 1643 Lady Mary Bankes might have stared out of this window down on the Parliamentarian forces who were besieging the castle.

Lady Mary's view, Corfe Castle, 1983

She was holding the fortification for the Royalist cause in the Civil War which had broken out the year before.

The castle, 1983

The siege was broken off in the August but two years later the army of Parliament returned and was successful in capturing the castle. *

My Wikipedia tells me that “Corfe Castle is a fortification standing above the village of the same name on the Isle of Purbeck peninsula in the English county of Dorset. 

Built by William the Conqueror, the castle dates to the 11th century and commands a gap in the Purbeck Hills on the route between Wareham and Swanage. 

The first phase was one of the earliest castles in England to be built at least partly using stone when the majority were built with earth and timber. Corfe Castle underwent major structural changes in the 12th and 13th centuries” **

It was sold on by Elizabeth 1st and was eventually bought by the Bankes family in 1635.

Not that I knew anything about it’s past when we happened in the place during a short summer holiday in Swanage which is just over 5 miles from Corfe.

Nor can I remember much of either the town or the holiday, suffice to say that the pictures I took over 40 years ago record long walks along the beach, the stunning cliffs and a few of Swanage.  

Swanage Town Hall, 1983

Of these there is an indifferent photo of the Town Hall, which Wikipedia says was “Constructed by the local building contractor George Burt in 1882–83, it reused materials salvaged from demolition works in London. 

The façade was rescued from London's 17th-century Mercers' Hall and the external clock is dated to 1826. It was not universally welcomed and one critic in the 1930s described it as ‘positively dreadful’. The hall serves as the chamber for the current town council and has previously hosted the magistrates' court, fire brigade and citizens' advice service”.***

Four decades on the streets near where we stayed haven’t changed that much, although one of them does look a little shabbier and has lost its street name.

But I rather think I located the holiday property and just wonder how different the interior looks from when we stayed there.

Back then the décor and furniture were fixed sometime in the 1960s and the place suffered from only being used a few times a year.

Marshall Row, 1983

And so there so there was a feel of quiet neglect compounded with a slight mustiness, made worse by the dust which caught the morning sunshine.

That said the beach, The Downs and the shops were just a few minutes away.

Revisiting the place forty-two years later I must confess that I can remember much else about the town, other than a curious conversation with a man in a pub, who offered us a drink back at his place.

In what seemed a more innocent time I was up for going but my companions were less sure and looking back I guess "stranger danger" was more appropriate. 

He may have been lonely or just friendly but the invitation was not taken up and we walked out into the night looking for a chippy and the offi.

And his collection of fossils and Purbeck stone were left to gain their own film of dust, along with stories and book on Corfe Castle.

The armchair, Park Road, 1983

Location; Corfe Castle and Swanage

Pictures; a castle and a town, 1983, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*Lady Mary Bankes and the fall of Corfe Castle, Poole Museum Society Blog, https://poolemuseumsociety.wordpress.com/2015/02/18/lady-mary-bankes-and-the-fall-of-corfe-castle/

**Corfe Castle, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corfe_Castle

***Swanage Town Hall, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swanage_Town_Hall