Scolland’s Hall
Adjoining the great chamber, standing against the south curtain wall, is the 11th-century block known as Scolland’s Hall. This is one of the most important surviving examples of early medieval domestic architecture in England. It has been called Scolland’s Hall since at least 1400, after a long-serving steward of the castle.
The hall block was probably built in the 1080s. It is a two-storey structure with its main apartments on the first floor above an undercroft, typical of early Norman and Anglo-Norman domestic architecture. The undercroft, lit with rectangular windows on the south side, was probably used for storage.
The great hall on the upper floor was the main domestic interior of the castle, occupying almost the entire length of the block. Large windows lined both sides. At the east end, separated from the hall by a stone wall, was a small withdrawing chamber, or solar. Count Alan or his deputy could have retired from the hall to this room to relax or sleep. There is also evidence for a balcony outside the east wall, overlooking the castle garden.
In the 12th century a new range was built to the west, abutting the hall. Three doors were punched through the west wall, giving access to a kitchen, buttery and pantry. A wooden screen may have concealed them from the rest of the hall. In about 1300 the building was further altered, perhaps as the result of a fire. The north window at the east end was turned into a door, giving access to the newly built chapel and chamber range to the north.
[English Heritage]
In Richmond Casle
Richmond Castle sits high on a cliff overlooking the River Swale in North Yorkshire, England. It was most likely built following the Battle of Hastings in 1066 by Alan Rufus, Alan the Red, of Penthièvre in the 1070s. The lands were granted to him by King William for his service and to maintain control in Northern England. Alan was awarded a vast amount of land, more than 400 manors in eleven different shires. His Yorkshire estates included Swaledale, and it was here that he built Richmond Castle as his principal residence. The land and property granted to Alan became known as the Honour of Richmond.
Alan constructed long stretches of the curtain wall, Scolland's Hall, and the archway of the keep, or Great Tower, in the 1080s, which survive today as England's most remarkable 11th century architecture of this size. After Alan died in 1093, the castle passed to his two younger brothers, Alan the Black and Stephen. Stephen's son, also Alan, held the castle by 1136.
Alan's son Conan inherited the Dukedom of Brittany in 1164 and held Richmond Castle from 1146 to 1171. It was at this time that the keep was expanded and later completed under King Henry II, who controlled the castle after 1171 as guardian of Conan's nine-year-old daughter Constance. In addition to completing the keep, towers, walls, and the gateway of the cockpit were built. A barbican with a drawbridge was also built in front of the keep.
The castle remained the crown's property through the end of King John's reign in 1216. Simon de Montfort rebelled against King Henry III during the Civil Wars of the 1260s. He ordered his supporters to lay siege to Richmond Castle in 1265, but there are no records that indicate this siege ever occurred.
Henry III and Edward I oversaw more growth at Richmond Castle, likely inserting the vault in the basement of the keep, upgrading Scolland's Hall, and extending the range along the east wall. Edward or one of the 14th century dukes also added apartments to the Robin Hood Tower and Gold Hole Tower and constructed the Southwest Tower. Duke John of Brittany would oversee the last building campaign at the castle when new chambers and the chapel were added to the north end of Scolland's Hall.
In 1313, the duke's second son, John of Brittany and Earl of Richmond, received money to construct a town wall as the area was subject to a Scottish raid after the English were defeated at Bannockburn in 1314. The town was raided, but the castle was spared. Richmond Castle was attacked in 1340 when a band of locals besieged the castle and injured some of the duke's servants.
By this time, the castle was in decline, and at the inquest into the duke's death in 1341, it was noted that the castle was in ruins and the buildings within required significant repair. The castle continued to lapse into a ruined state. In 1525, Henry VIII made his son, Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Richmond, but the castle was no longer of any military value. A survey in 1538 indicates roofless buildings and fallen walls at the castle.
Richmond Castle would remain a ruin for 300 years until the 3rd Duke began repairing the keep in the 1760s. In 1854, the Duke of Richmond leased the castle, and it became the headquarters of the North York Militia. The Barrack block was added against the west curtain wall the following year, and the keep became a military depot. A detention block of eight cells was also added just inside the castle entrance.
In 1907, the castle became the headquarters of the Northumbrian Division of the Territorial Army and was continuously used through World War I. During World War I, the castle was occupied by the Northern Non-Combatant Corps, a unit of men who had asked for exemption from military service but could contribute to the war effort in non-combatant roles. In 1916, some of these men refused to take part in any work involving the war effort and were then held in cells at Richmond Castle. Some of these conscientious objectors, who became known as the Richmond Sixteen, were sent to France in May 1916, where they were court-martialed and put on trial for refusing to obey orders and sentenced to be executed by firing squad. This sentence was immediately commuted to ten years of penal servitude. They were released in April 1919 following the Armistice of 11 November 1918. After the war, the Victorian Barrack block was demolished in 1931.
Richmond Castle was pressed into service again during World War II when the roof of the keep was used to watch for enemy aircraft activity in the area, and the keep itself was used as an air raid shelter. In the 1940s, the cells again detained prisoners, although these were foreign soldiers and not conscientious objectors.
Richmond Castle has been in the care of English Heritage since 1984.
[Great-Castles.com]
Taken in Richmond
Founded in 1071, Richmond is a town that grew out of the protected market beside the keep; in later centuries the town benefited from first the wool and then lead mining industries.