Agecroft Hall, Virginia

Richmond businessman Thomas C. Williams was part of Virginia's upper-class society. A set that promoted antiquarianism and Anglophile attitudes.[1] Williams was planning on building an English manor-style house on the James river and so he travelled to England, in search of items and inspiration for his new home.[2] Whilst Williams initially travelled for inspiration, he ended up purchasing an entire fifteenth-century medieval manor house in Pendlebury, Greater Manchester, called Agecroft Hall.[3] The Agecroft Hall that Williams purchased can be dated to around the end of the reign of Henry VII, or the beginning of that of Henry VIII, although parts of the south and west wings appear to have been built about a century later. The home once consisted of twenty rooms including a great hall, parlour, dining parlour, several bed chambers and a private chapel. [4] However, the home went through many changes and renovations throughout its years, including a fire in 1894, which destroyed two wings of the house.[5]

Agecroft Hall was the ancestral home of the Knightly family of Langley and then passed to the Dauntesey family, who inherited it through the marriage of William Dauntesey to Anne Langley in 1561.[6] The house then stayed in the Dauntesey family until Evelyn Dauntesey inherited the house in 1911 after her brother Herbert was killed in the Boer War. Evelyn and her husband already owned Lovell's Court in Dorset and so Agecroft was surplus to requirement.[7] By the early part of the twentieth century, like many second homes, Agecroft had fallen into disrepair.[8] The house was stripped and sold off at auction in 1925, where it was purchased by Williams. 

"The sale of Agecroft to be re-erected in the United States was only the most extreme example of an important but little appreciated phenomenon: the fact that although country houses themselves had little value as houses, they might be worth more if dismantled and sold as individual parts".[9] 

Williams carefully dismantled the house piece by piece, taking the sandstone foundation, timbers, window casements, leaded glass and roof. All of which was shipped to America and reconstructed into a house that reflected the architecture and interiors of the British Tudor period.[10] Architect Henry Grant Morse assisted Williams with his project, as did landscape architect Charles R. Gillette who designed the surrounding Elizabethan style gardens.[11]

At the time of the sale, Winston Churchill was chancellor of the exchequer and took part in a debate in parliament regarding the transportation of Agecroft to America. However, despite some local opposition, the sale was allowed to progress and Agecroft was sold and shipped to America.[12] The project cost Williams $250,000 dollars and took two years to complete. Williams died in 1929, stipulating in his will that the house was to become a museum.[13] Agecroft Hall was opened to the public in 1969, and is today is managed by the Agecroft Association.[14] The house is shown to the public as "an authentic fifteenth-century English manor house" and interprets English manor-house life during the 16th and 17th centuries.[15] On display are English and Continental furnishings from approximately the late 15th to the late 17th centuries.[16] In addition, Agecroft Hall is the home of the annual Richmond Shakespeare Festival, where the Richmond Shakespeare society performs shows on the grounds of the English manor house.[17] In addition, every year on April 23rd, they celebrate Shakespeare's Birthday.[18] 

Agecroft Hall is a fabulous display of English manorial life and an example of the antiquarianism and Anglophile attitudes that permeated Virginia's upper classes in the 1920s.[19] 

Thanks for reading.

Footnotes. 

[1] Calder Loth, ed., The Virginia Landmarks Register (USA: The University of Virginia Press, 1999), p. 419.

[2] Heather Lynn Skilton, 'A tale of two houses, transported: Virginia House and Agecroft Hall' (Master's thesis, University of Richmond, 1997), p. 13.

[3] Historic England, Agecroft Hall, Pendlebury, Greater Manchester. Available online:

<https://historicengland.org.uk/services-skills/education/educational-images/agecroft-hall-pendlebury-10148> Accessed 8 February 2020]

[4] Robert Mottley, 'Timeless Agecroft Hall' Colonial Homes, 25:5, Oct. 1999, p. 104.

[5] British History Online, Townships: Pendlebury, pp. 397–404. Available online: <https://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/lancs/vol4/pp397-404> [accessed 5 August 2020]; Robert Mottley, "Timeless Agecroft Hall." Colonial Homes, vol. 25, no. 5, Oct. 1999, p. 104.

[6] Edward Baines, The History of the County Palatine and Duchy of Lancaster, Volume 1 (London: George Routledge and Sons, 1898), p. 599.

[7] Giles Worsley, England's Lost Houses, p. 43; Chetham's Library, Deeds and Family Papers, Agecroft Collection. Available online: <https://library.chethams.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2016/09/chethams_library_agecroft_collection.pdf> [accessed 12 May 2020]

[8] Historic England, Agecroft Hall, Pendlebury, Greater Manchester. Available online:

<https://historicengland.org.uk/services-skills/education/educational-images/agecroft-hall-pendlebury-10148> [Accessed 8 February 2020]

[9] Giles Worsley, England's Lost Houses, p. 13.

[10] Robert Mottley, 'Timeless Agecroft Hall', Colonial Homes, vol. 25, no. 5, Oct. 1999, p. 104.

[11] Calder Loth, ed., The Virginia Landmarks Register (USA: The University of Virginia Press, 1999), p. 419.

[12] Susan Harb, 'In Richmond, There Will Always Be an England', The New York Times, 2004. Available online: <https://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/07/travel/in-richmond-there-will-always-be-an-england.html> [accessed 10 February 2020]

[13] Robert Mottley, 'Timeless Agecroft Hall', p. 104.

[14] Robert Mottley, 'Timeless Agecroft Hall', p. 104; Calder Loth, ed., The Virginia Landmarks Register (USA: The University of Virginia Press, 1999), p. 419.

[15] Clive Aslet, The American Country House (New Haven & London: Yale University Press, 2004), p.81.

[16] Robert Mottley, 'Timeless Agecroft Hall', p. 104.

[17] Agecroft Hall, Shakespeare Festival. Available online: <https://www.agecrofthall.org/richmond-shakespeare-festival> [accessed 19 August 2020]

[18] Agecroft Hall, Shakespeare's Birthday April 23rd Available online: <https://www.agecrofthall.org/shakespeare-s-birthday> [accessed 19 August 2020]

[19] Calder Loth, ed., The Virginia Landmarks Register (USA: The University of Virginia Press, 1999), p, 419.