FANCY A FLATT
It stands a on a site said to have had connections with the ancient Druids whose worship at a stone circle is alleged to have given rise to the name of Corkickle. Bought by the Lowthers in 1675 for £1000, sold again by them in the 1920's and acquired in the 1990's for a rumoured and mysterious £1,000,000 it's been quite a building. It still is but could have been much better! What an opportunity Whitehaven missed when it was allowed to escape into the hands of developers. Dreams , shared by many locals, of it becoming a most reputable museum cum heritage centre cum conference centre cum community centre etc, etc , etc, died in proportion to the decay of the structure and even when it was finally sold there was hope that a part of it would be preserved for something other than accommodation. At least it did not fall down is what most people say now. There's some consolation in that I suppose. Yes , I'm talking about the castle, our castle,Whitehaven Castle.
The first pictorial glimpse of it appears in the S.E. prospect of Whitehaven dated 1642 at which time it was the home of the Fletchers, referred to as the Flatt and can be seen protruding into the picture on the bottom left.
The Lowthers had acquired the Whitehaven estates by that time and ,in the person of Christopher Lowther , were living in a building called the Old Hall which stood roughly where the former Queens cinema stood and Argos stands today.
At a later date Christopher built his first mansion on the harbour side at the foot of Mount Pleasant where the water treatment plant is situated today. In a postcard reproduction of Van Wycke's painting of the harbour dated c. 1686 both the mansion and the Flatt can be seen , the former on the right of the picture and the latter in the centre background.
This detail below ,of the very same section of the harbour,from Parr's work dated early 18th century, makes the buildings clearer. Is this where Sir Christopher lived and Sir John was born? I believe so!
Sir Christopher lived here until his death in 1644 by which time his wife had given him a son John, an infant at the time. His estates were governed by three trustees until he came of age, and in 1675 he purchased the Flatt from the Fletcher family spending a considerable amount of time and money altering it, before he moved in a few years later . It was Sir John who ordered the construction of a "Great Wall " stretching from where the YMCA now stands ,along the line of Irish and Scotch Streets to the site of the old Town Hall on Duke Street, and it was not until his son took over that this wall was breached and the private estate began to shrink. Nevertheless it was still immense and private as can be seen from this next image
The gardens opposite the Flatt is where our new fast food outlet stands today and the track in front of the house was then the only route out of town southwards. On Sir John's death the estates passed to his younger son James who did not lavish the same attention on the Whitehaven family home. Thereafter it passed through more hands until in the 1760's Sir William..(Wicked Jimmy)Lowther of Swillington had it rebuilt in its present form and it became known as Whitehaven Castle.
By the end of the 19th century this time the wall was much nearer the actual castle and the estate had passed into the hands of the famous "Yellow Earl " the fifth Earl of Lonsdale, and this postcard shows what it looked like until the mid 1920's.
At that time Whitehaven's medical needs were catered for in the Howgill Street Infirmary.
However, the demands upon this institution had become so great that either an extension ,or the purchase of other buildings was essential. Then , out of the blue an anonymous donor purchased the castle and presented it to the town to become it's new hospital. It later became known that the philanthropist was Mr Herbert Wilson Walker, a prominent local business man, already very involved in local matters.
COMING SHORTLY......ROYAL CONNECTIONS.