Mitford Castle
| Mitford Castle | |
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Mitford Castle, 2005
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 Mitford Castle
 Mitford Castle shown within Northumberland |
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| OS grid reference | NZ170855 |
| Coordinates | 55°09′50″N 1°44′02″W / 55.164°N 1.734°WCoordinates: 55°09′50″N 1°44′02″W / 55.164°N 1.734°W |
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Mitford Castle is an English castle dating from the end of the 11th century and located at Mitford, Northumberland. It is a Scheduled Ancient Monument and a Grade I listed building, enlisted on 20 October 1969. The castle is also officially on the Buildings at Risk Register. The Norman motte and bailey castle stands on a small prominence, a somewhat elliptical mound, above the River Wansbeck. The selected building site allowed for it be to natural hill scarped and ditched, producing the motte.
Mitford Castle was the first of three seats for the main line of the Mitford family constructed on manor lands. Following the destruction of Mitford Castle, Mitford Old Manor House (nearby and to the northwest) was used from the 16th century until the construction of Mitford Hall in 1828. Mitford Hall stands in an 85-acre (340,000 m2) park to the west of the castle ruins.
Prior to the 1066 Norman conquest, the castle was held by Sir John de Mitford, whose only daughter and heiress, Sybilla Mitford, was given in marriage by William the Conqueror to the Norman knight, Richard Bertram. In the late 11th century, it was an earthwork fortress of the Bertram family, and of record as William Bertram's oppidum in 1138. In 1215, it was seized by John de Balliol, King of Scotland's troops. In 1264, the castle was held by the third Roger Bertram, but in that year, it was seized from him and committed to the custody of William de Valence, 1st Earl of Pembroke, King Henry's half-brother. It was held by Alexander de Balliol, the son of John de Balliol and the elder brother of King John, in 1275. During the rebellion in Northumberland set in the 1310s, Mitford Castle was seized from the Valence family by Sir Gilbert de Middleton. In 1315, Mitford Castle was used by Sir Gilbert for kidnappings and as a prisoner hold, when Ralph de Greystock seized de Middleton for treason.
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