Tixall Gatehouse

Tixall Gatehouse is a 16th-century gatehouse situated at Tixall, near Stafford, Staffordshire and is all that remains of Tixall Hall which was demolished in 1927. The gatehouse is a Grade I listed building. Tixall was used a prison for Mary, Queen of Scots for two weeks in 1586.

The manor of Tixall was held for many years by the Littleton family until 1507 when the Littleton heiress married Sir John Aston. The medieval manor house was replaced by Sir Edward Aston, High Sheriff of Staffordshire, in about 1555 and the Gatehouse was added in about 1580. The Gatehouse is a three-storey rectangular structure, the balustraded facade of which is decorated with three orders of twinned columns. There are four octagonal corner turrets topped with cupolas and weather vanes.

The Astons were later raised to the baronetage and to the peerage, with the title Lord Aston of Forfar.Walter Aston, 2nd Lord Aston of Forfar became a recusant Catholic. After his death it was said that he received Jesuits at Tixall, and in August and September 1677 held meetings at Tixall attended by William Howard, 1st Viscount Stafford and Aston's steward Stephen Dugdale where the assassination of Charles II was plotted. Amidst the Popish Plot allegations, one contemporary witness, William Skelton, described finding Dugdale and Stafford talking alone together in the Little Parlour and the Great Parlour (a dining-room next to Aston's chamber) at Tixall in September 1678. A letter from Stafford mentioning a plot was found in Aston's study.

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