Samlesbury Hall

Samlesbury Hall is a manor house built in 1325, located in the village of Samlesbury in Lancashire, 10 km east of Preston. It has been many things since then including a public house and girls' boarding school, but since 1925, when it was saved from being demolished for its timber, it has been administered by a registered charitable trust, the Samlesbury Hall Trust.

Samlesbury Hall is open to the public daily except on Saturdays. This Grade I listed medieval manor house attracts over 50,000 visitors each year.

Samlesbury Hall may have been built to replace an earlier building destroyed during a raid by the Scots, during The Great Raid of 1322. The hall has been many things in its past including a public house and a girls' boarding school, but since 1925, when it was saved from being demolished for its timber, it has been administered by a registered charitable trust, the Samlesbury Hall Trust. This Grade I listed medieval manor house attracts more than 50,000 visitors each year.



History
Before being owned by the Southworths, Samlesbury manor belonged to the d'Ewyas family.

Gilbert de Southworth of Warrington acquired half of the manor by marriage to Alice d'Ewyas and is credited with building the Great Hall around 1325. His great-grandson Thomas Southworth (c1497-1546) built the south-west wing. Southworth descendants held their part of the manor until 1677–78, when it was sold by Edward Southworth to Thomas Bradyll. Bradyll never lived at the hall but stripped much of its interior features to use at his main house of Conishead Priory at Ulverston. He then rented the hall out to handloom weavers before it was converted into the Bradyll Arms inn in 1830. The next owner was John Cooper, who bought the building in 1850 and leased it as a boarding school for girls being taught according to the Montessori system.

Joseph Harrison, of Galligreaves Hall, a prominent Blackburn industrialist, substantially renovated the Hall after he bought it in November 1862.[3] William Harrison, Joseph’s eldest son, lived at the Hall until 1789 when he sadly committed suicide. A fall on the ice in January of that year caused traumatic injuries to William’s brain and a leg, resulting in extreme depression and the resulting tragedy.[4] His father, Joseph Harrison, died the next year at Galligreaves Hall, 18 February 1880, ‘after a prolonged illness’.[5] Ownership of the Hall then passed to Joseph’s youngest son, Henry, who resided in Blackburn. He was mayor of Blackburn in 1880-1881[6] and became an Honorary Freeman of the Borough.

Although still owned by the Harrisons, the Hall was tenanted for a number of years by Frederick Baynes and his family.[7] Baynes was also a mayor of Blackburn, serving from 1896-1897.[8] When Henry Harrison died in 1914, the estate of Samlesbury Hall was entailed to his nephew Mr. M.J.C. Johnston, son of Henry’s sister Agnes.[9]

However, the Hall had been left empty since 1909 until it was bought in 1924 by a building firm who intended to demolish it and build a housing estate. After money was raised by public subscription, the hall was purchased in 1925 and put in the hands of the Samlesbury Hall Trust, who have managed it since then.[10]