End of chapter in castle history
A chapter in the long history of Cardigan Castle closed last week with the death of the castle’s last private owner, Miss Barbara Wood.
Miss Wood, aged 91, died at Brondesbury Lodge nursing home last Monday evening. Her funeral was held the Chapel of Rest in Cardigan on Saturday.
Barbara Woods
Miss Wood and her mother moved to Castle Green House in the 1940s. They struggled to maintain the listed Regency House and grounds which quickly fell into disrepair.
A proud, independent woman, Miss Wood continued to live in the house after her mother died and entered into many lively disputes with the local authorities about the declining state of the castle famously telling Cardigan Borough Council to “go fry themselves” after they discussed compulsorily purchasing the site.
In 1984 Castle Green House was declared unfit for human habitation. Miss Wood refused the offer of a bungalow in Cardigan but agreed to the provision of a small caravan in the grounds. She became a recluse-like figure, cloistered with her numerous cats behind the crumbling castle walls. Her failing health led to her being moved to Brondesbury in 1996.
The castle lay empty and neglected for five more years until the Tivy-Side’s Castle in Crisis campaign started the wheels moving to bring the castle into public ownership.
Miss Wood finally sold the castle to Ceredigion County Council in 2003 for £500,000. The castle recently got the green light for the first stage of a £4.8m Heritage Lottery Bid submitted by local building preservation trust Cadwgan.
“She is very much a part of the colourful history of Cardigan Castle,” said Cadwgan chairman Jann Tucker.
“Miss Wood was the last private owner of the castle and Cadwgan is committed to restoring her former home into an asset for Cardigan.”
Retired Catholic priest and castle historian Fr Seamus Cunnane knew Miss Wood for over 40 years.
“She had made her own mythology of the castle and her relationship with it and played that part always,” he said.
“I admired her stubborness, she was always very self possessed. She knew exactly who she was.”
During the royal visit to the castle in 2006, Fr Cunnane spent a few minutes chatting with the Duchess of Cornwall while Prince Charles toured inside the house.
“Camilla was more interested in Miss Wood than the history of the castle – she’d heard all about her!” he said.
Local historian Glen Johnson, who along with a group of friends formed the castle volunteers back in the 1980s, has fond memories of Miss Wood.
“She was a proud and independent lady, very much aware of her more prosperous past,” he said.
“Talking to her was like going back in time to the 1930s. We always treated her deferentially as the lady of the manor. She was a true eccentric in the kindest meaning of the word.”
