Bylaugh Hall, near Dereham, stood for 50 years as an imposing collapsing roofless ruin, overgrown, unloved and forgotten by all except those who stumbled across it by chance.

Now it is back to its former glory. What a story it has to tell and not just about bricks and mortar.

A new book called Bylaugh Hall, Norfolk:  The Rise, the Fall and the Rise Again of the Stately Home that Nobody Wanted also illustrates the life and times for the landed gentry across the county in days gone by.

Investigating the complex history of the hall and estate takes time but what is just what Norwich bookseller, historian and author David Clarke had during the days of lockdown.

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And what a tale he discovered about this grand mansion and vast estate, and how it has survived and flourished against all the odds.

It is the kind of story which today would make a film or a TV series in the 21st century.

The 600-acre estate in the heart of the county was won in a game of cards.

The owner wanted a grand house but died before a brick was laid…the highs and lows of what happened over the years make for a fascinating read.

David, the founder and proprietor of the City Bookshop in Norwich, says the book is neither an architectural history of one of Norfolk’s finest stately homes not a genealogical record of the family who created it but a chronological record of “who and when” and a basis for further research by others.

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“Apart from examining papers held by the Norfolk Record Office (NRO), and obtaining background information online, the content of this book has been extracted from printed and manuscript works within my own library,” he explains.

The hall was built on a site to comply with instructions laid down in the will of Sir John Lombe who died in 1817. The family fortune came from the silk trade and a factory in Derby.

Here are a few highlights of what followed over the years.

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*The inheritor (s), apparently related by an illicit affair, fought for decades to overturn this provision in the Court of Chancery and when forced to comply left the new hall empty.

*Following the end of this line the estate returned to the natural heirs who lived there in the late 19th century in some style until they let it to a rich  “Australian” who owned all the oil beneath Iraq.

*On his death, what was now the 4th biggest estate in Norfolk was sold in 1917 to a speculator who “passed the estate on” within two weeks for a profit, in today’s money of £400,000.

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*The purchasers then held an auction of the estate with the hall remaining unsold.

*In the early 1920s the hall was purchased by the anglophile Marsh family (whose office block is today being demolished on Queens Road, Norwich. Family members lived there until the outbreak of the Second World War when the WRENS and then the RAF took over.

*Following the end of the war it was purchased by a local farmer who sold the roof and all the internal fittings by auction.

*It remained as a roofless ruin for the next 50 years until a local family purchased and attempted a restoration leading up to bankruptcy.

*Finally, in 2016, the partially restored ruin was purchased for a seven figure sum in a contract race by the present title holders, publishers of the Lady Magazine, who have successfully completed the restoration and taken up residence.

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We have much to thank Ben and Helen Budworth who have devoted their lives to restoring beautiful Bylaugh where various events now take place.

Not forgetting David for his splendid book.

*Bylaugh Hall, Norfolk: The Rise, the Fall and the Rise Again of the Stately Home that Nobody Wanted by David Clarke is on sale both in-store or on line  at City Bookshop, Norwich,  and at Jarrolds in Cromer. It costs £14.95.