Stradling family: 1300–1738 According to tradition, the site of St Donat's was the place to which
Caradog, the Celtic chieftain, returned after being released from imprisonment in Rome by the emperor
Claudius. After the
Norman invasion of Wales in the mid-11th century, a timber castle was constructed on the site. A number achieved more than local fame. The third Sir Edward Stradling, in a run of nine Edwards, fought at the
Battle of Agincourt, married a great-granddaughter of
Edward III and established himself as a powerful landowner and courtier. One of Edward's sons, Henry, was seized by pirates in the
Bristol Channel while travelling from his Somerset estates to St Donat's, and was released only on payment of a large ransom. This event has subsequently been much embellished by, among others,
Taliesin Williams in his account
The Doom of Colyn Dolphyn: A Poem, with Notes Illustrative of Various Traditions of Glamorganshire, which involves the eponymous
Breton pirate and the witch
Mallt-y-Nos. Henry Stradling's nautical misadventures continued; after acceding to the baronetcy, he died of a fever at
Famagusta, returning from a pilgrimage to the
Holy Land.The Stradlings remained adherents of the Catholic faith following the
Reformation and experienced persecution as a consequence. Sir
Thomas Stradling (1495–1571) was imprisoned in the
Tower of London in 1561, following accusations of his having used the appearance of a "miraculous" cross in the trunk of an ash tree on the St Donat's estate to encourage support for the Catholic cause. His son, the scholar
Edward Stradling (1528/9–1609) established a celebrated, and exceptionally large, library at St Donat's, which was considered the finest in Wales of its time. The historian Graham Thomas records the Stradling tradition of educating their sons abroad, which led to the library holding extensive collections of foreign-language texts, particularly Italian works. Edward Stradling wrote a history of the area, ''The Winning of the Lordship of Glamorgan out of Welshmen's Hands'', which established the legend of the
Twelve Knights of Glamorgan, including the inaccurate claim that the first Stradlings had arrived with
William the Conqueror, rather than some 200 years later. He was also the patron of
Siôn Dafydd Rhys and funded the production and publication of the latter's
Cambrobrytannicae Cymraecaeve Linguae Institutiones et Rudimenta, the first
Welsh language grammar to be published in Latin and thus widely accessible. During the
English Civil War the Stradlings, prominent
Royalists, supported
Charles I and hosted the archbishop
James Ussher, when he had to flee Cardiff. Three Stradlings fought at the
Battle of St Fagans in 1648 and two were forced into exile after the King's execution. After the Civil War, the family declined in importance and ceased to occupy any significant position in the country and, ultimately, within Glamorgan. They retained ownership of St Donat's Castle until the death of Sir Thomas Stradling in a duel in France in 1738. The exact circumstances of his death are uncertain; he was travelling with his university friend Sir John Tyrwhitt, with whom he had reputedly made a pact, each promising the other his inheritance in the event of his death. Sources dispute whether the duel was actually between Stradling and Tyrwhitt, or was contrived by Tyrwhitt. In either event, Stradling was killed and Tyrwhitt inherited his estates.
Decline and recovery: 1739–1925 Under the Tyrwhitts, the castle entered a long decline that lasted over one hundred years.
J. M. W. Turner sketched the partly-ruinous castle in 1798.
John Wesley is reputed to have preached to a crowd of five thousand people on the terraced lawns in 1777. Partial restoration was started by Dr
John Whitlock Nicholl Carne, who claimed to be descended from the Stradlings, and bought the castle from the Tyrwhitt-Drake family in 1862. Carne's reconstructions have not generally been well-regarded; the historian of the castle Alan Hall described the work as being undertaken in an "unscholarly, inauthentic style". A more sympathetic, contemporaneous, account described Carne's efforts as "careful and scrupulous". Morgan Williams, a colliery owner from
Aberpergwm and the owner in the
Edwardian period, from 1901 to 1909, carried out extensive and careful restoration, employing the noted architects
George Frederick Bodley and
Thomas Garner. Williams's sensitive reconstructions were praised by
Henry Avray Tipping, the writer, architect and garden designer. The architectural writer Michael Hall was also impressed, describing Bodley's drawing room as "Edwardian antiquarian taste at its most refined". The process of reconstruction was less harmonious, Williams and Garner rowed constantly and Garner ultimately resigned. Almost all of Bodley and Garner's work was eradicated in the "brutal" remodelling undertaken by William Randolph Hearst. Williams also assembled a collection of arms and armour which was housed at the castle, and made major improvements to the castle's setting, moving the village which previously stood close to the castle's walls to a new location outside of the gates and constructing three entrance lodges. In 1903, the novelist Violet Paget, writing under her pseudonym
Vernon Lee, used the castle as the model for St Salvat's Castle in her
Gothic novel Penelope Brandling: A Tale of the Welsh Coast in the Eighteenth Century. Godfrey Williams, Morgan's son, disliked St Donat's, by tradition on account of its being haunted although this is disputed, and in 1921, having first culled the herd of deer that his father had reintroduced to the park, put the castle up for sale. Its advertisement in
The Times, dated 3 May 1921, described the castle as "a comfortable and liveable old-world home of the first importance". In 1922, it was bought, along with of land, by Richard Pennoyer, an American diplomat married to the
Dowager Countess of Shrewsbury. Pennoyer was to own St Donat's for less than three years.
William Randolph Hearst: 1925–1960 (centre) with
Alice Head and
Federico Beltrán Masses at St Donat's Castle in 1928
William Randolph Hearst inherited a mining and real estate fortune from his mother, and made a fortune of his own through the establishment of the
Hearst Corporation, the largest newspaper and magazine company in the world. Part of the revenues were spent on the building of
San Simeon, his Spanish-style castle in California, which began construction in 1919. By 1925 he was eager to purchase a genuine castle, and on 13 August he sent a wire to
Alice Head, the London-based managing director of his European operations, "Want buy castle in England . St Donat's perhaps satisfactory at proper price. See if you can get right price on St Donat's or any other equally good." Within two months it was Hearst's, or specifically, the property of the
National Magazine Company. The price paid for the castle and of surrounding land was $130,000. Hearst employed
Sir Charles Allom as his architect and designer. Allom was a noted decorator, the founder of White Allom and Company, and had been knighted in 1913 for his redecoration of
Buckingham Palace. Hearst attracted strong opinions.
Theodore Roosevelt called him "an unspeakable blackguard (with) all the worst faults of the corrupt and dissolute monied man".
Winston Churchill, who stayed as Hearst's guest at St Donat's and at San Simeon, described him in a letter to
Clementine Churchill as "a grave simple child – with no doubt a nasty temper – playing with the most costly toys ... two magnificent establishments, two charming wives, complete indifference to public opinion, oriental hospitalities". Churchill's mention of "two charming wives" refers to
Marion Davies, Hearst's long-time mistress and a constant presence at both San Simeon and St Donat's.
P. G. Wodehouse, invited to San Simeon, recalled Hearst's way of dealing with over-staying guests: "The longer you are there, the further you get from the middle [of the refectory dining table]. I sat on Marion's right the first night, then found myself being edged further and further away till I got to the extreme end, when I thought it time to leave. Another day, and I should have been feeding on the floor.", portions of which were purchased by Hearst and incorporated into St Donat's CastleHearst undertook a "rapid and ruthless" redevelopment and rebuilding programme at St Donat’s. He spent around £250,000 on repairs, reconstruction, refurbishment, and furnishings between 1925 and 1937, renovating the castle with architectural trophies from across the United Kingdom and abroad; at the peak of his buying, Hearst's expenditure reportedly accounted for a quarter of the world's entire art market. Hearst's actions were vigorously opposed, particularly in relation to the destruction of the
Augustinian foundation
Bradenstoke Priory in Wiltshire. Built in 1142, by the 20th century the priory was in poor repair. Hearst purchased the site in 1929, under conditions of secrecy, and had workmen take down the
cloister,
tithe barn, prior's lodging and
refectory. Parts were shipped to California; major elements were incorporated into St Donat's as part of the newly created Bradenstoke Hall; while other pieces, including the tithe barn, were lost. The Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings ran a poster campaign on the
London Underground, using text that was considered libellous and which had to be pasted over. The campaign also saw questions on the issue being raised in
Parliament. Hearst was unconcerned, Miss Head responding to the SPAB secretary: "Mr Hearst and I are well aware of your views. You must please allow us to hold our own opinions." Hearst did not visit until September 1928, and even then spent only one night in residence. Having undertaken a night-time tour of the castle which was illuminated by kerosene lamps, he left the following morning to board the
Berengaria for New York. During the voyage home he wrote a 25-page memorandum with instructions for further improvements to the castle. Over the next decade his time at St Donat's amounted to some four months; between his purchase in 1925 and his death in 1951 he visited, normally for a month at the end of his summer European tours, in 1930, 1931, 1934 and, for the last time, in 1936. His infrequent visits were invariably undertaken with a large entourage, whom he sometimes took for drinks to the Old Swan Inn at the nearby village of
Llantwit Major. Among his guests were the actors
Charlie Chaplin,
Douglas Fairbanks,
Errol Flynn and
Clark Gable, in addition to politicians including Winston Churchill,
David Lloyd George and a young
John F. Kennedy, who visited with his parents,
Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. and
Rose Kennedy. Visiting writers included
Elinor Glyn,
Ivor Novello and
Bernard Shaw. Of St Donat's, Shaw was quoted as saying: "This is what God would have built if he had had the money." In the late 1930s Hearst's publishing empire came close to collapse. St Donat's was put up for sale in 1937, the Hearst Corporation noting that it had invested £280,000 in the castle through its subsidiary the National Magazine Company. An opinion on the chances of recouping this sum was sought from
James Milner, a prominent solicitor and
Deputy Speaker of the House of Commons. His response was not encouraging: "We have at St Donat's a
white elephant of the rarest species."
Billy Butlin, the holiday-camp entrepreneur, was uninterested and a development proposal by
Sir Julian Hodge did not progress. Much of the furniture, silver and works of art were disposed of in a series of sales conducted by
Christie's and
Sotheby's which began in 1937 and continued for some years, with many items failing to achieve the prices Hearst had originally spent. Hearst did not return after the war but continued to lend the castle to friends;
Bob Hope, the comedian, stayed in May 1951 during his visit for a golf tournament at
Porthcawl.
United World Colleges: 1960–present Hearst died in August 1951. The castle remained on the market for the following decade until bought in 1960 by Antonin Besse II, son of the late
Sir Antonin Besse, and donated to the founding council of
Atlantic College, the first of what would become the
United World Colleges. The idea for an international school arose from a meeting between the educationalist
Kurt Hahn, who founded
Schule Schloss Salem in Germany and
Gordonstoun in Scotland, and Air Marshal Sir Lawrence Darvall, the commandant of the
NATO Defense College. They conceived of a college for 16–19-year-old students drawn from a wide range of nationalities, with the aim of fostering international understanding. With Rear-Admiral
Desmond Hoare, who would become the first headmaster, they persuaded Besse that the castle would make a suitable location for the first United World College, which opened in 1962 with fifty-six students. The first
rigid-hulled inflatable boat was invented, developed, and patented by Hoare at St Donat's in the 1960s. In an act of generosity, Hoare sold the patent for the boat's design to the
Royal National Lifeboat Institution in 1973 for a notional £1; From 1963 until 2013 the castle's seafront facilities hosted an RNLI lifeboat station, which was staffed by students and faculty of the college, and was credited with saving ninety-eight lives along the South Wales coast during its period of operation. The college has hosted several royal visitors at the castle, including
Charles III, when
Prince of Wales, and
Princess Diana,
Queen Elizabeth II and
Prince Philip,
Lord Mountbatten, who was closely involved with the UWC movement,
Emperor Akihito and
Empress Michiko of Japan and
Queen Beatrix and
Prince Claus of the Netherlands. The fiftieth anniversary of the college in 2012 was celebrated with a visit from
Queen Noor of Jordan, the then President of the United World Colleges. Politicians such as the former prime minister of Canada
Lester B. Pearson and the former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
Alec Douglas-Home also visited St Donat's, as have several ambassadors. The college is home to approximately 350 students from more than 90 countries, who live in houses constructed on the castle grounds for the two years of their studies. With a history of occupation from its construction in the late 13th century, St Donat's has been described as the oldest continuously inhabited castle in Wales. ==Architecture and description==