A little to the north of Nerquis Hall remains the ruinous curiosity that is TÅ· Castell. A folly, built in 1825 under the instruction of Elizabeth Giffard, owner of the Hall, to provide a picturesque view from her palatial home.
It was built to resemble a little gothic castle, complete with little turrets and blind arrow slits, at roughly the same time as her additions to the wings of the Hall. But while the folly remains, the gothic wings were demolished in the 1960s. The folly is actually not much more than a frontage, since there is little of depth to the structure, behind the impressive facade.
TÅ· Castell - the palatial cowshed.
While it may have been built to provide a scenic, if not quaint view from the Hall, it would seem to have at some point also become a cowshed. Perhaps caught in the Flintshire rain, the livestock casually claimed the faux castle for themselves, indifferent to the opulence of their surroundings.
Behind the folly are the remains of a railway embankment. In the 1850s, a few years after the death of Eliza Giffard, the owners of the nearby Nerquis Colliery built a private railway, to link their coal mines to the rail network at Coed Talon to the east. For many years then, the owners of Nerquis Hall would have witnessed the incongruous spectacle of steam trains harrumphing their way past the faux medieval little wonder of TÅ· Castell. What they made of this curious juxtaposition of ages is unknown. One imagines the cows remained unfussified.
Further Reading
G. Watkins, Welsh Follies, Secrets, Stories and Scandals, Gwasg Carreg Gwalch, Llanrwst, (2015)
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