Rosalie Chichester was the only daughter of the flamboyant Sir Bruce Chichester of Arlington , ten miles north of Barnstaple. The Chichesters can be traced back to the Norman Conquest, and have owned property and land all over North Devon, but the largest estate is Arlington Court, a Georgian country house, built in the neoclassical style, by local architect Thomas Lee in 1822. In the mid-nineteenth century, the grounds covered 5,300 acres, but this is now somewhat reduced to 3,500 acres.
Rosalie was born at Arlington. She was fortunate enough to travel extensively all over the world on two separate trips before she was out of her teens. Her father was a keen yachtsman, owning two yachts, the ‘Zoe’ and the ‘Erminia’, and used the latter to sail down with his family into the Meditteranean, where amongst other places, they visited Sintra (in Portugal),Malaga, Malta and Naples. Whilst in Naples, her father was taken ill and had to return to England to recuperate. She had to spend the next 48 days in Naples before her father returned.
On another occasion, she, with a female companion, Miss Chrissie Peters , literally travelled around the world, visiting Canada, New Zealand, Australia and South Africa. In those days it was almost unheard of for two unaccompanied young females to go globe-trotting in this way.
She made extensive sketches of her travels, and her sketchbooks are still extant. She was an animal-lover, and many of the animals on the estate today, including the ponies and sheep, are descendants of the stock that she introduced. She also kept caged birds, including canaries, budgerigars and parrots. She abhorred fox-hunting, and banned it from her estate, much to the chagrin of the local huntsmen. The ban was not always observed, and on several occasions, to their further annoyance, she took people to court for trespassing on her land.
Her travels probably started her mania for collecting. Amongst other things, she collected costumes, model yachts and boats, British and foreign shells, pewter, snuff boxes, tea caddies, paperweights, examples of scrimshaw (pieces of ornately decorated whalebone), and fossils.
Her favourite piece was a red amber elephant from China. After her death, when the National Trust came to do an inventory, they found an original William Blake painting gathering dust on the top of a cupboard.
She spent much time managing the estate, but she was also an avid painter, photographer and gardener.
She never married, and two years before her death, willed the house and its grounds to the National Trust, which has run it since 1949.
Since 1966, Arlington Court has housed the National Carriage Collection, and is also well known as a bat sanctuary.
Of course, her early adventures may have inspired her better-known nephew, Sir Francis Chichester, the famous aviator and yachtsman, but Rosalie deserves to be remembered in her own right for keeping her estate in good condition for posterity to enjoy.
Her ashes are buried beneath an urn near a lake in the grounds, but her real monument is the house and grounds itself.
Chris Trigger
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