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NOTTINGHAM PAST & PRESENT: NOTED BUILDINGS
No. 19 CASTLE GATE, 1921
This is surely one of the most beautiful structures that we have in Nottingham. When the first Duke of Newcastle built his great palace on the site of the old Castle fortress in the year 1679, he attracted a great number of the gentlefolk from the surrounding districts, who built mansions for themselves in the town where they spent a portion of each year, making a society season amongst themselves. Many of these houses are still left around St. James' Street, Castle Gate and the Pavements, although now they are nearly all used for commercial purposes. No. 19 Castle Gate is one of them; it is an eighteenth century building and was probably being erected about the time that Mr. Wesley paid his visit to Nottingham in 1753; it was the town house of the great family of Howe, of Langar, the most celebrated member ot which was Richard, Earl Howe, who on the first of June, 1794 gained the famous victory, called 'The Glorious First of June', over the French Fleet off Ushant. During the Revolution, Lord Howe represented Nottingham in Parliament.
Both the inside and the outside of this house are extremely beautiful, and the decoration is very much influenced by the brothers Adam, the great architects who revolutionised house building in the middle of the 18th century. Perhaps the doorway is the most striking feature, and its beautiful enrichments which include the ox skull and swags of flowers, reminiscent of the decorations of pagan altars, together with the lovely Venetian window over it, form one of the most striking architectural compositions imaginable.