Dundurn Castle
610 York Boulevard, Hamilton, Ontario
Completed in 1835, for Sir Allan Napier MacNab (1798-1862) 1st Bt., and his second wife, Mary Elizabeth Stuart (1812-1846). Covering 18,000-square feet, their 40-room home took three years to build at a cost of $175,000. The portico and embellishments were added in 1855 to celebrate the marriage of their younger daughter, Sophia, but the house itself was designed by Robert Charles Wetherell and was built on the foundations of an earlier brick house that had been commandeered by General Vincent as the British entrenched themselves here at "Burlington Heights" during the War of 1812. With its breathtaking, panoramic view over Burlington Bay when "Dundurn Park" was finished, it was perhaps the grandest mansion put up in Canada since Caldwell Manor....
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The original brick house belonged to the Indian-Trader Richard Beasley and stood at the centre of a 1,100-acre "park-like" estate planted with numerous fruit trees (apple, peach etc.) and outbuildings that included an ice house, smoke house, and wash house. John Solomon Cartwright bought the estate in 1832 for £2,500 and turned it over for a profit that same year to his partner, the ambitious young lawyer Allan Napier MacNab. He renamed the property "Dundurn" for his grandfather's small estate on Loch Earn in Perthshire and aside from the house, MacNab also built a romantic folly and dovecote.
Despite a successful career that saw the Chief of Clan MacNab become Joint Premier of the short-lived "Province of Canada," after his death in 1862 his complicated financial affairs left his sister-in-law/trustee of his estate, Sophia (Stuart) MacNab, with no choice other than to sell. But, in a move that would've impressed the canniest of financiers, she borrowed money from MacNab's son-in-law, the future 7th Earl of Albemarle, and bought the house back from herself, mortgaged it to settle MacNab's debts, and then left for Australia. The house sat empty for four years until 1867 when - in what a cynic may view as another canny financial move - she allowed it to be used as a home for Deaf-Mutes who were immediately put to work renovating and rejuvenating the tired old building. Once restored in 1872, she sold it to another Scotsman, Donald MacInnes (1824-1900).
MacInnes was a self-made merchant and manufacturer who became President of the Bank of Hamilton before being elected to the Senate. In 1863, he made an opportune marriage to Mary, the youngest daughter of Sir John Beverley Robinson, 1st Bt., Chief Justice of Upper Canada, and they were the parents of six children. During their time hime here, they hosted both Prime Minister Sir John A. Macdonald and the future King Edward VII whose mistress from 1898 to 1910 was Alice Keppel, the wife of Sir Allan MacNab's grandson, George Keppel, and great-grandmother of the Queen Consort, Camilla Parker-Bowles.
The MacInnes family lived here comfortably for 27-years and in 1887 the historian William Kingsford was touring old battlegrounds in Canada when he recalled a visit to Dundurn: "I had the good fortune to be accompanied by Senator MacInnes... I not only obtained the pleasure of his society, but I profited by his information. The enjoyment of his hospitality at Dundurn Park, the grounds of which include much of the old post of 'Burlington Heights,' must ever remain with me a most pleasurable recollection".
Having threatened to knock the house down and develop the site, only months before he died MacInnes sold Dundurn and its immediate six acres to the City of Hamilton for the reputed sum of $50,000. It has been open to the public ever since and in 1967 "Dundurn Castle" was fully restored to how it appeared in 1855. Queen Camilla is a great-x-3-granddaughter of Sir Allan Napier MacNab and the Royal Patron of Dundurn.
Despite a successful career that saw the Chief of Clan MacNab become Joint Premier of the short-lived "Province of Canada," after his death in 1862 his complicated financial affairs left his sister-in-law/trustee of his estate, Sophia (Stuart) MacNab, with no choice other than to sell. But, in a move that would've impressed the canniest of financiers, she borrowed money from MacNab's son-in-law, the future 7th Earl of Albemarle, and bought the house back from herself, mortgaged it to settle MacNab's debts, and then left for Australia. The house sat empty for four years until 1867 when - in what a cynic may view as another canny financial move - she allowed it to be used as a home for Deaf-Mutes who were immediately put to work renovating and rejuvenating the tired old building. Once restored in 1872, she sold it to another Scotsman, Donald MacInnes (1824-1900).
MacInnes was a self-made merchant and manufacturer who became President of the Bank of Hamilton before being elected to the Senate. In 1863, he made an opportune marriage to Mary, the youngest daughter of Sir John Beverley Robinson, 1st Bt., Chief Justice of Upper Canada, and they were the parents of six children. During their time hime here, they hosted both Prime Minister Sir John A. Macdonald and the future King Edward VII whose mistress from 1898 to 1910 was Alice Keppel, the wife of Sir Allan MacNab's grandson, George Keppel, and great-grandmother of the Queen Consort, Camilla Parker-Bowles.
The MacInnes family lived here comfortably for 27-years and in 1887 the historian William Kingsford was touring old battlegrounds in Canada when he recalled a visit to Dundurn: "I had the good fortune to be accompanied by Senator MacInnes... I not only obtained the pleasure of his society, but I profited by his information. The enjoyment of his hospitality at Dundurn Park, the grounds of which include much of the old post of 'Burlington Heights,' must ever remain with me a most pleasurable recollection".
Having threatened to knock the house down and develop the site, only months before he died MacInnes sold Dundurn and its immediate six acres to the City of Hamilton for the reputed sum of $50,000. It has been open to the public ever since and in 1967 "Dundurn Castle" was fully restored to how it appeared in 1855. Queen Camilla is a great-x-3-granddaughter of Sir Allan Napier MacNab and the Royal Patron of Dundurn.
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Contributed by Mark Meredith on 24/02/2022 and last updated on 25/01/2023.
Image Courtesy of Tom Flemming, P1090373, CC-BY-NC-2.0; The History of Canada: Canada Under British Rule (1887), by William Kingsford;
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