Thank you to Dave who, following my recent blog posting about Kirkby Lonsdale, has sent me an interesting reply with information about Lunefield.

Lunefield was a magnificent stone-built turreted and crenellated mansion constructed in the 1860s, in Kirkby Lonsdale, for Alfred Harris, a banker from Bradford, who also built Spring Lodge on Manningham Lane, Bradford.

The house was designed by Alfred Waterhouse, the Gothic Revival architect who also designed, amongst many other things,  Manchester Town Hall and the Natural History Museum in London.  Lunefield was embellished with sumptuous state-of-the-art interiors and Willliam Morris and Company supplied stained glass windows designed by Edward Burne Jones depicting Lancelot and Elaine in 1882.

The estate was divided up and sold at the end of the nineteenth century and, following army requisition during WWII, fell into decline.  Eventually, Lunefield met the fate of many British stately homes during the 1950s: it was finally demolished in 1958.

The house was situated in a prominent position with views over the River Lune and Devil’s Bridge formed one of the boundaries of the large grounds of the estate.   There is a pair of one of the original entrance gateposts to Lunefield, near Devil’s Bridge, which survive as a reminder of this lost historic house.

Devil’s Bridge