Allesley "Castle" - Secrets of Warwickshire's Lost Castles

Описание: Allesley Castle is one of Coventry’s strangest lost sites - a “castle” with no standing walls, no confirmed builder, and no definitive date. Hidden in the trees near to Allesley Park, all that survives is an earthwork: a mound, a ditch, and centuries of unanswered questions.

In this documentary, Chapters Through Time investigates the site from the ground up - using historic sources, landscape history, and modern mapping to explain what we can prove… and what remains speculation.

The four leading theories for what this site really was:
an Anarchy-era “adulterine” fortification (1140s)
a Second Barons’ War reuse or reinforcement (1260s / Henry de Hastings)
an early 14th-century Hastings fortified manor/fortalice
a moated manorial complex later misremembered as a castle

This isn’t a definitive origin story - because the evidence doesn’t allow one yet. But it is the clearest evidence-led case for what Allesley Castle may have been, and why its history is still contested.

If you enjoy local history, archaeology, and places hidden in plain sight - where the landscape tells a story the documents can’t fully confirm - this film is for you.

👍 If you enjoyed the documentary, please like, subscribe, and share to help more people discover Allesley’s past.

💬 Do you have your own memories of the mound, the park, or the “castle” stories? Or is there another Warwickshire site you want us to investigate next?

📍Filmed in and around Allesley Park / Allesley Village, Coventry
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Sources & research referenced:
Allesley Park Walled Garden website. (n.d.).
Cokayne, G. E. (1926). The complete peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom (2nd ed., Vol. 6: Gordon to Hurstpierpoint). The St. Catherine Press.
Cokayne, G. E. (1926). The complete peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom (2nd ed., Vol. 6: Gordon to Hurstpierpoint). The St. Catherine Press.
Coventry City Council. (n.d.). Coventry historic landscape characterisation report [PDF].
Coventry Evening Telegraph. (1962, April 3). Archaeologist pungent about Allesley site [Newspaper clipping]. Private collection.
Coventry Evening Telegraph. (n.d.). New light on story of Allesley Castle [Newspaper clipping]. Private collection.
Coventry Historic Environment Record. (n.d.). Allesley Castle, Beche Way, Allesley (HER No. MCT118).
Fernandes, M. J. (2000). The role of the Midlands knights in the period of reform and rebellion 1258–67 (Doctoral dissertation, King’s College London).
Historic Coventry Forum. (n.d.). Allesley [Forum posts].
Historic England. (n.d.). Allesley Castle – Coventry (Heritage at Risk register entry 42691).
Historic England. (n.d.). Motte castle 150m SSW of Allesley Hall (Scheduled Monument No. 1005907).
John, T. (Ed.). (1992). The Warwickshire Hundred Rolls of 1279–80: Stoneleigh and Kineton Hundreds (Records of Social and Economic History, New Series XIX). Oxford University Press for the British Academy.
Maddicott, J. R. (1994). Simon de Montfort. Cambridge University Press.
McGrory, D. (2003). A history of Coventry (2nd ed.). Phillimore.
National Library of Scotland. (n.d.). OS maps: Explore georeferenced maps.
Norgate, K. (1894). Montfort, Simon of (1208?–1265). In L. Stephen (Ed.), Dictionary of National Biography (Vol. 38). Macmillan.
Riddy, A. (2014, October 10). Mysterious Allesley… Facts & myths.
Salzman, L. F. (Ed.). (1951). Parishes: Allesley. In A history of the county of Warwick: Volume 6, Knightlow Hundred (pp. 3–8). Victoria County History.
Singlehurst, M. (2020, Month Day). Photograph of “Allesley Castle plan (possibly 19th century), J. B. Shelton archive”. Facebook.
Wagner, A. (Ed.). (1967). Glover’s Roll (A) [Digital transcription]. WappenWiki.
William Dugdale, W. (1656). The antiquities of Warwickshire illustrated: From records, leiger-books, manuscripts, charters, evidences, tombes, and armes (W. Hollar, Illus.). T. Warren.

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