BARDEN TOWER - BOLTON WOODS

Another Valentine's Series postcard from the Miller collection of 1906. This image is numbered 3615. I believe this card is an indicator of my theory that Septimus and Clara Miller were on the "Turner Trail" in Yorkshire, England in 1906/

North of Bolton abbey, this view is almost the same as that of a finished watercolour of 1815 "The River Wharfe with a distant view of Barden Tower" by Joseph Mallord William Turner. Turner's viewpoint of Barden Tower is some distance away at a bluff above the Strid.

"In 1808 Turner made a small sketching tour of the Rivers Wharfe and Washburn. He was making his first visit to the home of his great Yorkshire friend and patron Walter Fawkes of Farnley Hall near Otley. Turner, by this time, was well into his thirties and on this tour he began an intimate exploration of the scenery of Yorkshire that was to last for nearly twenty years.

Barden Tower is a medieval hunting lodge about 4km up the River Wharfe from Bolton Abbey. It was rebuilt in the 15th century as a fortified house by the Clifford family of Skipton Castle, but by the early 17th century had become a ruin and survives much as Turner shows it.

Rather unusually, Turner decided to make his sketches here on very large sheets of paper. His sketch of Barden Tower (Barden Tower, Wharfedale, Tate Gallery, Finberg number: CLIV L) would have required calm conditions for him to be able to work at all, but it does suggest that his idea was to enjoy an extended immersion in the site."
http://www.yorkshire.com/turner/trails/barden-tower

The principal hunting lodge of the ancient Forest of Barden and home of the 10th Lord of Skipton, more commonly known as the Shepherd Lord. The ruined tower overlooks the Priest's House, built in the early 16th century which the Shepherd Lord built for his private Chaplain.

Barden means “valley where the barley grew” and the tower was originally one of six hunting lodges within the forest of Barden.