Inside Blenheim Palace & Windsor Castle: Britain's Most Magnificent Palaces

Here in the heart of the Oxfordshire countryside there is a World Heritage Site, one of Europe's most stunning buildings. It's the only non-royal, non-episcopal building in England to be called a palace, and its name is justified. Look at that, Blenheim Palace, one of the most stunning sites anywhere in the UK. It was built by John Churchill, the first Duke of Marlborough, in a sort of celebration for the stunning series of victories he won over Louis XIV's France. It's a brilliant surviving example of English Baroque architecture and it's been home to the same family, the Churchill family, for 300 years since their ancestor built it. It's also the birthplace of one of John Churchill's more famous, more remarkable descendants, Winston. In this film I'm going to take you on an exclusive tour of this magnificent building, the spectacular architecture and the sumptuous interiors. We'll see the treasures of the private archive and learn more about Blenheim's most famous son. But our tour starts with the woman without whom there would be no Blenheim Palace at all. Queen Anne is central to this property and to this family. It was under her auspices, as it says, that John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough, won all his great victories. His wife was a favourite of hers, well they had a tempestuous relationship, but at times she was a favourite, and it was because of his wife's relationship that he was able to cement himself in control of her armies. And this property is the result, and this is one of the most magnificent rooms. It was a gallery, it was for paintings initially, you'd take your walks in here on rainy days and you'd look up at all the paintings on the wall today. You've got various relatives, various royal family members up there, but it's also a library now, 10,000 volumes, and I would just love to come in here and explore all these volumes as long as someone didn't start playing the organ at the end. I'm quite sure that's the library. The interior of the palace is just extraordinarily opulent, it is literally palatial, just look at this room here, beautiful 24 karat gold leaf ceiling, and the paintings on the walls of members of Churchill's family through the ages, painted by some of the finest artists in British life, like Reynolds. Behind me here, this is an important one, we've got Sarah Churchill, she's the reason we're all here. She was the first Duchess, she was the confidante of Queen Anne, she sort of shored up John Churchill's position at court while he was overseas fighting for queen and country. They were the premier political power couple of late Stuart England, and he's up there in his military uniform, and the combination of his military skill and her political mouse at court ensured the birth of this dynasty that would go on for generations. This room's great because this room is all about the first duke, there he is on the wall there, and now we explore the first duke as a great military commander, arguably Britain's greatest ever general. These are huge tapestries that he had commissioned, they were made in the European hot spot for tapestries, for needlework, in the low countries around Brussels, what we now think of as Belgium, and they were very very accurate. He was determined that they would accurately reflect his campaigns, so the faces and the individuals portrayed are as they were on the battlefields. This is the most famous of the vast tapestries, this is the Battle of Blenheim, Blenheim was his most famous victory, hence Blenheim Palace, it's a place in southern Germany, it's a hugely remote, all the great British victories in history, if you think about it, they're all quite near the coast. The British don't tend to like going too far away from their naval lifeline, but Marlborough led his men deep into the heart of Germany, and he fought a big coalition battle against the French. Here we see his allies, those are all individual allied commanders, Germans, people from the low countries elsewhere, and then there's Blenheim, there's the Danube running through the valley, the church, steeple, famous on the battlefield as a landmark, and then we have the surrender of the French commander, the French marshal, the French always wore white, surrendering, Marlborough receiving the surrender, holding his field marshal's baton, I look down here in the corner, I love this, I love the detail in his early 18th century uniforms, in its own right, this is a great historical resource, and he is holding a captured standard belonging to Louis XIV, you can see the fleur-de-lis, the white standard of the of the French royal army, so this is a gigantic celebration of the apotheosis of Marlborough's in the house that he built with the spoils of that victory. This is just a glorious room, there's nothing quite like it, it's the saloon, it's now the dining room where they eat, it's the sort of main reception room, it's painted the murals on every wall and ceiling, painted showing the peoples of the world at peace after the war of Spanish succession, it's a giant global war that was fighting in India and North America and Europe, fighting all over the place to restrain Louis XIV, Louis XIV wanted to put his grandson on the throne of Spain, the vacant throne of Spain, so he'd been frustrated in that aim and now the peoples of the world could live in harmony, thank you to the Duke of Marlborough and his victories, and remarkably the artist has included himself, he's done a selfie, there he is, his name is Louis Laguerre, even more bizarrely he's a Frenchman, his name means war and he's painted this gigantic celebration of peace and finally, most strangely of all, he's actually Louis XIV's godson, now whether that shows how enlightened the first Duke was bringing his former enemies into this celebration of peace, I don't know, it could be that he was just rubbing their noses. My favourite objects in this palace, in fact one of my favourite objects of all time, I love this, this is the Blenheim Dispatch, now it was written by the first Duke on the battlefield at Blenheim in a hurry, look at it, you can see how scruffy his writing is and we know it was in a hurry, particularly because it was written on the back of a bill from a tavern for the previous night's meal, you can see that it's in French, a bit of meat, a couple of candles, some bread, someone's given him this scrap of paper and he's written in a rush to his replica, August the 13th in 1704, I have not time to say more but beg you will give my duty to the Queen and let her know that army has had a glorious victory, Marshal Tallard and two other generals are in my coach and I'm following up the rest, i.e. the French commander is sitting in his coach, that is a pretty comprehensive victory, I just love the fact that news of such strategic importance was delivered on the back of a bar bill. This victory that he was so proud of was a very important victory, it proved decisive and it was the reason that Queen Anne, his sovereign, gave him this land that had been royal hunting land for centuries and the money to build this gigantic palace. In return she asked simply for one thing, that every year a standard be delivered to her and her successors with the French fleur-de-lis and to this day for the last 300 years the Dukes of Marlborough every single year have been delivering that to Windsor at the appointed time. George VI in 1946 gave one of the standards back so it could be displayed here at Blenheim so visitors would understand the process. I hope they've got their calendar alerts set to annual because if the family do ever forget Queen's having this place back. The building of Blenheim was far from smooth. Construction began in 1705 but a few years later the Queen and the Duchess fell out. The Marlboroughs had to flee into exile and work on the palace stot. It wasn't finished until the 1730s but the result was magnificent. It's just built on such a grand scale. It's gigantic. In fact it feels more like an Oxford college and that's partly because it's made from the same beautiful golden stone of the Cotswolds and the architects who worked on it are some of the foremost architects in British history. Vambra led, ably assisted by Hawksmoor. The current Duke's family, direct descendant of that first Duke live in that apartment over there and taken as a whole it is still the biggest private residence in the country. Well all that gold leaf and those paintings are fine as far as they go but everyone knows while history geeks like me know the real action is in the archives. That's where the treasures are and I'm off now to meet Dr Alexa Frost and she's going to show me some of the best things in the collection. Hi there. Hi. How are you doing? Good thank you. So you've got some stuff to show me? I have yes. What's this? The commonplace book. Yeah. I'm very grateful. This is my favourite item in the archives. It was written by the first Duchess of Marlborough, Sarah. The first? She's a great woman herself. I know we don't have much of her material here. It's her commonplace book so it's a journal and she writes about her views on life, love and the universe, quoting philosophers and mentioning her opinions in relation to that. Has this never been transcribed and published? We have got a transcription but it has never been formally published no. That's it because she's one of the preeminent political figures of her generation. Is that sort of sexism? Has she been overlooked? Why is that? It could be a combination of those things. It's one of the fascinating things about private archives. And so this is the book in, this has not been stuck in, I mean this is the book in which she wrote? Yes. And scribbling is probably an excellent definition of that. We do have a transcription, we can see the word gods there. Do we learn things about the politics of late Stuart England this or is this sort of personal? I think it's a combination of both. In it she discusses her relationship with family and friends that she'd fallen out with over the years, indirectly, which she did. But I think the way that she phrases it in this book is she defends herself by saying a true friend is somebody who cares for you enough to speak your mind and then she will back that up with philosophical evidence without directing it at a particular individual. And so this is a treasure. I mean this is one of the most famous people in the early 18th century and you've got this gigantic sort of, you've got access to her mind. Yes, yes, it's an enormous privilege. Right what's next? Next I have a rather lovely item here that was produced in 1878 which was an address to the seventh Duchess of Marlborough, Winston Churchill's grandma. It was produced in 1878 by the children of the industrial school in Cork. When she spent time in Ireland with her husband she was dedicated to setting up a fund to help poverty through the potato and famine fight. And we've got a collection of these beautiful addresses which you can see there's so much detail that the children and the teachers have worked on as a thank you and I think it creates quite a lovely message. Images you're seeing the children kind of working on the roof and but there's you know little girls still with a welcome sign and there's flowers and it's almost telling the story how you're working on the bottom with the thorns that develop into into flowers at the top. So I think when they start may it please your grace then I think I think that she would be pleased with. I don't think of the British aristocracy as being very popular in Ireland so that's an interesting. She made an enormous difference and raised a lot of money. What's next? Finally here I've got a 1772 map of the manor of Woodstock. And that's where we are now is it? Which is where we are now and this was created by the surveyor Thomas Pride. When we have a look inside. Oh look how beautiful that is. Look at the colours. I love that. And this is the manor of Woodstock is detailed here which are now sort of villages and you've got the palace here and Coombe, Woodstock itself, Old Woodstock, Slaydon but I think it is the the colours are so vibrant. I'm sure the duke enjoyed looking out on all those domains. Absolutely must be quite satisfying. I mean is it stupid to ask how many sort of objects are in the archive? Actually do you know I don't know. Okay. I know that there are 30,000 items catalogued. 30,000. And I reckon that that's what 60% of the archives. And so there's whole boxes of letters and farm receipts and things that has never been catalogued. Yeah really exciting. So as you're walking around the room we've got a number of boxes that are yet to be explored. That's the dream of all archivists. Exactly, exactly. It's a new adventure every day. So people go to the palace and look for all the treasures in there but the real treasure is in this room. Absolutely, yes. Wonderful to see that unique book belonging to Sarah Churchill. The recent Oscar-winning film The Favourite has made her once again a public figure but there's one Blenheim resident whose fame outshines all others. Blenheim tour guide Peter Gill is going to tell me his story. Hello, how are you? Hello, welcome Dan. Thank you very much. Thank you Peter. Nice to see you. We're talking about the illustrious man who was born, how come he was born here? Well his parents actually lived in London. He should have been born there but he had other ideas. He was a very impatient man so his parents were visiting here in the weekend in November 1874 and he decided to arrive in the world a few weeks earlier than planned. So he later said I chose to be born in Blenheim Palace. I don't think he had much choice really. And they weren't just guests, I mean they were part of the family, right? Yes they were, yes. His grandfather, if you look at the chart here, was the seventh duke of Marlborough and they had a number of sons and daughters. The eldest son, George, became the eighth duke on the death of his father but the younger son is Randolph Churchill and that's the father of Winston and he married this American lady from New York, Jenny Jerome. So Winston Churchill is in fact half American by birth. Half American? Yes. Born in the ancestral home and that remained very important to him. It did indeed. He loved this place and very much regarded it as his ancestral home. It wasn't his actual home, just the fact that he was born here. So this is his saddle? This is his baby saddle, yes. He learned to ride his pony, Rob Roy, here all around the palace grounds because he spent a lot of his school holidays here. His parents were rather dysfunctional they didn't come to see him, they didn't look after him in the holidays too much. So he was here with his grandmother and he learned to ride all around Blenheim Palace on Rob Roy, his pony. And he had endless toy soldiers, endlessly playing battles. Loved toy soldiers, yes. He could have been a military man quite easily, could have had his military career but he chose to be a politician of course. And when he was playing soldiers of France he was usually in charge? Absolutely, yes. He used to play a game with his cousin, the ninth duke, and the game was fighting the French if you like. And he was always head of the English army, he was the general, and his cousin was the enemy. And he always won, that was one of the rules. He was always the boss if you like. He was typical Winston. So Dan, we're going into the room where Winston Churchill was born on the 30th of November 1874 and you'll see here some examples of his paintings. Look at them. He came to Blenheim Palace, he painted a number of paintings inside the palace as well as in the gardens, again emphasising how much he was influenced by Blenheim Palace, how much he loved it, regarded it very much as his actual ancestral home. And this is the bed he was born in and on the end of the bed you can see there his curls, cut off at about the age of four or five. So up to that stage he had long curls and dressed as a girl, would you believe, and then he was breeched, which means he had breeches put on and dressed as a boy. Because up to that stage they were just known as children, they weren't sort of boys and girls, they were children. His mother comes here for a sociable weekend and she ends up going through labour at this point. And I think the fact that he was born in this palace, in the heart of his ancestral home, gave him that sense of he thought he was part of something pretty big. It didn't come as a surprise to him when he was Prime Minister did it? Not really, it's all part of his destiny I think. He loved it, he loved it. His parents were actually here for the weekend attending a ball in the Long Library and so you can see they were rushed up the corridor and Jenny Jerome, his mother, was put into bed here and a few hours later Winston Churchill was born here. I'm very proud of that. And is this his actual easel? A lovely painting there and his actual easel or one of them, he had several of these. He spent a lot of time painting here, in France, in Morocco etc. He's a very accomplished artist exhibiting in the Royal Academy. Beautiful paintings, some of them. The story began in this room that would take him all over the world, I mean he was one of the dominant figures of the 20th century. He was indeed, he was indeed and never lost the influence of Blenheim Palace, I think that's most important and that chose to be buried of course within sight of it so it just shows how much this did influence him but this is where it all started in 1874 on the 30th of November. Astonishing chapel here at Blenheim Palace. We have Winston Churchill's father here, his grandfather here and this is the chapel in which Winston Churchill was christened as a baby but when you're in here you're left in Winston Churchill is but a footnote. The real person that you're here to celebrate, to remember in this room is the first Duke, John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough. Even the altar has been shifted to one side so the people in the pews, the worshippers, frankly worship his monument, his memorial instead of the altar. There he is with his wife Sarah looking adoringly up at him and his two sons, his daughters don't get a look in which is ironic given the importance of the female line and the women in the story of this dynasty and there are scenes from his military career carved out at the base there. You are left in no doubt when you visit Blenheim Palace when you visit this chapel that this is a gigantic shrine to all the most important military and political figures in British history. So Blenheim is now a unique mixture of memorial, family home and national treasure as well as being the birthplace of one of the greatest Britons of all time. Winston Churchill obviously went through life carrying Blenheim close to his heart and now thanks to Winston Churchill we carry it in our pocket. This is the five pound note and on it we have Winston Churchill who regularly tops polls as the most successful, respected Britain of all time and there in the corner just above and to the right of the great man himself is a little reference to Blenheim. Ever since William the Conqueror came here almost a thousand years ago Windsor on the banks of the River Thames has been home to a castle. Windsor Castle isn't just one of the Queen's favourite palaces it is absolutely central to the monarchy. It has been a royal palace for longer than any other building in Europe. The story begins around a thousand years ago the Normans arrived here they conquered England 1066 and they chose this spot next to a for a stronghold. They built this artificial mound they put a tower on top of it and since then kings and queens have enlarged and invested on a gigantic scale. Edward III turned this into one of the great royal residences spending more money on this than any other secular project of the time and as a result today it is magnificent. To get an exclusive tour I'm meeting curator Kate Hurd. Hello Kate how are you? Thanks for having me in your castle. Now I always think of Windsor as a sort of medieval fortress but actually it's like a palatial stately home isn't it? Well it's a medieval castle but the castle you see today is largely the work of George IV who was king from 1820. And he turned it into a sort of a modern house? He did he inherited a castle which had been changed from the medieval castle in the 17th century his parents had made some changes and for him it didn't work as a modern royal residence so he set about this huge program of rebuilding and reconstructing and redesigning. This is beautiful. This is just wonderful this is his original entrance hall so he opened it up so his visitors would come through that door and would be able to walk into this magnificent space. But this feels a little bit to me like a 19th century gothic but we think of being later in the century do we? It is absolutely it was always the entrance to the castle but it was a smaller entrance. George III had a staircase coming up but George IV opens it up but he's so aware of the medieval history of the castle he does it in that gothic that gothic style. So for people who don't know what I'm talking about this like kind of fake really? It's reimagined gothic I mean it's fake in a sense but reimagined they were very consciously looking back to particularly the reign of Edward III who was another great builder at the castle. It's amazing. It's stunning isn't it and yet and so I guess visitors come here and think oh medieval in fact it's only 150 200 years old? Absolutely George IV have been wanting to get his hands on Windsor for so long and he really goes to town with this medieval history when he does. You say that is that because Windsor is in some ways the sort of spiritual core of the of the English and British monarchy? It's the medieval fortress he's very interested in medieval history and it's it's possibly the most imposing residence remember Buckingham Palace which is now really grand when he inherited it was quite a small townhouse his mother had lived in so this is the grandest and most imposing of the royal residences. And I guess it's the one associated with Edward III that they all love? Absolutely absolutely. Charles II was very fond of it here as well. He'd also lived here as a boy I mean remember it's his family home as Prince of Wales so he has a great fondness for the place. So this is their are they allowed to say but is this their sort of premier residence? I think for George IV it is the one that he is becomes most interested in it's the one that he really we know that he spends hours poring over the redesigns he becomes really occupied by it so I think for him it is the residence that he spends the most time on. And what about the subsequent what about Victoria his niece what did she make of it? Well Queen Victoria inherited it and she also made great changes to the castle so the space that we're in you can hear it echoing you can hear the the size of it she bricks it off because she changes the staircase again she bricks it off she doesn't want this grand entrance and it's only now that it's been opened up again and we can appreciate that great vision of George IV who wanted his guests to come up that wonderful approach the long walk and through those through those doors. Why did Victoria brick it off? I think she just again it's a different time the castle has different needs you know each each generation needs something different from it. Amazing. Right where are we off to next? I think let's go to the State Apartments. Let's do it. It's the grandest staircase I've ever seen in my life. Isn't it wonderful it's the entrance to the State Apartments with George IV taking over it. Looking at all the visitors to his new rooms. Absolutely yes. Weapons, arms and armour. Yes even more collection that historic collection that goes right the way back but George IV is a big collector of arms and armour as well. He's obsessed with the military isn't he? Absolutely everything he can do he's not allowed to fight but he forms this incredible collection. Even more muskets and swords here. Absolutely this in the medieval castle this space would have protected the State Apartments so that this displays reflect that. And I'm trying to think Winter Castle I think it was threatened when during the civil war at King John when Prince Louis came over. Was it besieged at the time? Well no other besiegers as it were Henry VIII I know during the pilgrimage of grace was here and there was a worry that it would be besieged but it wasn't. Isn't it stunning? This is the Waterloo chamber which holds this incredible series of portraits largely by Sir Thomas Lawrence of the men who were responsible for the defeat of Napoleon in the early 19th century. We've got Wellington up there. Absolutely. Commander at Waterloo, Austria. Yes. So George IV is very kind to let his dad go above the mantle. George III is the monarch who is ruling the country so at that point our George is Prince Regent so he acknowledges his father's role but he puts himself in very clear second place. I love this because this is basically all the crowned heads and the leading aristocratic military of all who for whom Napoleon represented an existential threat so this is a giant celebration. Yes and this commission starts before the battle of Waterloo. It dates from 1814 when they thought that Napoleon had been defeated and George sends Thomas Lawrence out to make these incredible paintings and the half-length is of a statesman as well who's acknowledging the role of statesmanship in that creating that piece after Napoleon. Was this room always a sort of banqueting hall? No in the medieval castle you're standing in the open air so you're in one end of Edward III's courtyard in the middle of a apartment and George IV had commissioned these incredible paintings. He wants a Waterloo gallery and this space is earmarked for it but it's not really finished until after his death so it's roofed over and then these little lights are added and it's not really finished until the reign of Queen Victoria. I always think of a very modern idea which you take your big courtyards and turn them into an atrium but actually they were doing it in the 19th century. Absolutely, it's a wonderful use of the space and the space also looks back to the earlier castles, to the 17th century castles and you see these wonderful pieces of wood carving and they're taken from Charles II's chapel where by Brinley and Gibbons reused in this space and they look wonderful. This is St George's Hall which is world famous, fantastic and has always had the function of a great pool for meetings, for meetings, for great occasions. And this was a medieval hall? Originally this space was Edward III's, we still have Edward III's under Croft's beneath which is just recently opened up for the first time. It becomes under Charles II a very baroque space, it looks very different with wall paintings. Under George IV it's turned again into a medieval looking space, a gothic space and he lengthens the hall by essentially knocking the chapel and the hall together but it's not entirely successful. His ceiling, his gothic ceiling is quite low and everything is plaster, essentially a plaster cake for a medieval building. The 1992 fire affected this space very badly so what you see again is the reconstruction in 1992 of this great sort of gothic space. This amazing hammer beam ceiling roof designed by Giles Downes, it's in green oak, it's a masterpiece of craftsmanship which the hall has always been all that way back. It's amazing, it's something so British about this that it's a reconstruction of a reimagining and yet so it's both very historic and very long but also ever-changing. Ever-changing but always grounded in history and it reflects the importance of the castles, which is the oldest order of chivalry founded again by Edward III in 1348 and so the shields you can see decorating the space are the shields of the Knights of the Garter. A lot of arms and armour on the walls again, I'm noticing a theme here. That's wonderful, that is the champion's armour which was last used at the coronation of 44. What's that? That is, traditionally going all the way back to the middle ages, a champion defends the king's honour after he's been crowned and issues a challenge to anyone who may want to challenge the new king and that is the armour that's worn by the champion, it's a hereditary armour. Really? Whoever that was and his father and his grandfather would ride through the coronation? It's the Dimmock family, absolutely and George IV is the last person to have the champion's hair at the coronation. And so what, he rides a horse through the party and throws down the gauntlet? He does indeed, it's through the coronation banquet for George IV in Westminster Hall and the horse rides in as part of the ceremony. What happens if, you know, grandson Dimmock was a bit of a softy? He still gets to do it. And they still have functions in here? Still used as a space that is for feasting, for special occasions, it's still used in a way that Edward III would have been familiar with. As we leave, there's George IV. There's our George again, yes. Looking down on what he's built, nice little room. Isn't it fantastic, that octagon, looking back again to the medieval precedent places, ideally if we draw the octagon there. Who's this? Is this Henry VIII? This is Henry VIII, yes. I don't believe it, that's so cool. You get that sense of the figure, don't you, that really imposing presence, just amazing. Yes, well I think it was probably made for him in his mature years. And then we've got all the silver and some of that wonderful silver and gold from the Royal Collection. I suppose this just accumulated over hundreds of years? Absolutely, just added to by each generation. That's amazing. That's unique, the continuity of the British state and its world tradition, means that you must just have centuries and centuries of all these treasures. Absolutely, yes. Each monarch is also aware of the history, so you get George IV looking back to the Middle Ages and looking back to the Baroque period and building on that when he's building his own collection, so you get that awareness of the layers. Where next? This way. So this is the really wonderful Crimson Drawing Room. Wow, this is peak George IV. It's just so opulent and gorgeous. It is, it was one of his private apartments. It was one of his major reception rooms, so he would have private guests here, but it's one of his. So I think we're getting close to his tastes. I think we're right in the middle of his taste here. It's very different from the rest of the castle. It's in this French neoclassical taste that he loved all his life. It's a stunning space. And it's these objects that he purchased that are now so famous at Buckingham Palace and everywhere else because he just hoovered this stuff up, didn't he? I mean, all this wonderful furniture was commissioned by him to furnish. Obviously, he's got a small residence as prince and then he gains Buckingham Palace. He gains Windsor Castle and he needs all this furniture to fill it up, so he commissions these wonderful suites of furniture. Some of the gilding on the doors was brought from Carlton House again, and so he brings quite a bit of material from Carlton House. The fireplace actually dates from 1807, before this room was established, and is from Carlton House and was brought here when Carlton House's London residence was demolished. Does this room survive a great fire? No. Very sadly, this room was very badly damaged, but it was reconstructed using the original documents from George IV's reign, and when George IV is planning this room, a set of really watercolours are made for him to show what the room might look like, and that archive he uses in planning his spaces has been reused in the 1990s for planning this space, and it's beautiful. He would have felt very at home in this room, even though it is largely reconstructed. So in the centre of this gigantic royal palace, administrative headquarters, medieval castle, you think this is kind of George IV's personal space? I think this is where we meet him most of all, the place where he would have relaxed. He's got his portraits of his sisters on the wall. I think he would have enjoyed this space. And he was a sad man in many ways. He was extraordinarily infirm with a variety of illnesses towards the end of his life. It's strange to think of him sitting here in those declinings when he was almost a recluse, wasn't he? He was a recluse. He didn't like people looking at him. He'd been tortured by satirists. He really did withdraw during his reign, that 10-year reign. But he surrounded himself with these incredible objects he'd collected, and he clearly takes such pleasure in craftsmanship and beauty, and this beautiful sort of skill in creating things in textures and colour. So you can imagine he was very happy in these rooms. Isn't it funny that he probably felt insecure because compared to, say, George II or the Duke of Cumberland, his martial relatives, he'd never fought on the battlefield. And yet actually, what the modern world looks for now is a collector, an interior designer. So his reputation's probably higher than ever. We can appreciate him now for these amazing things he left us, this incredible collection he formed.