The Earl of Devon

It was thus highly fitting that Hugh Rupert Courtenay — the future 18th earl — should be born in May 1942, hours after the Luftwaffe had rained bombs on Exeter, six miles distant, during the Baedeker Blitz. His half-sisters, Lady Rose and Lady Paulina Pepys, long recalled the baby’s cries, from his birthplace in the state room as they took shelter from the bombs in the cellar, along with the servants. They and their brother shared a mother, the Countess of Cottenham. She divorced her first husband, the 6th earl of Cottenham, a cousin of the 17th Earl of Devon, Charles Courtenay, whom she then married. They had two children, Katherine, born in 1940, and Hugh.

Together with their half-sisters, they were the first generation of children to be brought up at the castle since the 1770s, when it had been home to all 14 offspring of the 2nd Viscount Courtenay. Lord Courtenay (as he was known until becoming earl in 1998) was taught by a French governess and allowed in early childhood to ramble free through the castle, whose battlements give splendid views of the River Exe. On his eighth birthday, he was packed off to a prep school in Sussex. These did not turn out — as he had been promised — to be “the happiest years” of his life. Winchester College proved more agreeable although Courtenay regretted the lack of opportunity to take science O’levels, as this impeded him from studying agriculture, as he had hoped at Magdalene College, Cambridge. There, he read history for one term before swapping to rural estate management. His degree included an 18-month placement at the Lothian estate of the former Scottish international rugby player Jack Watherston.

In 1967, at St Andrew’s church, Kelso, Lord Courtenay married Watherston’s daughter Diana. They had three daughters — Rebecca, Nell (Eleanora) and Camilla. All are now mothers, and Camilla is a teacher. The youngest child, Charles, is a barrister and heir to the earldom.

Hugh Courtenay acquired essential experience for the running of Powderham, after qualifying as a chartered surveyor. He was land agent to estates including Monteviot in Roxburghshire, Blickling Hall in Norfolk and Broughton Castle in Oxfordshire. Just before taking over Powderham, he worked for the land agents Stratton Holborow who then helped him to manage the estate. To clear its substantial debt, Lord Courtenay sold antiques, including a pair of 18th-century bookcases to the V&A. Another sale — of four regency chairs and two sofas — led Courtenay to order copies of the original furniture, complete with gold and silver leaf and arm rests emblazoned with the family emblem (dolphins) for the 200-year-old music room.

By the 1970s, the Powderham estates had vastly shrunk due to the sale of land vital to pay off triple death duties after the passing — in speedy succession — of three earls in between 1927 and 1935. Charles Courtenay, the father of Hugh, became 17th Earl, but his claim was challenged by a clerk named Austin Courtenay, who was employed by the wardrobe department of the Denham film studios. Reporters who turned up to interview the clerk found him struggling to find a dozen pairs of silk stockings for Marlene Dietrich.

Satisfied as to his claim, the 17th earl and his wife later opened a school of domestic science for teenage girls at the castle, and, in the late 1950s, opened Powderham to the public. Chief among the minor attractions was Timothy, a tortoise brought to the castle from the ship of a Portuguese privateer in the 1850s. At the age of 87, Timothy was discovered, in fact, to be female.

That 35,000 people now visit Powderham each summer is largely because of shrewd decision-making by the 18th earl. He increased the estate farmlands from 400 to 2,000 acres, ran horse trials from Powderham, managed one of South Devon’s leading herds of cattle, and revived the 18th-century gardens and deer park. He also fought a successful legal battle against the Queen to regain the family’s medieval rights to land on the foreshore of the estuary of the River Exe. This, he swiftly turned to a thriving business in shell fishing and the renting of moorings. Another success was securing the first Lottery heritage grant assigned to a private house. He used this to revamp the Victorian servants’ hall and kitchen. Profit, was not his sole motive however: the castle lost around £20,000 in revenue when in 2008 the earl refused to allow a gay couple to marry in a civil ceremony at Powderham. He stopped all civil marriages at the castle to avoid breaching equality legislation. In 2013, the earl relented his stance and Powderham’s licence as a wedding venue was restored.

Ten years earlier, The Remains of the Day, starring Emma Thompson and Anthony Hopkins was filmed at Powderham and the same year the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra gave the first concert on the castle grounds. A galaxy of star-studded performances followed including those by Sir Cliff Richard, Sir Tom Jones and the band Blue, which drew a crowd of 20,000, an achievement that, in conjunction with the audience of 13,000 who watched Sir Elton John led to the estate receiving a venue of the year award in 2004. Nine thousand people turned up in July to Let’s Rock Exeter! an 80s revival concert featuring Billy Ocean, Midge Ure, Bananarama, Brother Beyond, Nik Kershaw and Jive Bunny.

The 17th earl died in 1998, and his son was the last hereditary peer sitting by right to make a maiden speech to the House of Lords. He took a quiet pride in the fact that another Hugh Courtenay, his ancestor had been summoned to parliament in 1335.

He bred Springer spaniels, often spent February on Safari in Africa, and long before it became the fashion, took up recycling.. Those closest to him were his friends made at Cambridge. Although shy on first meeting, he was loyal, generous and looked after his staff. For many years, at harvest-time the earl could be seen driving a combine harvester in the middle of the day, which he did to relieve his farm hands and allow them a lunch break.

The Earl of Devon, was born on May 5, 1942. He died on August 18, 2015, aged 73