William Cunliffe Brooks (1819 - 1900) and the Glen Tana Dream

William Cunliffe Brooks and the Glen Tana Dream

Introduction
WCB – William Cunliffe Brooks – was a wealthy Manchester banker who fell in love with Glen Tana, a sporting estate near Aboyne in North East Scotland, in 1869.  He subsequently made his home there and set about beautifying his surroundings through lavish spending.  His WCB monogram was inscribed on many of his works.  This vision of turning Glen Tana into an earthly paradise in which to live and entertain was sustained by WCB for more than thirty years until he died at Glen Tana House in 1900.  Sadly, although many of the artifacts that he created still survive in the glen and contribute to its charm today, WCB’s dream barely survived his demise.   Brooks insisted on the name of the glen being spelled “Tana” on dubious etymological grounds but, for simplicity, this spelling has been used throughout.  The story of WCB’s tenure in Glen Tana gives a fascinating insight into the personality of this gifted and generous, but ultimately flawed, visionary.

Origins of the Brooks family and its wealth
The Brooks family wealth originated in the burgeoning Lancashire cotton industry in the second half of the 18th century.  William Brooks, the grandfather of WCB, came from a farming background in the village of Whalley, near Clitheroe, in the Ribble valley.  William senior was born in 1762 and in 1792 he started a calico merchant business in Blackburn with a friend, Roger Cunliffe.  The Cunliffes were a wealthy family from Great Harwood, who had been mercers since Elizabethan times.  The two partners soon found that the customers of the calico business required banking services, which Cunliffe and Brooks proceeded to offer.  This innovation proved to be so successful that the banking business was soon able to trade independently and the Cunliffe, Brooks & Co Bank had arrived.

Samuel Brooks, son of the co-founder of the bank was born in 1793 and in due course entered the bank.  Samuel opened a branch of the bank in Manchester in 1819 and became a partner.  He was very successful, both as a banker and a property developer.  Large areas of housing in Manchester were developed by him, including Whalley Range, which was named after the home village of the Brooks family.  At the time of his death in 1864 he was reputed to be the richest man in Manchester and was known locally by the sobriquet “old stink o’ brass”.

Samuel’s son, William Cunliffe Brooks, was born in 1819 and studied at Rugby School, followed by Cambridge University, where he matriculated in 1838 and graduated BA in 1842.  He was admitted to the Inner Temple in 1840 and called to the Bar in 1848.  WCB’s father, Samuel, had wanted him to be admitted to a partnership at Cunliffe, Brooks & Co after he graduated.  When William reached his majority in 1840, Samuel asked his partner, James Cunliffe, if William could be admitted, but Cunliffe refused.  As a result, William pursued his career in the law for a number of years as a barrister on the Northern Circuit.  In turn, when James Cunliffe’s son Roger reached his majority in 1846 James asked Samuel Brooks to admit Roger.  The answer was predictable and in the negative!  There was then a “race for life” between the two partners, which was won by Samuel Brooks, since Cunliffe died first.  WCB was admitted as a partner to Cunliffe, Brooks & Co sometime between 1851 and 1856.

William Cunliffe Brooks married Jane Elizabeth Orrell in 1842.  The marriage produced two daughters who survived to adulthood, Amy, born in 1850 and Edith born in 1853.  Sadly, two boys, born in 1848 and 1851 and a girl, born in 1852, died in early infancy.  William’s wife, Jane, did not enjoy a long life, dying in 1865.  Thus William was left with the responsibility of bringing up two teenage girls.

WCB’s father, Samuel died in 1864.  Samuel’s five daughters each inherited property valued at £100,000.  His grandson, John Brooks, son of his deceased offspring, Rev John Brooks, inherited property valued at almost £200,000 and the balance of the estate was left equally to Samuel’s two surviving sons. William Cunliffe Brooks and Major Brooks.  Even more significant was the fact that William was now the sole partner in the Manchester bank of Cunliffe, Brooks & Co, which was still highly profitable, and in the London bank of Brooks & Co. 

WCB's love affair with Scotland is kindled
It was in the early 1860s that WCB started travelling to Scotland in August or September each year for the traditional country pursuits of that nation, grouse shooting, deer stalking and rod fishing for salmon.  His Manchester friend Tom Harrop Sidebottom had an estate in the Blackmount district of Argyll and WCB spent his first Scottish season there, subsequently returning several times.  In 1865 William Brooks rented a house near Ballachulish and for the 1866 season, he leased the whole of the shootings at Glenartney Forest, Perthshire, while residing at Drummond Castle.  By this time he had also started to adopt the social style of the local landed proprietors, entertaining the Earl and Countess of Mar, who were on honeymoon at the time.  WCB probably also spent the 1867 season in Scotland, since he gave two prizes for sheep classes at the Strathearn Agricultural Show.  In 1869 the Forest of Glentanner, near Aboyne, was available for let, due to the dire financial circumstances of the Aboyne Gordons and WCB took up the offer.  Charles Gordon, the 11th Marquis of Huntly, owner of the estate, was away on an extended visit to India at the time and the let was handled by his mother, the Dowager Marchioness, who was residing at another Huntly estate, Orton Longueville in Huntingdonshire.

The 11th Marquis of Huntly falls for Amy Brooks
WCB and his daughters Amy (19) and Edith (16) paid a social visit to the Dowager Marchioness at Orton in April 1869.  By chance, the 11th Marquis of Huntly, had arrived home unexpectedly the previous day.  It must have been love at first sight for Amy Brooks and Charles Gordon.  An announcement of the impending marriage appeared in the newspapers in May and the marriage took place at Westminster Abbey on 14th July 1869.  It was a very grand social affair, with Bishop Wilberforce presiding and the Prince and Princess of Wales being present at the ceremony.  The honeymoon was at Aboyne Castle, which WCB had hired for his own accommodation, while he was engaged in sport in Glen Tana.  Woodend House in the glen was then just a small shooting lodge and was inadequate in size and quality for William’s purposes.   The previous lessees of the glen had stayed in the Huntly Arms Hotel in Aboyne.  WCB graciously gave up the castle to the honeymooners and, being wealthy and used achieving his aims, immediately decided to extend Woodend House.

WCB engages George Truefitt
About the beginning of July 1869, William Brooks engaged George Truefitt, a London-based architect to plan the enlargement of the accommodation at Woodend House. Brooks had first met Truefitt about 1848 when the latter had entered an unsuccessful design for new premises for the Army and Navy Club in Pall Mall.  Truefitt had already been responsible for designing several new bank buildings for Cunliffe Brooks & Co, for example in Brown Street, Manchester in 1868.  This association and friendship between the two men was to last throughout the Brooks years at Glen Tana.  The Truefitt family were guests at the glen on a number of occasions and in 1883, when Mary Louisa Truefitt the architect’s daughter married, Brooks lent the couple Barlow Hall, his residence in Manchester, for their honeymoon.  Three major rooms were added by Truefitt to Woodend House, dining room, drawing room and billiards room, as well as servants’ quarters and a kitchen.  At the end of August, presumably after the work had been completed, WCB laid on a dinner for the men who had carried out the work, at the Huntly Arms in Aboyne.  Forty to fifty men had been constantly employed under the supervision of Mr Daniel, an Aberdeen builder.  The house was subsequently known as Glen Tana House.  WCB had laid down a marker for the Deeside locals that he had money and was prepared to spend it to achieve his ends.

WCB and Party Politics
It was also in 1869 that WCB first became a Conservative MP, representing the constituency of East Cheshire.  He continued in this role until 1885, when he lost his seat.  However, he was only briefly out of parliament before returning as MP for the Altrincham Division in 1886. WCB first leased Glen Tana and became an MP at about the same time but while his fascination with the glen grew with time, he never really took to parliamentary life.  Indeed, at the end of his period as an MP he told the housekeeper of his London home not to keep the blinds drawn when he was not in residence to try to conceal the paucity of time he was then spending in town.  He announced his intention to leave Parliament in 1890 and finally retired in 1892.  Eighteen sixty nine also saw WCB withdraw from direct day-to-day control of the Manchester bank, though he was still formally in control and insisted that the bank staff write to him daily concerning every detail of the business.

The Glen Tana project gets underweigh
In late 1869, William Cunliffe Brooks must have felt highly satisfied with his circumstances. He was now extremely wealthy and could afford to indulge his interests of philanthropy, country sports and politics. He had just entered the House of Commons and his elder daughter had married a dashing young member of the nobility, who was the owner of extensive estates in both Scotland and England.  It is not clear exactly when WCB’s love affair with Glen Tana developed.  Perhaps it was born out of the coincidence of Amy’s marriage to Charles Gordon and WCB’s love of country sports?  By living in Glen Tana he would be able to indulge his sporting passions, while at the same time being within easy reach of Manchester for bank business and London for his Parliamentary work, since the railway had been extended to Aboyne in 1857.  Also, he would be within a short carriage drive of Aboyne Castle where Amy and Charles lived.   And there was the prospect of grandchildren to come. 

Without question, Glen Tana was and is a beautiful place and Brooks described it as “One of the fairest spots on earth.”  It had about 30,000 acres of which about 8,000 or 9,000 acres were forest.  There was grouse shooting both inside the forest and on about 3,000 acres outside the forest.  The estate extended 6 or 7 miles along the Dee, including some of the best salmon pools on the river.  It also extended southwards for about 14 miles along the Tana glen, as far as Mount Keen.  Even at this early stage in his developing attachment to Glen Tana it seems likely that he had an outline plan in his mind for making Glen Tana his home.  His initial lease on the glen only extended for a season, yet he immediately sold off the sheep and cattle in the glen on the market stance in Aboyne in October 1869 "as he does not intend to keep cattle".  In that year he also spent a considerable sum on extending Woodend House. However, with the ownership of the glen being “in the family”, he probably felt secure that a longer lease would be likely to ensue and thus safeguard his investment.

The 11th Marquis of Huntly's financial problems
But the increasing involvement of WCB with Glen Tana and Aboyne must also have brought a growing insight into the financial circumstances of his son-in-law, Charles Gordon.  The 9th and 10th Marquises of Huntly, Charles Gordon’s grandfather and father, had run the estate into debt from which it had not fully recovered at the time of Charles’ accession to the marquisate in 1863 at the age of 16.  Charles did not assume control of the estate until he reached the age of majority in 1868.  He then embarked on a disastrous strategy of investing in the infrastructure of the estate using money, secured on most of his assets and borrowed at high rates of interest, at a time of growing agricultural depression.  This created a mounting debt which eventually forced him into bankruptcy in 1898.   Charles Gordon had consulted William Brooks  early in his marriage on business affairs, "Shortly after I was married there existed considerable excitement in the political world and there seemed to me to be reasons for my then entering actively on the field of politics and I wrote to our friend Mr Brooks that it seemed to me rather my duty to attend to politics than to the management of my own estates, which might be left to others.  I shall never forget the answer I received…….  “The man does best his duty to the State who attends first to the duties nearest to him in the position to which he has succeeded”.  Charles Gordon was still trying to run away from his responsibilities and WCB's sage advice had little impact.  WCB, highly successful in business, must have looked on with mounting disapproval at the inability of his son-in-law to get his debts under control, let alone run his estate profitably.
  

In spite of his dire financial circumstances, Charles Gordon, 11th Marquis of Huntly, did not moderate his personal style of living, entertaining lavishly, travelling abroad and continuing to hunt, shoot and fish.  He also enjoyed the turf, owning a number of racehorses.  Charles Gordon was an inveterate gambler, both on horse races and at cards and reputedly not a successful one.  Charles, who had been a friend of the Prince of Wales since university days, was his frequent companion across the green baize.   Sir William did not approve of Lord Huntly’s expensive habits and, when chided by friends for spending lavishly on the Glen Tana estate, said “I find my money is better spent in this way than going over horses’ tails or packs of cards.”  This looks like a barbed allusion to his son-in-law’s gambling losses.

WCB negotiates a new lease to Glen Tana

After leasing Glen Tana for the hunting season of 1869, WCB seems to have negotiated for a longer lease, which was prepared but not executed.  By 1871 William Brooks wanted a lifelease to the property but the entailment of the Huntly estates was apparently seen as an obstacle, so the Marquis of Huntly granted a lease for 20 years, or for William Brooks’ life, or for Huntly’s own life.  This lease history clearly shows that WCB’s long-term commitment to Glen Tana was made within 2 years of his initial visit in 1869.

Disposal of the 11th Marquis of Huntly's assets
After 1880 the trustees of the Aboyne estate were almost constantly selling off or leasing estate assets in order to recover the debts owed by Charles Gordon, the 11th Marquis of Huntly.  Since the estate had become disentailed in 1876, it was then open to the trustees to sell the land.  However, Britain was in the midst of a major agricultural recession and land values had dropped significantly.  The Aboyne estate was put up for sale at auction in 1885 but there were no bidders.  The following year the estate was again offered, unsuccessfully, for sale.  In 1887 the process was repeated but there were no acceptable bids, even for portions of the estate.  The trustees of the Aboyne estate must have been aware that there was one person in the district, William Cunliffe Brooks, who could afford to buy the estate and who had pressing personal reasons to interest him in Aboyne Castle and its policies and the Glen Tana estate.  At one stage during his tenancy, the trustees proposed to cut down some trees in Glen Tana but William paid them £10,000 not to do so, which may have made him a hostage to fortune.

WCB buys Aboyne Castle
William Brooks did not at the time own any property, though he held Barlow Hall, near Manchester, a house in Antibes in the South of France (which may have been designed by George Truefitt), a house in Grosvenor Square, London and Glen Tana estate on leasehold.  This was a principled stance by an astute money man. He judged that the capital value of these assets would be likely to depreciate in the coming years.  He resented buying Lord Huntly’s patrimonie for the benefit of his creditors but he also worried that his daughter, Amy, Marchioness of Huntly, who did not enjoy good health, might lose her home.  She added to the pressure on her father by writing, telling him that to live at Aboyne was the dearest object of her life.  WCB was not a man used to being pressured and his irritation was intense but eventually, in 1888, he bought Aboyne Castle and some surrounding land, which was then leased to Amy for one shilling a year, with an undertaking that she could reside there for life.  WCB’s will repeated this undertaking to Amy (but not to Lord Huntly) and obliged any new owner to maintain this burden.  In a letter from WCB to his Edinburgh solicitors, Messers Adam, he wrote “I know I must submit, but I feel very keenly what has happened – forced to buy an estate I did not care for, as the only means of restoring my dear daughter to the home which her husband had given up to creditors which he had created since his marriage.” 

The sale of Aboyne Castle did not solve Charles Gordon’s financial problems and the trustees of his estate, emboldened by their success with the castle sale, clearly sought to repeat the tactic with Glen Tana.  WCB’s lease to Glen Tana was due to expire about 1891 and he was again vulnerable to pressure.  Lord Huntly wrote to his father-in-law offering a renewal of the lease of Glen Tana but WCB wrote back refusing the offer and saying that he did not want to take a liferent to the property or to burden himself with a sporting estate.  However, it was the generally-held opinion of those who knew him that this was an empty threat and that he would not leave Glen Tana, which had become his home and his main interest in life. 

WCB buys the Glen Tana Estate
The Huntly trustees were ever-present in the background and WCB clearly viewed them as leeches.  He said that he could not make his home at Glen Tana if any other man bought it, in effect admitting that he would have to buy the estate to secure his future there.  He was also thinking about his succession.  He had hoped that his second wife, Jane, would live there after his death (she was much younger than WCB) but she did not wish to do so, which he said hurt him, perhaps because it showed that she did not fully share his commitment to the glen.  His thoughts then turned to his elder grandson, Ean Cecil, child of his younger daughter Edith.  His other daughter Amy, Marchioness of Huntly had no children and Ean would be his senior grandson.  But how could he get around the trustees, who were hoping he would eventually cave in and pay over the odds in a depressed market?  WCB made a half-hearted attempt to bid by proxy for the Glen Tana estate at auction in Edinburgh.  He was deeply antagonised by the pressure being exerted on him and hoped to secure the property at a more moderate price.  He then wrote to George Stewart, whom he had employed as clerk of works and general foreman at Glen Tana for 4 ½ years from 1870 and again for 1 ½ years from 1876, asking him to go to Edinburgh to bid on WCB’s behalf for Glen Tana.  There was obviously a significant level of trust and confidence between the two men.    Stewart was told to make no bid to begin with, but if anyone made a bid of £70,000, he might go up to £100,000 but that bid was only to be made at the last moment.  In the event, no offer was made for the property by anyone else, and Stewart then offered £60,000.  The offer was rejected and the reason given was that WCB had already offered £100k!  WCB eventually succumbed to his anxieties and bought Glen Tana for £120,000 in 1891, though he said he did so “with a knife at his throat”.  This was probably a reference to a letter he had received from the Huntly trustees giving him 10 days in which to make up his mind about the purchase, before they sold to a third party.  The news that William Cunliffe Brooks had bought Glen Tana must have been followed by a collective sigh of relief from the citizenry of the area and not least from Aboyne castle.

WCB begins his succession planning
Succession considerations also led to WCB buying the smaller estates of Ferrar and Gellan for £27,000 in 1899, which also belonged to the Marquis of Huntly, but lay on the north bank of the Dee, contiguous with the land Brooks now owned around Aboyne Castle.  He discussed the proposed purchase with Mr Milligan of his Aberdeen agents, Davidson and Garden.  WCB told Milligan that he proposed to leave his landholdings on the north side of the Dee to one of his grandsons.  At the time his intention was to leave these estates to Richard Cecil, the younger brother of Ean.  Milligan’s advice was to buy, so that WCB could add to the land around Aboyne castle which, at about 7,000 acres, was a bit limited.

The Chapel of St Lesmo
After the urgent work of summer 1869 to extend Woodend House, WCB’s next major project was to build the Chapel of St Lesmo in Glen Tana, incorporating an arch from a ruin, formerly a shooting box used by the Marquises of Huntly.  The total cost of the chapel was about £3,500.  William Cunliffe Brooks was a very religious man who had become a sidesman, then churchwarden, in Manchester by the early age of 26.  Morning prayers were part of his daily routine throughout life, so perhaps it was not surprising that creating his own place of worship should have been a high priority in the development of his northern idyll. The chapel was consecrated by the Episcopal Bishop of Aberdeen and Orkney early in January 1871.  Immediately after the consecration Mr Deakin and Miss Thomas, a Manchester couple, were married in St Lesmo’s.
  

WCB's daughter Ethel marries Lord Francis Cecil
St Lesmo’s Chapel was used for weekly worship by the servants at Glen Tana and by William Brooks when he was in residence.  It was also used for family religious occasions, though perhaps with lukewarm enthusiasm by some.  In September 1874 it was reported in the Aberdeen Journal that WCB’s younger daughter, Ethel, would marry Lord Francis Cecil, the second son of the Marquis of Exeter, at St Lesmo’s in a few weeks, but the marriage actually took place in London on 14th October 1874.   When WCB remarried to Miss Jane Davidson in 1879, the ceremony did take place at St Lesmo’s, though the new Mrs Brooks had wished to marry in either Edinburgh or London.  It appears that WCB’s opinion of the joys of the remote, bijoux St Lesmo’s Chapel was not shared by all those close to him.
  

By the time of Edith Brooks’ wedding in 1874, WCB’s elder daughter, Amy, had been married to Charles Gordon, 11th Marquis of Huntly, for five years but no pregnancy had yet been achieved. WCB must have been delighted when Edith and Francis Cecil quickly produced daughters in 1875, 1876 and 1879. However, William must have been both delighted and relieved when Edith produced two sons, Ean and Richard, in 1880 and 1882. WCB had a strong urge to plan ahead and especially to deal with his succession.  His two sons by his first wife had died soon after birth, so his succession planning had necessarily centred on his sons-in-law and his two grandsons.  However, WCB must have been questioning Charles Gordon’s ability to manage anything by the mid-1870s.  Charles had produced no heir and his inadequate commercial abilities had been confirmed.  WCB then seems to have turned his attention from Charles Gordon to his other son-in-law, Lord Francis Cecil.
 

Lord Francis Cecil suffers an early demise
Lord Francis Cecil was the second son of the Marquis of Exeter.  He lived at Stocken Hall, Rutland, which was located not far from Orton Longueville, the Marquis of Huntly’s English estate.  This proximity may have been the conduit by which Lord Cecil and Edith Brooks met.  Cecil pursued a career in the Royal Navy, which he entered at the age of 14 in 1865.  He was promoted to lieutenant in 1874 and flag lieutenant to the Commander-in-Chief at Devonport in 1878.  His military career did not make much progress and he left the Navy in 1884. In 1877 WCB introduced him as a partner in Cunliffe, Brooks & Co.  Up to that time WCB had been the sole partner in the bank, though he had given up day-to-day management in 1869 to his nephew John Brooks.  The report in the Aberdeen Journal stated that Lord Cecil "will take an active share in the management of the bank."  Sadly, this succession plan at the bank quickly fell apart.  It turned out that Lord Cecil would have been an ideal candidate for membership of the Drones Club.  All the Navy had done for him was to give him an addiction to sailing.  He spent the £30,000 his father had settled on him at marriage on buying a 40-ton racing cutter, the Sleuthhound, fitting her out, racing her and entertaining friends lavishly.  He depended on his wife, Edith, to pay for the upkeep of Stocken Hall, which was rented, from the £200,000 marriage settlement from her father.  In 1889 Lord Cecil was declared bankrupt.  At the proceedings he was described as a “Gentleman of no occupation”.  He had gross liabilities of more than £22,000, mostly unsecured and only about £300 of assets, essentially the net second hand value of Sleuthhound.  Some months before Lord Cecil’s bankruptcy he suffered a serious medical event which incapacitated him to the extent that he could not attend court for his examination in bankruptcy.  Death followed in June 1889 at the age of 38.  The most generous thing that the local newspaper could say of him in its obituary was that “….he was a man of many parts, and was much liked by those with whom he came in contact.”

Succession planning at the Bank
In 1888 WCB assumed his nephews Samuel Burd Brooks and John Brooks Clive Brooks as partners.  The reason for this move may have been that Lord Cecil was already ill, but it is also likely that the sailing Lord’s introduction to the bank had not been a success.  At WCB’s request both the new partners assumed the surname “Brooks”, so the perpetuation of the “Brooks” name seems to have mattered to William.  However, William Cunliffe Brooks remained firmly in control.  He owned 80% of the equity in the bank compared with 10% owned by each of his nephews. The 11th Marquis of Huntly wrote "It was his evident intention in his will that his banking business should descend to his nephews and be continued as a private bank: he was always telling me that trades preferred dealing with such instead of with a joint stock concern and a board of directors.  He was excessively proud of Brook & Co being the last private bank in Manchester and the neighbourhood.

George Truefitt is commissioned to carry out further projects
George Truefitt’s next major design for WCB was Fasnadarroch House, a fishing lodge on the South Deeside road west of the entrance to Glen Tana.  It was built in 1874, the year of Edith Brooks’ marriage to Francis Cecil and may have been a wedding present to the pair, though WCB retained ownership.  The house passed into the ownership of the Edith, Lady Francis Cecil, in 1900 by operation of WCB’s will dealing with his Scottish assets.  She had it extended for her use in 1901, when she could no longer stay at Glen Tana House, which had been leased by the trustees of WCB’s estate to Mr George Coats.  After the completion of St Lesmo’s Chapel and Fasnadarroch House, WCB embarked on a seemingly endless series of projects on the Glen Tana estate.  A photographic album, which belonged to George Truefitt, survives containing drawings of the house, dated from 1875 to 1885.  At this period Queen Victoria visited Glen Tana to look over the house.  Sadly, WCB was absent at the time but Truefitt was in attendance.  The Queen took a picnic tea while she was there and Truefitt marked the location with a carved stone, inscribed “The Queen’s Seat, 1874”. 

WCB’s manner of working was to employ an enormous number of day-labourers and craftsmen, variously estimated at 200 – 300, almost continuously to deliver his plans.  He closely supervised the work from start to finish.  This style of micro-management often led to the plans being changed during delivery and must have been frustrating for his architect.  However, the achievement of personal satisfaction was his overriding priority and cost did not seem to matter. When WCB was engrossed in a development project, he sometimes did not come home to dinner.  Late in the year, as the weather deteriorated, he would carry on with his projects until outside work had to stop.  Then he would sometimes go to his house in Antibes for a break.  His annual expenditure on Glen Tana was estimated by several people closely associated with the work and by Brooks himself at £20,000 per year.  The bills were all settled by the Manchester bank.  In 1877 an article in the Aberdeen Journal praised WCB for making such marked improvements to Glen Tana, describing the shooting lodge as “one of the finest residences in the North”.  It noted that there were now more deer and more people living in the glen than previously, that the roads had been improved, that arable land was now protected from game by high fencing and that the houses of the tenantry had been modernised.  It was also in this year that operations had begun to further extend Glen Tana House by the construction of a grand ballroom and a bowling alley, to the plans of George Truefitt.  By 1890 Glen Tana House was very large and magnificently appointed, though its overall architectural appearance lacked proportion, with a forest of turrets and chimneys.  This effect probably resulted from the fact that the house had grown like Topsy over a period of 20 years.

Adjoining the house and supporting its function as a palatial home and venue for entertaining and impressing guests, many other facilities were built by WCB, often incorporating the latest technology.  Again, cost was not a constraint.  In addition to accommodation in the house, there was a separate building, called “The Barracks”, for guests which containing 12 bedrooms, and stables for at least 18 horses.  These two facilities were estimated to have cost £15,000. Brooks kept 12 horses and about 12 carriages of various sorts for the transport of himself and his guests.  Other houses and shooting lodges cost about £26,000, a riding room near the stables £12,000, a blacksmith’s shop £600, a joiner’s workshop £800, kennels and cottages £3,500 and deer and other fences £10,000.

The ornamental gardens at Glen Tana were almost entirely the creation of WCB, assisted from 1898 by the landscape architect Thomas Mawson.  Brooks also obtained the skeleton of a 40ft Greenland whale, which he kept in the grounds.  The artificial lake existed from before Brooks’ time but it is thought that he added some ponds, possibly for the rearing of salmon.  WCB also formed a 50 acre meadow on low ground in view of the house, called the Deer Sanctuary, which was trenched, levelled and sowed and where the deer were not hunted.  This feature could be irrigated by cisterns, fed by springs through iron pipes, for when the weather was dry in summer.  Sewage from the Home Farm steading and the houses was added to these cisterns, to improve the fertility of the land in the Sanctuary.  The idea for this utilisation of sewage was probably derived from the irrigation farm created to treat the sewage of Aboyne before it entered the Dee.
William Brooks also introduced a turbine for powering a threshing machine at Home Farm and a dynamo to supply electricity to Glen Tana House, both water-driven.

In the earlier part of his occupation of Glen Tana, WCB expended money mostly on the house and amenities around the house, but latterly his attention and expenditure shifted more to the farm houses and farm buildings on the estate.  Pierre Fouin, who was born in Glen Tana, has made a detailed study of the buildings and other artefacts constructed in the district by Brooks.  Although it is known that some farm buildings received attention before 1890, the year that Brooks bought Glen Tana, it is clear from the dates carved into farm buildings in the glen that work on these structures proceeded with particular intensity from 1890 onwards.  The ornamentation used was unique to farm houses in Scotland.  In the case of Corntulloch farm on the Glen Tana estate, which appears to have been completed in 1894, Aboyne photographer, R Milne, took “before” and “after” pictures.  The original farm was an attached building with the house and steading combined but the new structure had a separate house enclosed by a wall.

Tower of Ess and Glen Tana School
About 1887 WCB built the Tower of Ess at the entrance to the Glen Tana estate from the South Deeside road, clearly intending to make a statement to visitors and guests about the important status of the place they were about to enter.  Further work was carried out in the same area in 1894 to widen the Bridge of Ess and realign its approaches, all paid for by WCB.  In 1896 WCB commissioned George Truefitt to design a new school and schoolmaster’s house for Glen Tana, which was built at a cost of £2,600.  It is situated on the South Deeside road, near to the entrance to Glen Tana at the Bridge and Tower of Ess. The cornerstone of the new building was laid by Lady Brooks at the end of October of that year.  She was presented with a silver trowel by Francis Sandison, Provost of Aboyne and landlord of the Huntly Arms hotel, to mark the occasion.  The school was officially opened by WCB on the last day of December 1897.

WCB extends and renovates Aboyne Castle and builds the "Coo Cathedral"
In 1888, much against his instinct and inclination, WCB had bought Aboyne Castle in order to secure it as a home for his elder daughter, Amy.  Despite his negative feelings concerning the purchase of the Aboyne estate, he immediately set about upgrading the castle and its facilities as he had previously done with Glen Tana.  Over the next decade it is estimated that WCB spent over £35,000 on the castle and its amenities.  George Truefitt was again the architect employed to draw up the plans.  In addition to extensive re-modelling of the castle itself, the approaches to both sides of the castle were re-made and re-worked.  An avenue of trees was planted from the village to the castle, new lodges were built at both east and west entrances and boundary walls improved.  Most of Aboyne village was within the Aboyne estate and Brooks was also responsible for the construction of new buildings there, such as buildings in The Square, adjacent to the railway station and Birse Lodge.  He also fenced the Green in the centre of Aboyne.

Truefitt was also responsible, in 1889, for the design of a large cattle steading near the Castle.  In his speech at the celebratory dinner after completion of the project, the Marquis of Huntly said “I have been rather chaffed in connection with this beautiful building in which we are now assembled, and which is one of the marks that Sir William will leave.  It has been called, by those who delight to chaff, a cow cathedral, (Laughter)…”.   “Coo Cathedral” is the Doric nickname of the building, which sticks even today. It was 205 ft by 85 ft, built of granite and cost £6000.  It could accommodate 40 cows and several pedigree bulls.  It also contained a granary, turnip shed and the head cattleman's house.  Its floors were of concrete and a tramway for carrying cattle food ran down the middle of the building.  When the work had been completed, WCB entertained 300 workmen from the Aboyne and Glen Tana estates to dinner, which was held in the steading.  Each workman received a Christmas present of a half pound of tea, together with a Christmas card.

The “Coo Cathedral” must have been constructed for the accommodation of the Marquis of Huntly’s herd of Aberdeen-Angus cattle and both WCB and Lord Huntly are known to have had some input into the design of the building.  The herd known, locally as “Doddies”, was the Marquis’ pride and joy.  He was a well-known breeder of these cattle, a frequent winner of prizes at agricultural shows and the first president of the Aberdeen-Angus Society.  However, because of the Marquis’s financial embarrassments, there had been frequent sales of cattle from his herd in recent years to raise funds.  The herd was still in existence at the date that the “Coo Cathedral” was built but it would finally be dispersed in 1899 after Charles Gordon’s bankruptcy.  This grand cattle shed typified the Brooks approach, with the structure being wildly over-designed and over-engineered for its purpose and for a tenant who paid no rent!   It could not at the time have been viable as a commercial investment, though the present owner, the 13th Marquis of Huntly, must be pleased to have it, as it has been pressed into use as an attractive wedding venue!

WCB overrides his friends' advice
Several of WCB’s friends and professional advisers, over the years, counselled him against his expenditure on elaborate and therefore expensive estate buildings.  Mr G Walker, who surveyed the Glen Tana estate in 1883, told Brooks that his tenants could not afford to pay interest on such buildings.  Admiral Sir Arthur Farquhar, his friend who lived at Drumnagesk, told him he would not get a return on his money and Sir Allan McKenzie, his landed neighbour in Glen Muick to the west, told him he was making a mistake putting up fine buildings in the countryside.  Brooks was perfectly well aware of this fact.  At the celebratory dinner on the inauguration of the “Coo Cathedral”, he quoted from his father, Samuel and then elaborated on his own approach “"Take care William, it’s a very expensive amusement.” (Laughter and cheers) Now he was a very great man, and I imitate him as much as I can, but there is one remarkable feature which I cannot compass.  He was always willing to spend the present shilling to get the future guinea; I spend the shilling, but I don’t get the future guinea (Loud laughter and cheers) But at the same time, I do get that which is better than all the guineas in the world – the power of doing an immense amount of good in the district in which I live.”  (Cheers)
  

WCB remarries to Jane Davidson
In 1877, Lt Col Sir David Davidson and his family went to live in a villa near to Glen Tana. Inevitably William Cunliffe Brooks, whose first wife had died in 1865, met Jane, Sir David’s daughter.  In spite of a significant difference in age, they were attracted to each other and married in 1879, when William was 59 and Jane was 27.  Sometime during the marriage, WCB put £50,000 in trust to provide an income for Jane during her life, in the event that she survived her husband and to hold the capital for any children of the marriage. The marriage produced no children.

WCB's increasing commitment to Glen Tana
William Cunliffe Brooks had a great love of entertaining, of charitable works, of showing off his achievements and of supporting causes and institutions with which he was in sympathy.  These separate categories often overlapped with each other and WCB’s pursuit of them had been evident throughout his adult life and all his places of residence.  Progressively after 1869, when he first leased Glen Tana, WCB spent more and more of each year living in the glen, as his interest in politics and the bank waned as his commitment to the Glen Tana project intensified.  Between 1894 and 1899 he spent, on average, 13 days/year at Barlow Hall, Manchester, 41 days at Grosvenor Square, London and 267 days at Glen Tana.  Jane, his new wife supported him enthusiastically in his socialising.  Above the door to Glen Tana House was an inscription in Latin, which WCB happily translated for guests - “The door is open but the heart is more so”.  WCB was in his element!  To the people of Aboyne and district it must have appeared that most of WCB’s expenditure was in their area.  However, between 1891 and 1900 WCB donated more than £12,000 to charities in England, compared with £1,300 in Scotland.  Aboyne folks probably did not know and could not grasp just how wealthy he was, his income from the bank being £30,000 - £50,000 per year and his income from estates around Manchester bringing in another £20,000 per year.
 

WCB's charitable works
Lord Rosslyn rather acidly christened William Brooks “BB” which he said stood for “bursting with benevolence”.  Brooks was a rather rotund figure and his record of giving was both extensive and very public.  He had a fondness for children, travelling around the Aboyne district with a pocketful of sweets, in case he should come across youngsters in his peregrinations.  In 1896, WCB gave an 1895 issue penny to every scholar at Aboyne Public School via Rev Gray, the headmaster.  Even before he became proprietor of Glen Tana, WCB and his wife had been in the habit of entertaining the local schoolchildren to a soiree and Christmas tree.  In 1891, the first year with WCB as owner of Glen Tana, it was on an unusually large scale, being held in the ballroom, with tea being served in the adjacent bowling alley.  A separate celebration for the 36 Inchmarnoch children was held on Hogmanay.  Each child at Glen Tana and Inchmarnoch received a present of a winter cloak and two interesting books, a cravat and a pair of mittens.  In those days winter in the glen could be severe.  In 1892 WCB laid on a production of Cinderella for the children of both Glen Tana Public School and Dinnet Sabbath School.  Similarly, in 1893, local children were treated to tea in the bowling alley and entertainment with a magic lantern in the music room.  Each received a present appropriate to his or her age.  However, WCB could not resist impressing his guests. On display on the billiards table were over 300 Christmas cards and presents sent by friends.  He revelled in his popularity.

WCB was also a regular supporter of medical charities, such as Manchester and Salford Lying-in Hospital for Diseases of Women and Children, Blackburn Infirmary Building Fund, The National Orthopaedic Hospital and Aberdeen Hospital for Incurables.  He did not generally support individuals but he made an exception in the case of Thomas Taylor's Relief Fund, of which he was appointed treasurer in 1852. Thomas Taylor would have been described as a member of the deserving poor.  He had a disabled daughter and an aged wife, who were dependent on him and, when he lost his sight at the age of 65, he had no means of supporting his family.  For nearly 40 years "he was actively engaged after hours in counselling and advising the working classes to habits of temperance, frugality and thriftiness."  WCB clearly thought him a worthy case.

Another popular theme to Brooks’ benevolence was the provision of new schools and churches, especially in areas of Manchester developed by Brooks, pere et fils, contributions to church repair funds and contributions to educational and self-help organisations, such as Manchester Free Library and Pendleton Mechanics Institution.  He also supported the Gordon Highlanders, the local regiment in Aberdeenshire and local military Volunteers.  In 1895, WCB arranged at his own expense for a lecturer on chicken keeping, Mr Birch, the poultry expert from Cheshire County Council, to come up from England to help local farmers in the Aboyne area, who were suffering from the agricultural depression, to find a new source of income.  Also in 1895 he donated £1000 to the Aberdeen University Extension Scheme, which was being fronted by his son-in-law, Lord Huntly, then Lord Rector of the University.

William Cunliffe Brooks was very keen on country sports, which was the reason for his first visit to Scotland.  At Glen Tana he and his many guests enjoyed mainly deer stalking, grouse shooting and salmon fishing.  Newspaper reports of the results of these activities give the impression that the size of the kill was the main objective, mass slaughter frequently being the outcome of a day’s sport.  As a result WCB had abundant supplies of grouse, venison and salmon and he often made gifts from the haul to needy organisations or others that he supported.  For example, he would send both salmon and 10 dozen bottles of wine to Cheetham Hill Bowling Club, Manchester, where he was the Father of the Club, for their annual dinners.  He distributed venison to the poor and others in the Aboyne locality, often several times in a season and at Christmas,1898, WCB presented each of the railway station officials at Aboyne with a haunch of Red Deer venison.  William Brooks was opposed to the public having free access to roam the hills, because of the potential to disrupt deer stalking.  The “Access to Mountains Bill” was at that time wending its way through Parliament.  A stinging letter was published in the Aberdeen Journal complaining about the negative impacts of exclusion on the traditional collection of blueberries by local people and the discouragement of the growing Aboyne tourist trade.  Perhaps as a result of this letter, he opened the hills on the Glen Tana estate for a day or two each autumn to allow locals to pick berries.

William Brooks was ever mindful of the needs of the sick and poor in the district and annually made a donation of funds, usually £10, to each church minister in Aboyne and Dinnet for distribution to needy members of the congregation.  Although he was an adherent of the Church of England, he treated all Christian denominations (Church of Scotland, Free Church and Roman Catholic Church) equally.  In late 1879, WCB authorised Mr Ogg, bank agent, Aboyne, to supply the poor in Aboyne and neighbourhood with provisions which he considered necessary for the time.  Tea, sugar, bread and coals were distributed.  His Glen Tana housekeeper was instructed to write to him each day he was away giving a report on the status of sick people in the glen. 

WCB and mid-Deeside social life
WCB was a generous and frequent entertainer.  Indeed, Glen Tanar House was well equipped with guest bedrooms and the means to entertain both lavishly and for large numbers.  His sporting friends, some local, many from a distance, often stayed with him for long periods of time.  The Glen Tana estate lands included fishing on the Dee all the way from Ballater to Aboyne and possessed some of the best salmon pools on the river.  Throughout the season WCB gave many entertainments, such as garden parties, tennis parties and croquet parties.  The artificial lake was used for curling in winter and the curlers were usually entertained after a session.  He was a member of the Aboyne Curling Club and donated to it every year.  Dr Farquharson, the local MP, confirmed the importance of WCB’s social role when he said Glen Tana was the pivot around which the social life of the district revolved.

WCB the public figure
William Cunliffe Brooks derived great joy from public adulation.  He was never more  happy than when he was opening a public event, such as a church bazaar or the annual Aboyne flower show held at the same as the Aboyne Highland Games in early September.  Every such occasion was an opportunity for him to address the public, often humorously but, on occasions, on serious issues of a political nature.  No opportunity was missed to hold a celebration and his generosity was always to the fore, often accompanied by his bon mots.  The completion of a building, such as the “Coo Cathedral”, summer picnics for servants and employees, an annual Ghillies’ Ball, Christmas celebrations for local children, the introduction of a turbine-driven threshing machine, all were opportunities for WCB to shower largesse on the locals, whether by presents, dinners, magic lantern shows or balls and he seemed to derive genuine pleasure from the process.  Of course the local society was one dominated by a few large landowners, even before his arrival and the lower orders “knew their place” and knew how to curry favour with the landed proprietors, pouring adulation on their wealthy betters at every opportunity.  WCB readily joined the top of this social pyramid and played the part with ease.  He even aped his Scottish landed neighbours to some extent.  In 1878 he engaged Charles Ewen as his piper, a role Ewen fulfilled until Brooks’ death.  Every morning Ewen, dressed in Gordon tartan, would inflate his bagpipes on the dot of seven and march around Glen Tana House noisily to announce the start of a new and inevitably busy day.

Important family events were always occasions for celebration, lubricated on the one hand by Brooks’ money and on the other hand by public adulation.  In late 1875, Lord Francis Cecil, his wife Edith and their baby daughter, Ethel Frances Sophia, made a first visit to Glen Tana since their marriage, arriving to much cheering and waving by both locals and estate workers.  On Thursday 4th November, they were entertained to a grand ball and supper, with 500 guests, given by the tenants, servants and workmen at Glen Tana in a marquee erected close to Glen Tana House.  On the following Monday WCB threw another ball in return for the one given by staff.  When WCB married Jane Davidson in 1879, the citizens of Aboyne presented him with an illuminated address and a silver claret jug.  In return, he entertained his tenantry to dinner in a marquee on the Green.

Baronetcy bestowed on WCB
William Cunliffe Brooks finally received the public recognition he probably most craved when in February 1886 the Queen bestowed a baronetcy on him.  This award was not related to his work on the Glen Tana estate or his charitable work in either England or Scotland, or his commercial success with Cunliffe, Brooks & Co, but for political work for the Conservative Party in Lancashire. Ironically, this was the part of his career from which he derived least pleasure.  On Friday 12th February, 60 of WCB's servants, tenants and labourers assembled in the evening at Glen Tana House to testify their appreciation at the award of a baronetcy to their laird.  In spite of the snow they constructed a bonfire on the summit of Creag-na-Sleage, a nearby hill and lit it at 7.30pm.  A reception was then held in the ballroom and everyone drank to the health of Sir William and Lady Brooks.  Dancing followed and was kept up to an early hour.  His baronetcy was also celebrated by the presentation of addresses by the principal tradesmen of Aberdeen, who clearly derived much business from Glen Tana and by the inhabitants of Dinnet and Aboyne.  The somewhat gushing addresses were presented in the billiards room by the Rev Michie, Minister at Dinnet, Rev Andrew Gray, schoolmaster, Aboyne and Mr John Hay of Messers Hay and Lyall, Aberdeen.  Luncheon in the ballroom followed the eulogising.

WCB the Royalist
WCB was staunchly royalist and must have regretted being away from the glen when the Queen dropped in on her neighbour in 1874.  William Brooks was a staunch supporter of the Primrose League, formed in 1883 to promote God, the Monarchy, the Empire and Conservative values and he hosted  the annual meeting of the local branch (“Habitation”), which was always well attended, at Glen Tana for many years.  The League was very popular and had attracted over 1 million members nationally by 1900.  Eighteen eighty seven was the year of the Queen’s Jubilee.  She had been on the throne for 50 years and celebrations were held in every city, town and village in the land.  WCB laid on a picnic for 600 guests at Glen Tana and presented every guest with a Jubilee medal.  Sir William and Lady Brooks must have been very proud when they were invited to attend the Queen’s Garden Party at Buckingham Palace in July 1896. In the next year WCB paraded his royalist credentials on the occasion of Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee, when he sent a book on the life of the monarch to every child in the public schools of the Aboyne area.

WCB and the mid-Deeside economy
The constant employment of 200 – 300 men from the neighbourhood over a period of 30 years must have had an enormous impact on the economic well-being of Aboyne and its environs, since most employed men, in turn, supported a wife and family.  The population of the parish of Aboyne and Glen Tana was only about 1,200.  It is easy to understand why Sir William was so popular, since the area became almost addicted to the benefits of WCB’s seemingly never-ending projects.  In 1894 Sir William and Lady Brooks took a long holiday, travelling by boat to the West Indies.  There was some anxiety during this absence, probably because projects started to dry up and consequently employment declined.  Their return in April 1894 was marked by the presentation of yet another illuminated address by Provost Sandison at Aboyne railway station in recognition of his many good works, including the recent provision of a public water supply to Aboyne.  Referring to the stream of improvements at Glen Tana, Francis Sandison said, “They have been the means of bringing bread, health and happiness to the fireside of many a hard-working man.”   WCB’s son-in-law, Charles Gordon declined an invitation to the event saying that he had “three important committee meetings in Aberdeen” that day.  Perhaps he could not stand being overshadowed by his nouveau riche father-in-law?   In 1896, WCB’s importance in creating employment in the area was acknowledged by another local landowner, Sir John Clarke, Laird of Tillypronie, on the occasion of WCB opening a bazaar and Highland gathering in support of the Logie-Coldstone Public Hall Fund.  He said that Sir William was well-known up and down the Dee valley but especially by those "twa-mile roun' Dinnet Brig", across which the workmen employed in connection with his innumerable improvements might be seen returning home to Cromar on their bicycles in the evenings.

In early 1900, Sir William and Lady Brooks took an extended stay of more than 3 months at Barlow Hall in Manchester, which was not usual and their absence was noted locally in Aboyne.  Some of his joiners were first paid off, so he knew he would be away for some time. The Aberdeen Journal commented, "They had been absent since January and the Glen was getting dull without them.  The genial baronet has for long been the backbone of Aboyne and surrounding district." and “The return of Sir William and his good lady to Glen Tana is anxiously looked for by not a few”.

WCB's personality
WCB had a complex personality.  On the one hand he was highly intelligent, sociable, generous, caring, highly individualistic and very successful in business but, on the other hand, he was a workaholic, a micromanager, overly sensitive to criticism, autocratic, arrogant, insensitive to advice and never apologised directly, seeing it as a mark of weakness.  He had a short temper and often made threats in the heat of the moment which, when the red mist passed from his eyes, he did not deliver, for example declaring he would sell Glen Tana and buy the Isle of Arran if he did not get his way over the siting of the Aboyne Isolation Hospital.  He also gave contradictory statements to different people, such as the location of his desired place of burial.  A good example of his arrogance concerned the spelling of place names in the glen.  Probably with no more knowledge of the Gaelic than access to a Gaelic dictionary, he proclaimed that Glen Taner (or Tanar), which has no meaning in Gaelic, should actually be “Tana”, meaning “shallow” and that the corruption was due to “Cockneydom”.   Similarly, with Bridge of Ess at the entry to the glen, he asserted that the spelling should be “Eas” (ravine in Gaelic), not “Ess” (ash in Gaelic), another alleged corruption by southerners!  Although he was indulged by almost everyone in his idiosyncratic spellings at the time, including the Aberdeen Journal, his assertions did not survive his death.  Pointedly, his son-in-law, the 11th Marquis of Huntly, in his autobiography “Milestones” used the spelling “Glentanar” thoughout, except for slipping up once, when he used Brooks’ spelling “Tana”!

As time went on, WCB’s personality changed.  His wealth and his pleasure at exercising power progressively turned him into a despot and he increasingly fell out with friends, often over relatively trivial matters.  The Marquis of Huntly warned him that, as a result, he was becoming surrounded by slaves and sycophants.  From about 1898 he had visibly lost his vivacity and bonhomie and he seemed depressed.  As his landscape architect, Mr Mawson, found it did not take much to put Sir William in a foul mood.  During a dispute with the Deeside District Committee over the siting of the Aboyne Isolation Hospital, Sir William abandoned truth and rational argument when the case started to go against him, resorting instead to lies and distortions, pressure on tenants to back him and the writing of letters to the Aberdeen Journal supporting himself, but written under a series of pseudonyms.  It was a sad descent from the heights of achievement he had reached as a barrister and as a banker.

WCB's ill-health
William Cunliffe Brooks suffered from adult-onset diabetes for many years, as had his father, Samuel Brooks.  WCB was looked after by Aboyne GP, Dr Keith, who prescribed a strict diet to counteract the diabetic condition and the Marquis of Huntly ascribed WCB’s change of personality to the diet.  Today it seems much more likely that the causation was indeed the disease, which is now known to be linked to such conditions as Alzheimer’s Disease and vascular dementia.

Succession revisited
Succession was an issue which had bedevilled WCB for many years and his succession plan was repeatedly revised as various nominated successors proved to be not up to the tasks that he had mapped out for them.  When he finally arrived at grandson Ean Cecil as his nominated successor at Glen Tana, WCB, wanting him to be brought up carefully, warned him of the dangers of drink (WCB was hostile to the excess consumption of alcohol, though he kept well-stocked cellars at his residences) and made him take the pledge, clearly trying to equip him for the task of managing the precious Glen Tana estate.  As part of his succession planning, WCB wrote many wills, 260 according to his son-in-law, Charles Gordon, not all of which were implemented.  This excessive will-writing and, in his final will, the minute detail of his instructions to his executors and trustees, is reminiscent of his frequent changes to buildings during the course of construction.  He had advised Charles Gordon not to rewrite his will after the age of 70, only to rewrite his own will many times after that age!  Perhaps also WCB realised that his innings was coming to a close and he had only limited time to act.  This was the reason why he was unusually absent from Glen Tana for three months early in 1900, staying at Barlow Hall.  In fact he was writing and rewriting his wills with the active participation of his Manchester lawyer, Mr Wood, the final versions (there were two wills) both being dated 6th April 1900.  The Marquis of Huntly claimed that even after that date WCB drafted further wills of a different character, but they were not signed.

WCB falls victim to the Second Boer War celebrations
In the early months of 1900 the middle phase of the Second Boer War was coming to a conclusion in South Africa, with the relief of towns which had been under siege by the Boers.  Ean Cecil was serving there with the Lincolnshire Regiment and William Brooks had a keen interest in the progress of the fighting.  On Saturday 19th May, news reached Britain of the relief of Mafeking. In Aboyne flags were flown on many of the buildings and church bells were rung.  Baden-Powell and his comrades were praised everywhere.  A concert and dance were held in the evening and at 10 o’clock, “when night set in” there was a firework display on the Green, with many people present. Effigies of the Boer leaders Kruger and Steyn were burned in tar barrels and kicked all over the Green. Provost Sandison called for three cheers for “The Queen” and “The British Army” and the large crowd responded with enthusiasm.

About two weeks later, the news of the Battle of Paaderberg and the occupation of Pretoria by British forces under Lord Roberts reached Britain on Tuesday 5th June and WCB immediately contributed to the organisation of celebrations in Aboyne.  He gave orders for fuel to be collected from his woods for a bonfire on the Green the next day.  He also sent a large collection of fireworks for the celebrations.  After lighting a bonfire at Glen Tana, he and Lady Brooks and party drove to Aboyne and, at the request of Provost Sandison, he lit the bonfire there.  A large crowd of locals and summer visitors were present and this was an unmissable opportunity for WCB to give a rousing, patriotic speech.  He harangued the crowd, giving a history of the war, a critique of Government policy and praising the army.  WCB was loudly cheered and the National Anthem was sung with fervour.  He stayed for an hour, baking himself in front of the bonfire and then departed for Glen Tana in an open carriage.  WCB arrived home shivering and went to bed, but was unable to eat.  The following day his symptoms worsened.   Dr Keith was summoned but could do nothing for him and WCB died peacefully at 3pm on Saturday afternoon in the presence of Lady Brooks.  His son in law, Charles Gordon, rather uncharitably, said he was “a victim of his own foolhardiness”.

Funeral and aftermath
The funeral was held the following Thursday in St Lesmo’s Chapel at 2pm.  Bells were tolled in both the Established and Free churches and all shops in Aboyne were closed for the afternoon.  Thoughts of local people quickly turned to the impact WCB’s death would have on the district.  It was immediately clear that there would be a loss of employment for a good many workers and tradesmen in the district, leading to a loss of population, especially in Glen Tana.  Early in August WCB’s carriages and harness were sold. There was substantial interest in the sale and it took 7 carriages to carry all interested parties up the glen from Aboyne.  High prices were realised, in total about £500.  There was also much speculation about the contents of WCB’s will and who would inherit his wealth and property.

WCB's Wills
During discussions over many years on the content of his will, with both his Aberdeen and Manchester lawyers, two issues had repeatedly been raised.  Firstly, should he have one will or two, since the bank, of which he was the senior partner was located in England, along with substantial holdings of property, while the Glen Tana and Aboyne estates lay in Scotland?  Secondly, was he a domiciled Englishman or Scotsman, which would determine whether his will or wills would be interpreted under Scottish law or English law?  On the matter of domicile the advice received was clear; he was a domiciled Englishman, in spite of spending much of the year living in Scotland.  On the issue of the number of wills, he received conflicting advice.  Two wills would allow him to deal with his Scottish and English estates separately but could also lead to confusion and possibly challenge if there was any inconsistency between them.  After changing his mind several times WCB eventually plumped for two wills on the advice of his English lawyer, Mr Wood.

WCB had settled £200,000 on each of his daughters and their respective husbands on marriage, he said in his English Will “as their fortunes”.  Also, about 1898-99, he made a settlement of £50,000 on his second wife, Lady Brooks “for expenses consequential on my decease”, which yielded her an income of about £1500/year.  He had also made money gifts to many people, including servants, on reaching each successive birthday and in particular he made large gifts on his 70th and 80th anniversaries.  WCB repeatedly said that this pattern of giving was done with the intention of him enjoying seeing people deriving pleasure from his gifts while he was alive.

Sir William Brooks nominated the same five people as trustees and executors of both wills, his nephews Henry Brooks Gaskell, Frank Gaskell and Frank Tootal Broadhurst, his longstanding friend Tom Harrop Sidebottom, MP and his Manchester solicitor Henry Wood.  All accepted the role, except Edward Tootal Broadhurst, who renounced probate and its execution, probably realising that it would be an onerous role.  The gross value of WCB’s estate was almost £1,252,000.

Many specific items in the possession of WCB were bequeathed to relatives and friends and money gifts were made to his most important retainers at Glen Tana, his employees at the bank and his executors and trustees.  Of his closest relatives, Lady Brooks was left a signed photograph of Queen Victoria and Princess Beatrice, clothes, linen, paintings, silverware, wedding and personal presents, jewellery and furniture.  The Marchioness of Huntly received furniture, a marble bust of herself and books but most importantly, life residency, at no rent, of Aboyne Castle.  Lady Francis Cecil inherited pictures, furniture and crockery but most importantly, Fasnadarroch House and its surrounding land.  None of these three ladies, who had been central to WCB’s life, received any general share in his residual English and Scottish assets, which were considerable.

The Marquis of Huntly’s creditors were a constant source of irritation to WCB and were probably one of the reasons why he did not treat Amy Gordon and her husband more liberally.  He told his friend, Sir Arthur Farquhar, that he did not intend to leave the Marchioness of Huntly money on his death as he thought that interest of any money settled on Lady Huntly might go to “the Jews”, in Farquhar’s words.  This appears to be a reference to the Marquis’ creditors.

The residue of the English estate was left collectively in trust to his grandchildren, the children of daughter Edith, Lady Francis Cecil - Edith, Ethel, Violet, Ean and Richard Cecil and Esterel Tillard.  It was left in trust for the benefit of any or all the grandchildren on reaching the age of 21, or, in the case of the girls, marrying.  Advances could be made for the purposes of education, training or starting a business.  Additionally, Ean Cecil inherited the residue of WCB’s Scottish estate, essentially Aboyne Castle, Glen Tana and their surrounding lands and fishing rights, which would be conveyed to him in its entirety on him reaching the age of 25 in 1905.  Until that time, the income from these estates was for the benefit of Ean Cecil and his younger brother, Richard.

WCB's Wills cause unhappiness to his wife and elder daughter
The news of the contents of the two wills was badly received both at Glen Tana House and at Aboyne Castle.  The disgruntled daughter, Amy and the disgruntled wife, Jane, each raised actions in the Court of Sessions in Edinburgh, against the Will Trustees, to contest both wills on the grounds that William Cunliffe Brooks was a domiciled Scotsman and that his wills should therefore be determined under Scottish law.  The importance of this point lies in a fundamental difference between the two legal systems.  In England a person is free to leave his or her estate to whom ever he or she pleases, but in Scotland that freedom is partly curtailed.  If the Marchioness of Huntly could establish that her father was a domiciled Scot, she would have a right (legitime) to a defined share of 1/3 of WCB’s movable estate.  In the case of Lady Brooks she sought to establish that she had a right to jus relicti, a widow’s right, which had existed since 1881, to a defined share of ½ of her dead husband’s movable estate.  Interestingly, WCB’s other daughter, Edith did not join her sister and step-mother in mounting a challenge to the trustees of her father’s wills.  But then her interests had been well catered for.  She had inherited Fasnadarroch, all her children would share the bulk of WCB’s residual estate and her older son Ean, in addition, would inherit the Aboyne lands.

In his judgement of these actions, Lord Low came to the conclusion that the pursuer must prove not only that WCB had become Scottish by living at Glen Tana as his principal residence for 30 years but that he had sought to acquire his new status and actually abandon his old one.  He concluded that WCB had never relinquished his English domicile.  Residence alone was not sufficient to change domicile.  There must also be evidence of intention to give up the old domicile and acquire the new one.  He kept up his connection with England even though he lived most of the year at Glen Tana. Thus Lady Huntly and Lady Brooks lost their cases against the trustees of Sir William's estate, leaving them free to exercise their judgement in carrying out Sir William’s wishes.

The Glen Tana dream falls apart
William Cunliffe Brooks had wanted his bank, headquartered in Manchester, to continue with the involvement of his nephews.  However, he had invested his trustees with considerable powers to determine how his assets should be beneficially managed after his demise.  Within 2 weeks of the court case being settled, the trustees had sold the bank to Lloyds.  John Brooks was retained by the new owner as the manager of the Manchester branch and later became a main board member at Lloyds.  The second wish of WCB was that Ean Cecil, his senior grandson should continue to occupy and manage the Scottish estates.  The Glen Tana estate was quickly leased to Mr George Coates, the Paisley cotton thread magnate, which meant that Lady Brooks had to find somewhere else to live.  She had a house specially built for her in Aboyne, called “The Neuk”.  Engraved above the door was the motif “JCB” – shades of “WCB”, which was to be found in many places in the glen and in Aboyne!  In 1905, on Ean Cecil reaching the age of 25, Glen Tana was sold at auction in London, the buyer being George Coates.  In 1901 Lady Francis Cecil was living at Craigendinnie House on the south side of the Dee, while Fasnadarroch House was extended for her permanent use.

WCB was aware that future owners of Glen Tana might not share his vision.  When he addressed the workmen present at the inauguration of the “Coo Cathedral” he said “Now one word of caution to you.  You are in the summertime of your enjoyment of labour; but take care, be thrifty.  Take care of the money which is now being spent amongst you.  The fountain cannot always flow, and, unless someone comes after me to take up the running and the plans I have designed, it may be that labour will again be too abundant in these parts, and therefore I advise all of you workmen, much money as you may now be making – I pray you to be thrifty and reserve it for future times.”   Ean Cecil was not interested in continuing as the owner of Glen Tana and George Coates did not share William Brooks’ vision for the future of the glen.  Essentially development stopped with WCB’s death.  However, Coates did fund the building of an Episcopal Church in Aboyne in 1907.  His successor, Lord Glentana built the Recreation Hall on the estate in 1926 and upgraded the bedrooms of Glentana House in 1935 but much of the house was subsequently demolished in 1972, only the ballroom remaining today.  The house was simply no longer fit for purpose, being too big and too costly to maintain.  Thus WCB’s vision for Glen Tana essentially only survived for his period of residence, 1869 to 1900.

WCB's legacy
WCB told his piper, Charles Ewen that he wanted to be buried next to St Lesmo’s Chapel.  There was a large granite boulder in the grounds of the chapel, which had been taken out of the River Tana. Ewen understood that it was arranged between Brooks and Donald McIntosh, the head keeper, that whoever died first would have the boulder placed over his grave.  Donald McIntosh was the first to go and it was placed over his grave.  WCB  also said that he did not want a tombstone, with the words “If anyone wants to know who Sir William Cunliffe Brooks was, let him look around.”  Brooks felt that his legacy would survive in his works and that is true for today’s visitor – if he or she knows something of the glen’s history. Perhaps the final comment on Sir William Cunliffe Brooks should be left to Charles Gordon, 11th Marquis of Huntly and WCB’s son-in-law.  “Whatever the faults of his later years, he deserves to be held in grateful remembrance for his many acts of kindness and generosity, for the improvements he made to the roads, buildings, and cottages of the district, and for the liberal employment he gave to the labourers and tradesmen around him.”

Don Fox

20140421, 20140611, 20150127
donaldpfox@gmail.com