14 Facts About Leeds Castle That Will Surprise You
The short answer
It is in Kent, not Leeds. Six queens held it in a row and one of them was imprisoned in it. Dutch prisoners of war burned part of it down in 1665, a Lord Fairfax emigrated to Virginia and never returned, and the 1978 talks here fed straight into the Camp David Accords.
1. It is not in Leeds
Leeds Castle is in Kent, seven miles east of Maidstone. The city of Leeds is roughly 250 miles north of it. The name comes from the Kentish village of Leeds beside it, which Domesday recorded in 1086 as Esledes, meaning slope. Visitors book the wrong end of the country every year.
2. Two postcodes, and only one of them works
The postal address is ME17 1PL. The postcode the castle tells drivers to use is ME17 1RG. They are different places, and the first one will take you somewhere else entirely.
3. Six queens held it in a row
From 1299 the castle passed from queen to queen as part of the royal dower: Margaret of France, Isabella of France, Anne of Bohemia, Joan of Navarre and Catherine de Valois, after Eleanor of Castile had rebuilt it in the 1280s. That is 140 years in which the castle was more often a woman's property than a man's.
4. One of them was imprisoned in her own castle
Joan of Navarre, Henry IV's widow, was accused of witchcraft by her stepson Henry V and held at Leeds Castle — the castle she owned — until her release in March 1422.
5. A siege ended in a beheading
In 1321 Bartholomew de Badlesmere refused Queen Isabella entry to the castle. Edward II brought an army, took it, and had Badlesmere beheaded.
6. Dutch prisoners of war burned part of it down
In 1665 the castle was leased as a detention centre. The Dutch prisoners held there set fire to their accommodation, and the damage was not repaired until the nineteenth century.
💡 Did You Know? Jean Froissart, the chronicler, visited the English court while it was in residence here in the 1390s and called it ‘the beautiful Palace in Kent called Leeds Castle’ — a century before Henry VIII made it a palace in fact.
7. A Lord Fairfax emigrated to Virginia and never came back
The 6th Lord Fairfax sailed for Virginia in 1746 to manage his estates and settled there for life — the only British peer to move permanently to colonial America.
8. His brother died in a pauper's grave
Robert Fairfax held the castle for 46 years, improved the parkland and commissioned an estate map in 1748. He died in 1793 having spent everything he had, and is buried in a pauper's grave in the churchyard at Broomfield, a mile from the castle he owned.
9. What you walk through is mostly from the 1930s
The interiors are the work of Olive, Lady Baillie, who used Armand-Albert Rateau and then Stephane Boudin of Maison Jansen. The house that comes with them included a swimming pool with a wave machine, tennis and squash courts, and a cinema in the Maiden's Tower.
10. The New Castle is younger than the United States
Fiennes Wykeham Martin had the main house surveyed in 1821, demolished it on the report, and finished its Tudor-style replacement in 1823. The castle that appears in every photograph is two centuries old, on a site nine centuries old.
11. It helped set up the Camp David Accords
In 1978, two years after opening to the public, Leeds Castle hosted the Middle East peace talks that preceded the Camp David Accords of the same year.
12. The maze is a square that looks like a circle
2,400 yew trees, planted in 1988 to a design by the maze designer Adrian Fisher. It is laid out in a square, and from the viewing mound the pattern reads as a circle. Part of the plan mirrors a queen's crown, and the only way out of the centre is downwards through an underground grotto.
13. There is a museum of dog collars — and no dogs
The Dog Collar Museum holds five centuries of them, from spiked anti-wolf iron to Victorian silver. The estate itself admits no dogs at all except assistance dogs, because wildfowl wander freely across the moat and the Great Water.
14. Your ticket lasts a year
Every Leeds Castle admission ticket is valid for multiple use for one year from the date you select. Two visits on one adult ticket cost less per visit than a single standard one, and almost nobody uses it. Full prices are on Leeds Castle ticket prices.
✅ Useful Tip. If you want the history rather than the highlights, the multimedia guide is included with admission and the full castle history runs from Domesday to Camp David.
The fourteen, by date
| Year | What happened |
|---|---|
| 1086 | Domesday records the manor as Esledes — the village that gives the castle its misleading name |
| 1119 | Robert de Crevecoeur builds the first stone castle on two islands |
| 1278–1437 | Six queens hold it in a row as part of the royal dower |
| 1321 | Edward II takes the castle by siege and beheads Bartholomew de Badlesmere |
| 1422 | Joan of Navarre is released after imprisonment in her own castle |
| 1517–1523 | Henry VIII converts a fortress into a royal palace |
| 1665 | Dutch prisoners of war set fire to their quarters |
| 1746 | The 6th Lord Fairfax sails for Virginia and settles there for life |
| 1793 | Robert Fairfax dies penniless and is buried in a pauper's grave |
| 1823 | The New Castle is finished in the Tudor style |
| 1930s | Lady Baillie remakes the interiors, adding a wave-machine pool and a cinema |
| 1978 | The Middle East talks that preceded the Camp David Accords are held here |
| 1988 | Adrian Fisher lays out the 2,400-yew maze |
| Today | Every admission ticket is valid for twelve months |
Where these come from
Every fact here is from Leeds Castle's own published history, its ticket terms or its visitor rules, and the dates are theirs. A Leeds Castle and Canterbury tour will get you to the building; what is in it takes a little longer to explain than a coach stop allows.
- The chronology from Domesday to the Foundation: the history page
- What is on the estate today: things to do at Leeds Castle
- The rules, the hours and the postcode: visiting Leeds Castle
Frequently asked questions
Is Leeds Castle in Leeds?
Who built it, and when?
Why is it called the queens' castle?
What is the maze like?
Can you take dogs to Leeds Castle?
Tours that tell these stories on site
Leeds Castle, Cliffs of Dover and Canterbury Day Trip from London with Guided Cathedral Tour
A guide with the history, castle entry included, and Canterbury after it.
From $130 per person
Check AvailabilityLeeds Castle Admission - Ultimate Explorer Tickets
The multimedia guide, the Gloriette and the Dog Collar Museum, all day.
From $59 per person
Check AvailabilityLeeds Castle, Canterbury, Dover & Greenwich Boat ride
Early entry before the gates open, and a mead tasting from April.
From $134 per person
Check AvailabilityFourteen facts, one castle, and a ticket that lasts long enough to check every one of them yourself. Compare the ways in at Leeds Castle Tours.