Dundas Castle

Dundas Castle

The one in Edinburgh, Scotland, right? Nope, the one in the secluded forests of the Catskill Mountains in the good ole U.S. of A.

How odd (or maybe not, considering it’s me :P) that one of my first posts is not about Scotland, England, or even the sixteenth century for that matter. It is about a place that I have been obsessing about since seeing an abandoned house video on YouTube. The place is Dundas Castle in Roscoe, New York and although abandoned, it is hauntingly beautiful and still full of potential.

Shrouded in mystery, the original country house, called Craig-E-Clair, was expanded in 1915 with the beginning of the building of the castle now known as Dundas. Built on 964 acres, the massive estate has 40 rooms, and took the owner and originator of the idea, Ralph Wurts-Dundas, over eight years and more than a million dollars to construct.

Sadly, since it took over eight years to build, Mr. Wurts-Dundas did not live to see its completion. Ralph died in 1921, and construction stopped in 1924. The finishing touches were never added, and neither he nor his wife, Josephine, ever lived within its walls. Josephine had been committed to a sanatorium and upon her death, the castle passed to their only daughter, Muriel, who was a child at the time.

But the tragedy of Dundas Castle doesn’t end there. Muriel Wurts-Dundas, who had only visited the castle a handful of times, married James R. Herbert Boone and moved to England, where she too eventually was committed to a mental health institution. In her absence, Dundas had passed through the hands of several caretakers before being sold to the Prince Hall Grand Lodge of the Masonic Order in Manhattan.

Although Dundas Castle was used as a children’s summer camp for some time, no one has ever lived there, and it still stands empty to this day.

I just had an epiphany!  My house is older than this one.  It was built in 1890. Woohoo!

Feel free to click on the images below to view photographer, A.D. Wheeler’s other photos of Dundas Castle. Or, check out his other photos and the history behind the pics at https://portfolio.theexplorographer.com/Landscapes/Dundas/

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<strong><a href=”https://TheExplorographer.com” target=”_blank” rel=”noopener”>Photo by: A.D.Wheeler/The Explorographer</a></strong>

Want to feel like you’re really inside Dundas Castle? Watch the YouTube video that spurred my interest.

Want to read more about Dundas? Take a look at these sites:

http://dundascastle.synthasite.com/

https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/craig-e-clair-castle

One final note…

I have not been to Dundas Castle in Scotland, but I have been to a few others there. Can you tell this is one of my favorite things? Obsessed, I tell ya. Ob-sessed. It could be worse, right?

The following pictures are my own. Please see below for usage permission.

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Now go be the queen (or king) of your castle...and have a blessed day. 

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