Ripley Castle: History of Yorkshire country estate where The Flaxton Boys was filmed which is now up for sale for first time in its 700-year history
Ripley Castle where The Flaxton Boys was filmed has recently been put up for sale for the first time - here is its history.
Ripley Castle is a Grade I listed country estate that has been the residence of the Ingilby baronets for seven centuries.
The house is built of coursed squared gritstone and ashlar with grey slate and stone slate roofs.
In January 2025, it was announced that the estate, near Harrogate, will go on the market for the first time in its 700-year history by its current owners Sir Thomas and Lady Ingilby.
It will go on the market in the autumn and the sale is likely to include the pub, hotel and restaurant, The Boars Head and a few houses in the village as well.
The family will continue to reside nearby.
History of Ripley Castle
Between the years 1308 and 1309, Sir Thomas Ingleby married heiress Edeline Thwenge and acquired the Ripley Castle estate along with its medieval manor house as her dowry.
The king was saved from being impaled by a wild boar by the eldest Ingleby son, also named Thomas, whilst on a hunting expedition and was knighted in return with the boar’s head symbol as his crest.
The estate was predominantly built in the 1300s, though the castle and surrounding buildings took 500 years to build, and feature three main architectural styles.
The gatehouse was completed in 1450, Sir William Ingleby began constructing the building we see today in 1548 and the house was rebuilt in 1780 and in 1803, King James II of Scotland stayed at the castle.
Sir Thomas’s descendent Sir John Ingleby inherited the estate at the age of five from his father William and built the castle’s gatehouse, before becoming a monk at Mount Grace Priory, near Northallerton, and later the Bishop of Llandaff.
His son William Ingleby was raised by his abandoned mother and Sir John’s grandson, Sir William Ingleby, was the High Sheriff of Yorkshire in 1564-1565 and he added the tower to the building in 1548.
In 1603, Sir William Ingleby was knighted by James VI of Scotland when the king was on his way to his coronation as James I of England and two years later, he was involved in the Gunpowder Plot, allowing the plotters to stay at Ripley whilst they found horses.
One of the Gunpowder Plot conspirators, Robert Winter, was Sir William Ingleby’s nephew, and Sir William Ingleby was arrested and charged with treason, but acquitted.
When Sir John Ingleby, the 4th Baronet, died in 1772, the baronetcy became extinct and was revived in 1781 for his illegitimate son John.
A major renovation of the castle took place between 1783 and 1786 by Sir John but got into debt and fled overseas in 1794 for several years. His son, William, was a drinker, gambler and MP for East Retford from 1807 to 1812 and High Sheriff in 1821.
He demolished and rebuilt the village of Ripley, including a continental-style hotel de ville. With no heir, he left the estate to his first cousin, Henry John Ingilby and the baronetcy was extinct for a second time.
The estate has been owned and managed for 26 generations.
In recent years, the castle was used to film the Yorkshire children’s TV series The Flaxton Boys as the fictional Flixton Hall and was used in the 1976 Disney film Escape from the Dark and the BBC TV series Gunpowder in 2017.