Posted by Duncan on June 05, 2012 at 03:16:16 user Duncan.
I might have tracked down a link between AR and Belle Grange (a potential Beckfoot) - referred to in an earlier thread earlier in the year.
It's all a bit vague at the moment, and I'll toughen it up for a "Great Northern?" blogpost in the next week or so, along with some of the interesting Derwent Water thoughts from last week.
The potential link is the Curwen family. AR's Aunt in Windermere was aquainted with the family - AR recalled going to Belle Isle and doing archery with them. Well they also owned Belle Grange (the house and island were both named after Isabella Curwen). They definitely owned it when Ransome was at school - I haven't quite managed to track down when they let the house go yet. The acquaintance is likely to have been extended, because W.G. Collingwood worked alongside John F. Curwen in the Cumbria and Westmorland Archaeological Society.
More to follow - but the start of a theory is germinating... The Curwens, incidentally, owned most of the woodland in Claife, including an area known as the Heald Wood. The promontory next to Belle Grange is called The Mount and is pretty much the only think on the shores of Windermere to have an even vaguely Beckfoot Promontory feel to it (it's all wooded now, but I don't know if it always was).