With the return of Heritage Open Days comes our annual invitation to enjoy a host of historic treasures for free and, as BARBARA HODGSON discovers, one is hoping for a very personal response

AS DOWNTON Abbey – which makes its eagerly-awaited return to the small screen this autumn – illustrates, life below stairs in a stately home is every bit as interesting and colourful as that of the titled owners above.

But period dramas aside, the staff stories are rarely the ones that make the light of day.

Which is why Cragside in Northumberland is taking advantage of Heritage Open Days this year to put matters right.

The country retreat of Lord Armstrong – the 19th Century Tyneside industrialist and inventor whose own life story is widely documented – is hoping that relatives of its former staff will come forward with lesser-known details of life there.

It is opening to all for free on Saturday but is extending a special invitation to those with a family link to the estate to share memories.

And, in bringing past and present together, some real-life drama might well be uncovered, with the minutiae of life revealed through photographs, letters and memorabilia building up a picture of Cragside which is rarely seen.

Andrew Sawyer, landscape conservation and interpretation officer at the property, said: “Cragside has always been about the story of the first Lord Armstrong but it would be nice to find out about the loves and lives of the people who worked here.

“Lord Armstrong is always the one credited with creating Cragside but it took a lot of other people to fashion it and look after and run it day in, day out.”

The home, which has a 1,000-acre estate, is famous for being the first in the world to be lit by hydroelectricity and was such a pioneering and celebrated property that the-then Prince of Wales – later King Edward VII – is said to have taken his family there on a three-day visit in 1884 to see for themselves a scientific wonder of the Victorian age. Such was its profile – with presidents and prime ministers also among the family friends – that it would have taken an army of domestic and estate staff to run it in its heyday.

Between 1870 (when the first railway came to Rothbury) and 1885, during the time of building the current, bigger, house, 300 people were believed to be on the first Lord Armstrong’s payroll.