Duke flees stately home over hidden peril in the walls

With 13,000 acres and the sumptuous family seat, Woburn Abbey in Bedfordshire, at his disposal, the Duke of Bedford would seem very nicely placed to see out the lockdown.

But that, alas, is not so. For i can disclose that Andrew Bedford, the 15th Duke, his wife, Louise, and their children, Alexandra, 18, and henry, 14, have been obliged to leave the Abbey — and its 24 priceless paintings by Canaletto — after it was discovered that behind some of its walls lurked panels of potentially lethal asbestos.

the highly disquieting development comes two years after the Duke, 58, initiated the most extensive refurbishment of Woburn since his grandfather pulled down more than half the house, including 37 bedrooms, in 1950, after finding they were riddled with dry rot. Five years later, his grandfather shocked the aristocracy still more by opening the Abbey to the public — and unveiled a safari park 15 years after that.

‘Most of the work had been done,’ a family friend tells me of the current refurbishment, explaining that the Duke and Duchess

(right), who’d temporarily moved out, were so confident about the progress that had been made that they moved back in time for a family Christmas. Since then, however, disaster has struck. ‘there was just one bathroom to be done — and when the builders hacked into it, they found asbestos. it was reported to the authorities, but they had to move out again.’ the Duke and Duchess decline to elaborate on this development. ‘ their Graces’ living arrangements are a private matter,’ i’m told by their office in Bloomsbury, the part of central London which is among the family’s possessions, and which perhaps explains why, as the Duke’s grandfather put it, the family ‘have always thought themselves slightly grander than God’.

Fortunately, there are more than 400 cottages on the estate, so the Duke and Duchess will, with luck, be able to find somewhere to bed down.