24/04/2026
You can spot Polly Peachum's Tower from many vantage points...and also Bolton Castle, the sentinel of The Dales....can you see it here?
The Mount, Wensleydale
Driving through Wensleydale, this caught my eye up on the hillside.
A roofless little tower in a field, looking out across one of the great Dales views, with Bolton Castle visible in the distance and the valley opening out around it.
It is called The Mount, though it is also known as Polly Peachum’s Tower. Historic England lists it as a Grade II building, dating from before 1723, and describes it as a rare surviving example of a hunting tower - one of the country’s early sporting structures.
The Polly Peachum name comes later, through its association with Lavinia Fenton, the actress who played Polly Peachum in the original 1728 production of The Beggar’s Opera. She captured the heart of Charles Powlett, 3rd Duke of Bolton, and became Duchess of Bolton after they married in 1751.
As with a lot of these places, the story has picked up a bit of romance over the years. The connection between Lavinia and the tower is at least partly tradition rather than hard fact, but it has stuck - and it is much better than simply calling it “that ruined thing I spotted from the road”.
Northern Perspectives continues to document places like this across the region - sometimes planned, sometimes stumbled across - where a quick look turns into a much better story than expected.
