Belcourt Castle - The Tinneys

The Tinneys

The Tinney Family, of Cumberland, Rhode Island, bought Belcourt in 1956 for $25,000. In addition to changing the name from Belcourt to Belcourt Castle, the Tinneys filled the castle with their own collection of antiques and reproductions. Included are a coronation coach, which the Tinneys made, and a 1701 copy of a Hyacinthe Rigaud portrait of Louis XIV, which hung in the Green Room in the Palace of the Tuileries. The centerpiece of the Tinney additions was an enormous Imperial Russian-style chandelier, which holds 13,000 rock crystal prisms and 105 lights. The chandelier hangs a few feet above the rose marble mosaic floor of the banquet hall.

At the time that Belcourt was purchased in 1956, the Tinney family comprised Harold Tinney, his wife Ruth Tinney, their son Donald Tinney, and Ruth's aunt Nellie Fuller (a descendant of Mayflower passenger Edward Fuller). In 1960, Donald Tinney married Harle Hanson, who had been at Belcourt to work as a tour guide. Harle Tinney wass the only surviving member of the family when Belcourt was sold in 2012.

Other artifacts within Belcourt included an immense collection of Persian rugs, French royal art and furnishings, Oriental art and furnishings and numerous religious objets d'art.

Changes at Belcourt have been numerous in the years following 1956 when the Tinney Family moved in. They raised the ceiling of the Organ Loft 11 feet (3.4 m) to accommodate a 26-rank tracker organ. Between 1966 and 1970, when the coronation coach was being built, an old kitchen area became a coach hall. In 1969, the open loggia became a French salon. In 1975, they transformed the north-west reception room into a chapel with the addition of German renaissance stained glass. In the early 1980s, the Tinneys built gate piers on Bellevue Avenue and installed gates that they had acquired from the Taylor estate in Portsmouth. The overthrow was altered to make the gates the tallest of any estate entrance in Newport.

In 1983, robbers attempted a million-dollar heist of Belcourt's antiques. Police recovered many artifacts, but not a 14-pound silver reliquary containing a relic from the third century.

The lawns contained many sculptural pieces in bronze, terra cotta, marble and stone. Depicting scenes from mythology, nymphs and cherubs, the collection is an informal contrast to the strong and robust lines of the French-style château. The driveways and pathways are lined with lush arborvitae, planted by the Tinneys a few years after they moved into Belcourt.

Belcourt Castle is the third largest mansion in Newport, after The Breakers and Ochre Court. The castle has been the subject of an ongoing restoration project spanning from the beginning of the Tinney family's occupation of the castle up to and including the present day.

On 26 May 2009, it was reported that the then-owner of Belcourt Castle, Harle Tinney put the residence up for sale. The home was put on the market for $US 7.2 million. As of June 2011 the price had been reduced twice to $US 5.1 million and then to $US 3.9 million. Subsequently, it was taken off of the market and re-listed for sale in two parcels totaling $US 4.625 million. Tinney said she is ready to part with the home after her husband's death in 2006.