on the Bristol Aeroplane Company factory at Filton, bombs cut off the estate's water supply, and during a later raid, one bomb badly damaged the lantern roof light over the hallway. In 1946, after the end of the war, Lady Wraxall applied to the Ministry of Defence for a repair grant, but was turned down. As a result, damp, and latterly birds, entered the house through the roof light, until the house came into the ownership of the National Trust and was repaired. Richard Gibbs, 2nd Baron Wraxall: 1979–2001 George Richard Lawley Gibbs, known as Richard, was born on 16 May 1928, and was educated at Eton College and Sandhurst. He spent eight years with the Coldstream Guards. He never married and was succeeded by his brother, Sir Eustace Gibbs, a diplomat, who became the third Baron Wraxall. Richard died unmarried in 2001 from complications arising from an asthma attack, having reduced his usage of the substantial accommodation within Tyntesfield to just three rooms. National Trust purchase Concerned with the demolition and desecration of various historic country houses since the end of the Second World War – 450 great houses were completely demolished in England between 1945 and 1955 – in the 1970s the National Trust commissioned architect Mark Girouard to catalogue and assess the remaining Victorian country houses across the United Kingdom for significance and structural integrity. He published his findings in a report, and later in the book The Victorian Country House, which in the revised second edition of 1976 included Tyntesfield as allowing access. With the Trust as a result placing Tyntesfield second on its list of priorities for preservation, Girouard said of the property: In his later life, Richard Gibbs recognised that the diverse interests of the large family, and the need to invest heavily in even basic refurbishment of the house to make it weather-secured and habitable, would require the family to sell Tyntesfield. Recognising also that substantial death duties would become payable on his death, Richard drew up a will based around a trust that would allow his fortune to pass to the surviving children of his brother and half sister, a total of 19 beneficiaries. When Richard died, the trust he had set up stated that, should the trustees agree by majority that the estate should be sold, such a sale should be completed within 12 months, and to the highest bidder. The