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When The Camera Makes The Talkings
By: Ravindran Bob
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| Tuesday, 27-Feb-2007 01:22 |
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Kellie's Castle
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From the bridge to the Castle Entrance
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The Castle
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Small Path leading towards the stairs go up
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the narrow Stairs
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The Altar Room
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View From the Altar room to the Hall
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A view from Smith's first house
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Smith's first house
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Smith's first house2
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Smith's first house3
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Smith's first house4
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Smith's first house5
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The Haunted Corridor, the spirit of Smith is believed to be wa !
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Main Hall
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Main Hall2
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The Haunted Corridor from the left end
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The Haunted Corridorfrom the right end
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The Main Stairs to top floor
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The Haunted Corridor - 1st floor
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Perhaps to place pictures?taken from one of the room at 1st flr
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Master BedRoom
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Anthony's Room
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Master Bedroom2
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The Haunted Corridor
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A guest room in the top floor(4th)
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The Roof
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Narrow stairs to down
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The TOP
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if this was completed then this is the first lift in Malaya
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Stairs from TOP
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Narrow stairs to go up
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Pathway leading to the Guest Rooms
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Taken from one of the Guest room
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A window
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Taken from the floor
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Guest room
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The Basement Liquor Storage
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The Basement Liquor Storage
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The Basement Liquor Storage
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Kellie's Castle (sometimes also called Kellie's Folly) is located near Batu Gajah, and is about 20 minutes' drive from Ipoh, Perak, Malaysia. The unfinished, ruined mansion, was built by a Scottish planter called William Kellie Smith. According to differing accounts, it was either a gift for his wife or a home for his son. Smith himself was from a small town in Scotland known as Kellas.
In 1890, at the age of 20, he arrived in the then undeveloped Malaya. Here, he met an estate owner called Alma Baker, who had won concessions from the state government to clear 360 hectares of forests in Perak. With the substantial profits made from his business venture with Alma Baker, Smith started planting rubber trees and dabbled in the tin mining industry. In time, he became the owner of Kinta Kellas Estate and the Kinta Kellas Tin Dredging Company.
Now with his fortune made, he returned home to marry his Scottish sweetheart, Agnes, and brought her over to Malayia in 1903. The following year, the couple was blessed with a daughter whom they named Helen. For many years after that, Agnes tried to conceive, but to no avail. William Smith desperately wanted a son and heir to take over his empire in the Malay Isles. After many years, Agnes finally gave birth to a son, Anthony, in 1915. The birth of his child was the start of even greater success for William Smith. To celebrate Anthony's birth, William Smith decided to expand on his mansion. Smith started planning for a huge castle which he planned to call Kellas House, after his hometown in Scotland.
Unfortunately for Smith, tragedies struck soon after the construction of the Kellas House began. A virulent strain of the Spanish flu spread from Europe to Asia soon after World War I ended in Europe, killing many of the workers in the Kellas Estate. Another seventy workers constructing Smith's dream castle also became victims of the flu. Smith, who had already spent a fortune on his house, lost a lot of money because of this.
In the end, Kellas House, later known as Kellie's Castle or even Kellie's Folly to some, was never completed. William Kellie Smith himself died of pneumonia during a short trip to Portugal in 1926. His heartbroken wife decided to pack up and return home to Scotland selling the estate and Kellie's Castle to a British company called Harrisons and Crosfield.
Descendants of the Tamil labourers brought over to Malaya to work on the mansion still live nearby even now. Kellie's Castle is now a popular local tourist attraction.
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