Penoyre House

John Lloyd Vaughan Watkins (1802–65) was a nineteenth century Welsh Liberal politician who sat Member of Parliament for Brecon. and was High Sheriff of Brecknockshire and Lord Lieutenant of Brecknockshire. Watkins inherited a late eighteenth century house from his father, the Reverend Thomas Watkins, and engaged Salvin to undertake a complete rebuilding from 1846-8. The cost of the house alone was over £33,000 and Allibone records that Watkins was obliged to "close (it) and live cheaply in a local hotel." Only three years after his death in 1865, the house was sold. Privately owned from 1868 to 1947, the house was then used as a school, the clubhouse to a golf club, a nursing home, an hotel…