These papers relating to Heston and Isleworth were collected for their general or antiquarian interest and relevance to the subject, rather than having a united provenance (that is, being produced by the same institution or business).
Nathan Adler was born in 1803 in Hanover, Germany and was the grand-nephew of Chief Rabbi David Tewele Schiff. He was educated at the universities of Gottingen, Erlangen, Wurzburg and Heidelberg and was ordained in 1828. In 1829 he was elected Senior Rabbi of the Grand Duchy of Oldenburg and in 1830 appointed to the office in Hanover in his father's stead. In 1844 Nathan Adler succeeded Chief Rabbi Soloman Hirschell and was installed on the 9th of July 1845.
Nathan Adler worked to establish uniformity of religious practices. In 1847 he issued a code of Laws and Regulations which underlined the supremacy of the Chief Rabbi. He visited provincial congregations and took an active interest in settling or preventing communal disputes. In 1855 he founded Jews College in Finsbury Square, London. It was opened as a school and college, but the attraction of good schools outside the Jewish community and the movement of Jews from the area of the City led to the school being closed in 1879.
Many changes to the composition and administrative framework of Anglo-Jewry took place during this Chief Rabbinate. Important Jewish institutions such as the Jewish Board of Guardians and the Anglo-Jewish Association were founded. In the 1860s Adler encouraged proposals for the union of Ashkenazi congregations under one management and the United Synagogue was created by Act of Parliament in 1870. It was also a period when some Jews examined their approach to their faith; some broke away from traditional observance to worship at the newly formed West London Synagogue, the first Reform congregation in Britain. The number of Jews in the country grew, especially from 1881 with the arrival of thousands of refugees fleeing from pogroms in Russia and Eastern Europe. In 1850 the Jewish population in Britain as around 35,000; in 1914 it stood at 300,000.
In the last decade of his life Nathan Adler had poor health and retired to Brighton. His son Hermann Adler acted for him as Delegate Chief Rabbi until his death on 21st January 1890.
The church of Saint Sepulchre, Holborn Viaduct, was first mentioned in 1137. It was damaged in the Great Fire of 1666 and was rebuilt in 1670-71. However the tower and outer wall survived and date from around 1450. The church is now the National Musicians' Church. The church is also known as Saint Sepulchre without Newgate as it stood just outside the Newgate walls. The parish was partly within the City of London and partly within the former county of Middlesex.
The Association of British Insurers (ABI) is the trade body for insurance companies in the UK. It was formed in 1985 on the merger of the British Insurance Association, the Life Offices' Association, the Fire Offices Committee and the Accident Offices Association. The Association has around 400 companies in membership. The work of the ABI includes policy formulation, research and statistics, and public relations representing the insurance industry. It also organises conferences and seminars and publishes reports. The ABI is based at 51 Gresham Street in the City of London.
Buzzacott and Company is a firm of chartered accountants based at 12 Fetter Lane, formed out of numerous predecessor firms.
Down and Harper was formed from the partnership of A N Harper and H E Down in 1945, and became Down, Son and Harper on Down's son's qualification and entry into the partnership in 1952. They were based at 44 Bow Lane. Their successor firms merged with Watson, O'Regan and Company, Buzzacott, Lillywhite and Company and Vincent and Goodrich to form Buzzacott and Company in 1971.
No historical information has yet been found for the other companies represented in this collection.
The companies listed in this collection had several connections, such as shared premises and directors.
They had ceased trading or had become holding or investment companies by 1982 when those that survived became subsidiaries of the Caparo Group Limited.
The Grain and Feed Trade Association (GAFTA) was founded in 1971 when the London Corn Trade Association merged with the London Cattle Food Trade Association. GAFTA is a trade association for those working in the international grain trade. It defines standards, acts as a regulatory body and handles problems for its members.
For historical information about the predecessor bodies whose records comprise this collection, please see the sub-fonds entry for each organisation (listed in the 'arrangement' section).
Gresham House, in Old Broad Street, was the home of Sir Thomas Gresham (1519-79), Lord Mayor of London, and was the site of Gresham College until 1768 when the house was demolished and HM Excise Office was built. This was sold in 1853 by the Government to six partners and, in 1857, the Gresham House Estate Company Limited was formed by them to manage the property. Other property was purchased in 1936 and 1955 in Bishopsgate (nos 25-27 and 31-33 respectively). Gresham House was sold in 1959.
In 1921 Broad Street Estates Limited (incorporated 1913), which owned a freehold building in Old Broad Street opposite Gresham House, was acquired. This property was sold in 1953. An "island" site between London Wall and Great Winchester Street, comprising approximately 1 acre, was purchased in 1928 and a subsidiary, Great Winchester Street Estates Limited, was formed to hold it. This company went into voluntary liquidation in 1958 and the site was sold in 1960. Since the late 1950's, Gresham House Estate Company Limited and its subsidiary, Broad Street Estates Limited, have been concerned mainly with investment business.
Henry Barber traded as a salmon factor from 1841. By 1855 he had a stand in Billingsgate market and by 1880 had leased shop 7 where the business remained until it went into voluntary liquidation in 1979. The limited company was formed in April 1925. It specialised in salmon, but also dealt in eels through subsidiaries.
Subsidiaries of H Barber and Son Limited included:
- D and J Barber (Eels) Limited, formerly John and Paul (Eels) Limited, eel merchants, trading from 13b Lovat Lane (they were taken over and renamed in 1960);
- Braddan Fishing Co Limited, formed in 1952 to manage salmon fishings;
- Cahill and Young Limited, a defunct Irish company which was acquired ca. 1954 and used to purchase the Galway fishery;
- John T Clark Limited, a Billingsgate company taken over ca. 1960;
- UC Farmer Limited, a Billingsgate company formed in 1965;
- A Langley and Co Limited, cooked eel merchants, trading from 28 Monument Street;
- EF Marchant Limited, a Billingsgate company taken over in 1964.
In the early nineteenth century it was impossible for women to practice as doctors in Great Britain. The alternative choice of nursing was seen as a corrupt profession of the unskilled and the lower classes until the middle of the century. Both attitudes were caused by women's lack of access to training in the profession, largely through the parallel lack of access to training in universities and colleges that were only open to men. The one role open to them, midwifery, was constantly undermined and devalued due to this very lack of university education involved in learning its skills. In America the situation was slightly different: the English-born Elizabeth Blackwell had become the first woman in the United States to qualify as a doctor though rejection by male colleagues forced her to set up a women's hospital in New York. Visits to London in the 1850s led to work at the St Bartholomew's Hospital and friendship with Florence Nightingale. In 1859 the General Medical Council admitted her to the Medical Register but the following year a special GMC charter made it possible to exclude doctors with foreign medical degrees, leaving women who had qualified on foreign soil open to attack. Nonetheless, in 1869 Blackwell moved permanently to London and there established the London School of Medicine for Women in 1870, as well as the National Health Society. Blackwell's influence on British women intending to enter medicine was already great: in 1862 the Female Medical Society was established and Elizabeth Garrett decided to enter the profession under her advice. However, Garrett's initial attempts to enter several medical schools failed due to the continuing refusal of universities to accept female students. Instead, she was forced to become a nurse at Middlesex Hospital, a profession that had become respectable through the work of Nightingale and her colleagues in professionalising nursing training and practice. Nevertheless, it came to light that the Society of Apothecaries did not specify that females were banned from taking their examinations and in 1865 Garrett sat and passed their examination before the loophole that allowed this was closed. Other countries began to allow women to enter the profession: in 1864 the University of Zurich admitted female students while the universities of Paris, Berne and Geneva followed suit in 1867. Garrett later was appointed visiting physician to the East London Hospital but though she subsequently graduated from the University of Paris, the British Medical Register refused to recognise her MD degree. In the next few years she opened the women-run New Hospital for Women in London with Elizabeth Blackwell and helped Sophia Jex-Blake to establish the London Medical School for Women to which Garrett Anderson was elected Dean of the London School of in 1884. The legal situation of women who wished to become doctors did not change, however. Though Edinburgh University allowed Sophia Jex-Blake and Edith Pechy to attend medical lectures in 1869, male fellow students rioted and their final examinations were rendered void as university regulations only allowed medical degrees to be given to men. The consequence of this was that the British Medical Association therefore refused to register the women as doctors. However, Russell Gurney, a MP and supporter of women's rights took the first legal steps to remedying the situation and in 1876 the Enabling Act was passed that allowed universities to award female students degrees in their subject. This meant that all medical training bodies were now free to teach women in this area if they chose to do so. The following year the Royal Free Hospital admitted women medical students for clinical training and the University of London adopted a new charter in 1878 that allowed women to graduate from their courses. Individual institutions were slowly forced to change their practices to permit women to hold their degrees, though some, like Oxford and Cambridge, resisted until 1920 and 1948 respectively. By 1891, 101 women doctors were in practice in the British Isles, and the following years the British Medical Association was finally forced to admit women doctors.
In the 1860s, a number of individuals such as Bessie Rayner Parkes and Barbara Bodichon, who were involved in creating employment agencies for women and opening up a variety of professions, became involved in the campaign for women's suffrage. The two movements came to be closely connected through shared membership. Many saw votes for women as the only means by which the professions could be opened up to both sexes and the conditions of working women improved through appropriate legislation. The connection between the two campaigns continued into the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. Individual members of suffrage societies were involved in the work of the Women's Industrial Council, which was established in 1886 to campaign for 'equal pay for equal work'. The London Society for Women's Suffrage established a Women's Service department and a bee toymakers' scheme during the First World War, which later became the Women's Employment Department in the post-war period.
James Ramsay MacDonald (1866-1937), was born in Lossiemouth, Morayshire in 1866, the illegitimate son of Ann Ramsay, a maidservant. He studied at the local school from 1875 until 1881 before becoming a pupil-teacher. Aged nineteen, he went to Bristol before moving to London in 1886, where he was employed as a clerk for the Cyclists' Touring Club. Poverty and ill-health ended his attempts to win a science scholarship and be became a clerk to Thomas Lough, MP. MacDonald joined the Fabian Society around this time and there met others such as George Bernard Shaw, Annie Besant, Walter Crane and the Webbs who were concerned with issues such as socialism and women's suffrage. In 1893 the Independent Labour Party was formed by members of this group, including Philip Snowden, Robert Smillie, Tom Mann, John Bruce Glasier, Ben Tillett and James Keir Hardie.
Mrs Mary Ellen Taylor (fl 1910-1914) and her husband Captain Thomas Smithies Taylor were friends of the Pethick Lawrence family, Dr Elizabeth Wilkes (her sister) and her brother-in-law Mark Wilkes. By early 1912 Mrs Taylor was an active member of the Women's Social & Political Union which was then engaged in a campaign of militant action against government and private property. On 4 Mar 1912 she took part in a window smashing party with a Miss Roberts and a Miss Nellie Crocker, attacking a post office in Sloane Square. They were arrested and brought before a magistrate at Westminster Police Court, who referred their case to the Sessions. From the 5-22 Mar 1912 they were placed on remand at Holloway Prison until Taylor went before Newington Session and was given a three months sentence. While in prison, she went on hunger strike, though she was not forcibly fed, and was subsequently discharged and taken to her sister's house on the 27 Apr 1912. She was imprisoned a second time in Jul 1913 under the alias of Mary Wyan of Reading. Mrs Ellen Mary Taylor refused release under the Cat and Mouse [Temporary Discharge for Ill-health] Act of 1913. She claimed complete discharge and declined to give the prison governor any address. When she was conveyed to a nursing home she refused to enter until her full release was granted and continued her strike on a chair in the road outside. The police then removed her to the Kensington Infirmary where she eventually gave up her protest. Around this time, the Woodford assault case took place, touching the Taylor's immediate circle of friends.
Captain Thomas Smithies-Taylor (fl 1910-1914) was the husband of Mrs Mary Ellen Taylor. He was a supporter of the militant suffragettes based in Leicester. He wrote letters to the national and local press on this and related subjects.
Dr Elizabeth Wilkes (fl.1910) was married to Mark Wilkes, he was a teacher employed by London County Council and a member of the Men's League for Women's Suffrage. She was also a suffragist and a member of the Women's Tax Resistance League. On the occasion when she refused to pay her taxes, her husband was obliged by law to pay the amount on her behalf. However, Mark Wilkes refused to do so and was sent to Brixton prison for this action. The Men's League organised a protest march to the prison and the Daily Herald interviewed Wilkes while in prison. He went on hunger strike and was released due to ill health. A meeting was subsequently organised by the Women's Tax Resistance League at the Caxton Hall in honour of the couple.
Mark Wilkes (fl. 1894-1914) was a teacher and the husband of Elizabeth Wilkes (1861-1956). Elizabeth refused to complete a tax return or to pay taxes herself and informed the tax authorities that as a married woman her tax papers should be forwarded to her husband. He, in turn, claimed that he had neither the means to obtain the necessary information to complete the forms nor to pay his wife's tax bill and was imprisoned for debt. The Tax Resistance League took up the case and achieved much publicity for it.
Women's Social & Political Union (WSPU) (1903-c.1919) was the prime mover of suffrage militancy. In Oct 1903 the WSPU was founded in Manchester at Emmeline Pankhurst's home in Nelson Street. Members include: Emmeline, Adela and Christabel Pankhrst, Teresa Billington-Greig, Annie Kenney and Elizabeth Wolstenholme Elmy. Several had been members of the NUWSS and had links with the Independent Labour Party, but were frustrated with progress, reflected in the WSPU motto 'Deeds, not Words'. An initial aim of WSPU was to recruit more working class women into the struggle for the vote. In late 1905 the WSPU began militant action with the consequent imprisonment of their members. The first incident was on 13 Oct 1905, Christabel Pankhurst and Annie Kenney attended a meeting in London where they heckled the speaker Sir Edward Grey, a minister in the British government. Pankhurst and Kenney were arrested, charged with assault upon a police officer and fined five shillings each. They refused to pay the fine and were sent to prison. In 1906 the WSPU moved to London and continued militant action - with the Daily Mail calling the activists 'suffragettes' an unfavourable term adopted by the group. Between 1906-1908 there were several constitutional disagreements with the Women's Freedom League being founded in Nov 1907 by the 'Charlotte Despard faction'. From 1908 the WSPU tactics of disturbing meetings developed to breaking the windows of government buildings. This increased the number of women imprisoned. In Jul 1909 Marion Dunlop was the first imprisoned suffragette to go on hunger strike, many suffragettes followed her example and force-feeding was introduced. Between 1910-1911 the Conciliation Bills were presented to Parliament and militant activity ceased, but when Parliament sidelined these Bills the WSPU re-introduced their active protests.
Between 1912-1914 there was an escalation of WSPU violence - damage to property and arson and bombing attacks became common tactics. Targets included government and public buildings, politicians' homes, cricket pavilions, racecourse stands and golf clubhouses. Some members of the WSPU such as the Pethick-Lawrences, disagreed with this arson campaign and were expelled. Other members showed their disapproval by leaving the WSPU. The Pethick-Lawrences took with them the journal 'Votes for Women', hence the new journal of the WSPU the 'Suffragette' launched in Oct 1912. In 1913 in response to the escalation of violence, imprisonment and hunger strikes the government introduced the Prisoner's Temporary Discharge of Ill Health Act (popularly known as the 'Cat and Mouse Act'). Suffragettes who went on hunger strike were released from prison as soon as they became ill and when recovered they were re-imprisoned.
Discord within the WSPU continued - In Jan 1914 Sylvia Pankhurst's 'East London Federation of the WSPU' was expelled from the WSPU and became an independent suffrage organisation. On 4 Aug 1914, England declared war on Germany. Two days later the NUWSS announced that it was suspending all political activity until the war was over. In return for the release of all suffragettes from prison the WSPU agreed to end their militant activities. The WSPU organised a major rally attended by 30,000 people in London to emphasise the change of direction. In Oct 1915, The WSPU changed its newspaper's name from 'The Suffragette' to 'Britannia'. Emmeline's patriotic view of the war was reflected in the paper's new slogan: 'For King, For Country, for Freedom'. the paper was 'conservative' in tone and attacked campaigners, politicians, military leaders and pacifists for not furthering the war effort. Not all members supported the WSPU war policy and several independent groups were set up as members left the WSPU. In 1917 the WSPU became known as the 'Women's Party and in Dec 1918 fielded candidates at the general election (including Christabel Pankhurst). However they were not successful and the organisation does not appear to have survived beyond 1919.
Dr Robert Michaelis was born in 1903 in Berlin. Michaelis was of Jewish origin and emigrated to Shanghai in 1939, becoming president of the organisation of emigrant lawyers. He worked in a legal capacity; wrote articles on the rights of emigrants in Shanghai and returned to Germany in 1948 where he became Senatpräsident for Mainz.
Michaelis had been interested in the Dreyfus affair for many years and on retirement in 1957, he devoted much of his time to researching the legal aspects of the case against Dreyfus. The Dreyfus affair was an antisemitic scandal which divided France from the 1890s to the early 1900s. Captain Alfred Dreyfus, an artillery officer in the French Army was found guilty of treason for passing military secrets to the German embassy in Paris. Drefus was suspected for many reasons including his Jewish heritage. Michaelis died in Mainz in 1973.
The Dunera, a military transport ship, transported over 2000 internees from the UK to Australia in 1940 and was used to transport German and Austrian immigrants to Australia during this period.
Robert Philip Baker-Byrne was born in Berlin in 1910. His father was the owner of the company, Modellhaus Becker, Berlin. In 1936 he and his parents, under increasing pressure from life under the Nazis, came to Great Britain as refugees. Some time later he married and had a daughter. From 1939 until 1944 he was a member of the Pioneer Corps. In 1944 he began working for the British Secret Service and made two lone parachute drops into enemy territory. Whilst on the last mission into the Lübeck area he was apparently captured.
Having survived the war, he worked as an investigator in the investigation section of War Crimes Group, North West Europe. After he left the military he went to Australia (presumably with his family). After a few years he returned to Great Britain where he worked as a sales manager in the 1950s. Nothing further is known about his life nor that of his family.
The bulk of the material in this collection was collected on the initiative of the Wiener Library in 1939. Former rabbis of synagogues in Germany who had managed to escape to Great Britain were asked to supply information on the fate of their synagogues. 985/1 consists of these responses, most of which are dated November or December 1939. In addition, there is a list of respondents. The project's results comprised a set of statistics on the fate of Germany's synagogues.
Until the end of the nineteenth century, most middle-class girls were educated at home by the family, unlike their brothers who routinely attended university, and the schools which did cater for them were generally of a very poor academic standard, with emphasis on 'accomplishments' such as embroidery and music. However, some, such as Louisa Martindale, tried to start their own schools for girls with more academically demanding curricula. Despite the failure of Martindale's exercise, Frances Mary Buss followed in her footsteps when, at the age of twenty-three, she founded the North London Collegiate School for Ladies with similar aims. In 1858 Dorothea Beale became Principal of the already extant Cheltenham Ladies College and soon transformed it into one of the most academically successful schools in the country while at the same time working to improve teaching standards through her work with the Head Mistresses' Association and The Teachers' Guild. In 1865 Beale began collaborating with Emily Davis, Barbara Bodichon, Helen Taylor, Frances Buss, and Elizabeth Garrett Anderson, in forming a debating society which became known as the Kensington Society. There, these women, who would be crucial in the development of these schools, met for the first time to discuss this and other topics such as women's franchise. Nor did they confine their attentions to the education of girls but also researched the question of the subsequent entrance of women into higher education. The Queen's College in London had already opened in 1847 to provide a superior level of education to governesses and had proved a success without being an accredited institution of higher education itself. In this context and influenced by the London group, a large number of Ladies' Educational Associations sprang up throughout the 1860s and 1870s. Those in Leeds, Liverpool, Newcastle, Sheffield, etc, were brought together in 1867 by Anne Clough as the North of England Council for Promoting the Higher Education of Women and its members included Josephine and George Butler as well as Elizabeth Wolstenholme-Elmy. This council began setting up a series of lectures and a university-based examination for women who wished to become teachers and which would later develop into a University Extension Scheme. However, universities generally still refused to open their degree examinations to women. In 1871, Henry Sidgwick established the residence Newnham College for women who were attending lectures at Cambridge where Clough would become principal in 1879 when it was recognised as an academic college. Girton was established by Davis as the College for Women at Hitchin in 1869 and moved to Cambridge as the first residential higher education college for women four years later. After the campaign to establish these institutions, it remained necessary to continue the campaign to extend their levels of excellence to the general state of female education and to open up other avenues of achievement to them.
The two compilers of these MSS. are the same as those of MS. No. 210 (Consultationes], the later hand may be that of Pierre Rivallier [1644- ],a physician at Nîmes.
The church of Saint Philip was situated on Granville Square, Clerkenwell. It was designed by Edward Buckton Lamb between 1831 and 1833. After only 25 years the church had been undermined by the building of the Metropolitan Railway and had to be repaired, re-opening in 1860. The last marriage register was closed in 1936 on the union of the parish with the Church of the Holy Redeemer, Exmouth Market.
The church of Holy Trinity on Grays Inn Road was designed by Sir James Pennethorne and erected in 1837. It seated 1500 people. Restored in 1880, it reopened in 1881. It was closed during the 1914-1918 war but was in use again by 1921; before finally closing in 1928. Holy Trinity parish was created from the parish of Saint Andrew, Holborn in 1839. The parish and benefice were united with Saint George the Martyr, Queen Square in 1931. Holy Trinity church was closed with the intention of demolishing the church and selling the site.
St Mary's Church, Greenwich, was demolished in 1936.
This collection of photographs had its origins in the Greater London Council (GLC) Architect's Department.
The images of the Fellows of the Royal Society have been collected since the foundation of the Society in 1660.
This type of record has been solicited by the Royal Society during several periods of its history. In 1723 James Jurin appealed for observations via the 'Philosophical Transactions' and from 1725 instruments were sent to foreign observers to assist in this process. The resulting papers were abstracted in the 'Philosophical Transactions' by William Derham and others, but are preserved entire in this series. The Royal Society kept its own observations for the period 1774-1843 from which date the duties were transferred to the Royal Greenwich Observatory. In the mid 19th century further impetus was given to such information gathering by the Meteorological Committee, and many of the manuscripts date from this time.
The Royal Society's Tercentenary celebrations took place on 18 July 1960.
Various
Biography - documents
Vice-Admiral Lancelot Ernest Holland (1887-1941) was lost with the HOOD in 1941.
The letters in the Letter Collection were bought or donated on an individual basis between 1938-1946 and given separate accession numbers and presumably collected and bound soon after 1946.
No information was available at the time of compilation.
The manor of Paris Garden covered almost the same territory as the parish of Christ Church, Southwark, a little less than 100 acres. The whole area is below high-water level and was prone to flooding. Consequently it was not built-up until after 1809 when new sewers were constructed. The land belonged to the Knights Templars from around 1113. After that order was supressed the manor was granted to the Knights Hospitallers, who leased it out. The first use of the name "Parish Garden" (later Paris Garden) to describe the estate was made in 1420.
In 1536 the Hospitallers surrendered the land to Henry VIII. It was held by the Crown until 1578 when it was granted to Henry Cary, Lord Hunsdon. Two years later he demised the demesne lands to one owner and the copyhold lands to another; thenceforward they have separate histories. The copyholder's lease was converted into a fee simple in 1881, but the manorial rights were not abolished until 1936. The manor was bought by William Angell in 1655, and was sold by him to George Baron. The Baron family held the manor until 1827, when Elizabeth Ann Baron married John Lethbridge, it then passed into the Lethbridge family, who still held it in the 1950s.
For a more detailed history see 'Paris Garden Manor', Survey of London: volume 22: Bankside (the parishes of St. Saviour and Christchurch Southwark) (1950), pp. 94-100 (available online).
These papers relating to Battersea Park were collected by James Phillips for their general or antiquarian interest and relevance to the subject, rather than having a united provenance (that is, being produced by the same institution or business).
Battersea Fields were converted into Battersea Park between 1846 and 1864, designed by Sir James Pennethorne.
John Burns was formerly a member of London County Council. His private collection of documents was acquired by Lord Southwood, who gave them to the Library.
Stephen Warwick is mentioned in the documents as living at 1 Belle Vue Villas, Lefevre Road, Bow. He is described as a butler. He died in 1869 leaving his wife Louisa Warwick. There was a dispute between Louisa and shoemaker Thomas Eames of Elstree over Warwick's will.
Stephen Knott of Exmouth served in the Merchant Navy and the Royal Naval Reserves. The Knott and Legg families were connected by the marriage of Emma Knott and John Legg. The family lived in Holloway.
The documents in this collection all relate to associations but have not been assigned separate fonds due to their size or because the originator cannot be identified.
An 'indenture' was a deed or agreement between two or more parties. Two or more copies were written out, usually on one piece of parchment or paper, and then cut in a jagged or curvy line, so that when brought together again at any time, the two edges exactly matched and showed that they were parts of one and the same original document. A 'right hand indenture' is therefore the copy of the document which was on the right hand side when the parchment was cut in two.
A 'fine' was a fee, separate from the rent, paid by the tenant or vassal to the landlord on some alteration of the tenancy, or a sum of money paid for the granting of a lease or for admission to a copyhold tenement.
A bargain and sale was an early form of conveyance often used by executors to convey land. The bargainee, or person to whom the land was bargained and sold, took possession, often referred to as becoming 'seised' of the land.
Source: British Records Association Guidelines 3: How to interpret deeds (available online).
The early history of the estate later known as Swakeleys manor is obscure. In the early 13th century the estate seems to have passed to John de Trumpinton whose son, also called John, still held it about 1260. By 1329, however, part of this land had apparently been acquired by Robert Swalcliffe of Swalcliffe. Four years later Robert and his wife conveyed their lands to William le Gauger of London, but the family name Swalcliffe, later contracted to Swakeleys, continued to attach to the estate. In 1751 the estate was sold to the Reverend Thomas Clarke, Rector of Ickenham. Members of the Clarke family held Swakeleys for over a century. Thomas Clarke died in 1796 and was succeeded by his son Thomas Truesdale Clarke. Thomas Truesdale's son, another Thomas Truesdale, succeeded in 1840 and bought the manor of Ickenham in 1859. He died in 1890 and was succeeded by his son William Capel Clarke, who had married Clara Thornhill and had added his wife's name to his own. William Capel Clarke-Thornhill died in 1898 and in 1922 his son Thomas Bryan Clarke-Thornhill sold most of the Swakeleys estate to agents for development as a residential suburb.
The extent of Swakeleys in the Middle Ages is unknown: from the 14th century the manor included much land outside the parish. In 1531 it was said to comprise more than 1,000 acres and in 1608 over 2,000 acres. At inclosure in 1780 Thomas Clarke held 368 acres in Ickenham. A park is mentioned in 1453 and again in 1517. This presumably was that surrounding Swakeleys manor-house.
From: A History of the County of Middlesex: Volume 4: Harmondsworth, Hayes, Norwood with Southall, Hillingdon with Uxbridge, Ickenham, Northolt, Perivale, Ruislip, Edgware, Harrow with Pinner (1971), pp. 69-75 (available online).
There is no unifying factor to these papers (e.g. that they relate to property owned by one estate or family or the legal work of one office), they were simply collected by the Wiltshire Archaeological Society for their antiquarian or research interest before being passed to the archive.
A deed is any document affecting title, that is, proof of ownership, of the land in question. The land may or may not have buildings upon it. Common types of deed include conveyances, mortgages, bonds, grants of easements, wills and administrations.
Conveyances are transfers of land from one party to another, usually for money. Early forms of conveyance include feoffments, surrenders and admissions at manor courts (if the property was copyhold), final concords, common recoveries, bargains and sales and leases and releases.
A bargain and sale was an early form of conveyance often used by executors to convey land. The bargainee, or person to whom the land was bargained and sold, took possession, often referred to as becoming 'seised' of the land.
Source: British Records Association Guidelines 3: How to interpret deeds (available online).
Hayes Manor was granted to Christ Church, Canterbury, in 832; and remained in the possession of the church until 1545 when it was taken over by the king. It was sold to the North family in 1546, who in turn sold it on in 1613. It subsequently passed through various owners. The estate was broken up in 1898.
Southall Manor has its origins in land held by William of Southall in 1212. In 1496 the manor was sold to Edward Cheeseman. His son gained the Manor of Norwood, and the two manors were henceforth united. The manors passed through various owners until 1757 when it passed to the Child family, and then the descent of the manor passed with Hayes Manor.
Information from 'Hayes: Manors and other estates', A History of the County of Middlesex: Volume 4: Harmondsworth, Hayes, Norwood with Southall, Hillingdon with Uxbridge, Ickenham, Northolt, Perivale, Ruislip, Edgware, Harrow with Pinner (1971), pp. 26-29 (available online).
Colham manor was in 1086 assessed at 8 hides, 6 of which were in demesne. At some time before 1594 Hillingdon manor was incorporated in that of Colham. Insulated within the lands of Colham lay the 'three little manors' of Cowley Hall, Colham Garden, and Cowley Peachey, and freehold estates belonging to a number of manors in other parishes, including Swakeleys in Ickenham. The manor passed through several owners before, in 1787, John Dodd sold the whole manor to Fysh de Burgh, lord of the manor of West Drayton. Fysh de Burgh died in 1800 leaving Colham subject to the life interest of his widow Easter (d 1823), in trust for his daughter Catherine (d 1809), wife of James G. Lill who assumed the name of De Burgh, with remainder to their son Hubert. The manor passed to Hubert de Burgh in 1832 and he immediately mortgaged the estate. Hubert retained actual possession of the property until his death in 1872.
Information from: 'Hillingdon, including Uxbridge: Manors and other estates', A History of the County of Middlesex: Volume 4: Harmondsworth, Hayes, Norwood with Southall, Hillingdon with Uxbridge, Ickenham, Northolt, Perivale, Ruislip, Edgware, Harrow with Pinner (1971), pp. 69-75 (available online).
A deed is any document affecting title, that is, proof of ownership, of the land in question. The land may or may not have buildings upon it. Common types of deed include conveyances, mortgages, bonds, grants of easements, wills and administrations.
Conveyances are transfers of land from one party to another, usually for money. Early forms of conveyance include feoffments, surrenders and admissions at manor courts (if the property was copyhold), final concords, common recoveries, bargains and sales and leases and releases.
Feoffment was an early form of conveyance involving a simple transfer of freehold land by deed followed by in a ceremony called livery of seisin.
Source: British Records Association Guidelines 3: How to interpret deeds (available online).
A deed is any document affecting title, that is, proof of ownership, of the land in question. The land may or may not have buildings upon it. Common types of deed include conveyances, mortgages, bonds, grants of easements, wills and administrations.
Conveyances are transfers of land from one party to another, usually for money. Early forms of conveyance include feoffments, surrenders and admissions at manor courts (if the property was copyhold), final concords, common recoveries, bargains and sales and leases and releases.
An assignment of term, or assignment to attend the inheritance, was an assignment of the remaining term of years in a mortgage to a trustee after the mortgage itself has been redeemed. An assignment of a lease is the transfer of the rights laid out in the lease to another party, usually for a consideration (a sum of money).
Source: British Records Association Guidelines 3: How to interpret deeds (available online).
A deed is any document affecting title, that is, proof of ownership, of the land in question. The land may or may not have buildings upon it. Common types of deed include conveyances, mortgages, bonds, grants of easements, wills and administrations.
Conveyances are transfers of land from one party to another, usually for money. Early forms of conveyance include feoffments, surrenders and admissions at manor courts (if the property was copyhold), final concords, common recoveries, bargains and sales and leases and releases.
Lease and release was the most common method of conveying freehold property from the later seventeenth century onwards, before the introduction of the modern conveyance in the late nineteenth century. The lease was granted for a year (sometimes six months), then on the following day the lessor released their right of ownership in return for the consideration (the thing for which land was transferred from one party to another, usually, of course, a sum of money).
Feoffment was an early form of conveyance involving a simple transfer of freehold land by deed followed by in a ceremony called livery of seisin.
Source: British Records Association Guidelines 3: How to interpret deeds (available online).
Jonathan Passingham, a farmer from Heston, died in 1833, leaving most of his estate at Heston in trust for his wife Elizabeth and, after her death, to be divided between his two daughters. Ellen, who married Jonathan Passingham of Cornwall in December 1833, was to receive Heston Farm estate (143a 29p), and Emma, wife of James Basire, engraver of Chancery Lane, was to receive North Hyde Farm estate (132a 2r 3p). After their deaths the property was to be divided between their respective heirs. The executors and trustees of the will were Francis Sherborn, gentleman of Bedfont, and Charles Farnell, brewer of Isleworth.
The inheritance became a cause in Chancery in 1836 when the heirs accused Francis Sherborn of "a series of frauds, misconduct, negligence and breaches of trust", and Charles Farnell of "gross negligence" in failing to take steps to prevent this. Farnell stated he had been "a mere cypher in the business", as Sherborn had been the active trustee (see ACC/0328/033). The main charge of the plaintiffs concerned the mismanagement of Heston and North Hyde Farms which, soon after the death of Jonathan Passingham, had been leased by the trustees to Francis Sherborn and his brother Matthew as tenants in common. The plaintiffs claimed that the terms of the lease, which was drawn up by Henry Farnell, brother of Charles, were fraudulent, and resulted in "acts of waste and destruction" by the Sherborns. These were specified as ploughing up valuable meadow and pasture land, denuding the estate of timber, and allowing buildings to fall into decay and, in some cases, pulling them down. A further charge related to the sale of a brickfield called Tentlows in which the trustees had a beneficial interest. The decree in Chancery in 1839 discharged Sherborn and Farnell from their trusteeship.
George Robert Rowe, M.D. of Chigwell, Essex, and Francis Passingham of Truro, Cornwall, were subsequently appointed new trustees, to be accountable for the estate to the Master of the Rolls. An Act of Parliament in 1844 (7 and 8 Vict. c.22) enabled the trustees to grant leases for digging brick earth on the estate. The royalties from brick making were to be paid into two accounts at the Bank of England, one for Heston Farm and one for North Hyde Farm, in the name of the Accountant General of the Court of Chancery. Another act in 1847 (see ACC/0328/058) authorised the construction of a canal link for transporting bricks. This, however, was not undertaken, a tramway being built instead.
The Depot Estate was land originally purchased by HM Ordnance in 1814 from several owners. Three small pieces of land, copyhold of the manor of Heston, were added to the estate in 1817. When it was sold in 1832, the estate comprised barracks, storehouses, dwelling houses, lands and a private canal. Most of the Depot Estate was purchased in 1845 by Messrs. Allen and Holmes, solicitors to the Passingham trustees, and conveyed to the trustees in 1848. James Basire, widower of Emma, the daughter of Jonathan Passingham, held the life interest in the rents and profits of North Hyde Farm and the Depot Estate. When he died in 1869 the Basire heirs brought a further cause in Chancery for the sale or partition of the North Hyde Estates, and in 1871-2 the property was sold in twenty one lots, primarily for building development, (see ACC/0328/105-106).
The Manor of Little Stanmore, also known as Canons, was sold to James Brydges in 1709. Brydges later became Lord Chandos, and in 1719 was made Duke of Chandos. However, Henry, Duke of Chandos, was forced to sell the manor and house in 1746, to pay off heavy debts. James Brydges also acquired the Manor of Great Stanmore which remained in the Chandos family until 1840.
Warren House, situated on Wood Lane, and its estates were originally part of the Manor of Great Stanmore and were leased out by the Chandos family. It was later owned by James Forbes of the East India Company. Forbes sold it in 1813, and by 1827 it was the property of the architect Sir Robert Smirke who also held 23 acres in Great Stanmore and 108 acres in Little Stanmore. It was then owned by Charles Keyser, banker Henry Bischoffsheim, and his grandson Major General Sir John Fitzgerald. In 1937 Fitzgerald sold 123 acres of land to Harrow Urban District Council as part of the Green Belt; and then in 1951 sold the house with 11 acres of land to the National Corporation for the Care of Old People.
Source: A History of the County of Middlesex: Volume 5: Hendon, Kingsbury, Great Stanmore, Little Stanmore, Edmonton Enfield, Monken Hadley, South Mimms, Tottenham (1976), available online.
The Christmas cards are from Sir James Boyton, M.P. for Marylebone; Henry John Yeend-King, landscape painter and Royal Academician; and Adrian Jones, sculptor and Royal Academician.
Nicholas Abbott of Uxbridge was a malster, while his son William Abbott (fl. 1677-84) was a victualler. Edward Powell of Uxbridge (fl 1791) was a carpenter who had 6 children.
The Manor of Sunbury was held by John Alliston between 1825 and 1852. The estate was then sold to John Park, who died in 1887 leaving the manor to his widow. It was then left to their son C J Park who died in 1909, when the manor passed to the Chester family.
From: 'Sunbury: Manors', A History of the County of Middlesex: Volume 3: Shepperton, Staines, Stanwell, Sunbury, Teddington, Heston and Isleworth, Twickenham, Cowley, Cranford, West Drayton, Greenford, Hanwell, Harefield and Harlington (1962), pp. 53-57 (available online).
Duncan Sinclair died in the 1840s.