Interesting Local History from an Estate Agent's Account Book

Last Wednesday I gave a talk about this interesting 1850s account book to the Tring & District Local History & Museum Society and all the slides are now available at:

www.bit.ly/BrownAccountBook

You will find the menu on the left gives you access to

• A page describing the Account Book
• The Calendar - which in turn allows you to view all 283 folios
• William Brown's A-Z Customer Index
• The slides for the talk (to see additional notes press the [A] button)

Bearing in mind the recent news about the Conservative Party not properly declaring their election expenses one of the slides that cause much interest was:

The 1851 election was caused because one of the MPs was unseated because too much "bribery" money had been spent wining and dining prospective voters... 

I think all the audience were distressed that historically valuable documents relating to the history of the town had ended up on ebay, and that some key documents have ended up with unknown buyers. It is possible that other less attractive looking but historically important documents may have been rubbished. At least the account book will end up in the museum collection - and the information it contains is available to all online.

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Two areas are still being worked on. The Calendar uses the headings on every page but only some pages have a supplementary list of personal names and places and it is hoped to complete this over the next few months. In addition I have still to add supplementary notes to some of the slides.

Three further books - the minute books of the Tring Agricultural Society - will also be passed the the museum when I have provided more online information about them.

In addition only a few pages have been studied in depth, and if you are interested in following up the history behind any folio (including those relating to people and places over the boundary in Buckinghamshire) do not hesitate to contact me.

The 1850s Account Book of William Brown, of Tring

On 18th May the Tring & District Local History & Museum Society will be holding their A.G.M.in the Tring Parish Hall at 8pm - and I will be giving the talk. The official introduction reads:

William Brown's client account general ledger contains a wealth of information relating to property in and around Tring, including the sale of houses and farms, valuations for probate, etc., relating to local families. A significant part of the volume deals with the management of the Tring Park Estate. Dr. Chris Reynolds is an amateur historian and member of the Society. He has lived in Tring for over 50 years, and currently runs the "Genealogy in Hertfordshire" website. This site includes many pages on Tring including a digitised copy of William Brown's account book.

 Over the next three weeks I will be preparing the talk - which will be made available on the main web site, with supporting notes, after the event. Between now and then I will be posting some advanced "publicity" information on this blog. In addition you can go online and browser through the accounts and if there are any which particularly interest you (maybe they concern a property or individual you have been researching) add a comment below and I may be able to include a mention in the talk, or add notes to the web site after the talk.

After the talk the Account Book will be passed to the Museum for safekeeping - and will possibly appear in the document display cabinet.

The Joys and Distractions of Historical Research.

Sir Walter Gilbey's Funeral, November 1914

One of the joys and distractions of historical research is finding an unexpected clue - and before you know where you are you are hard at work on an interesting side issue - which becomes more interesting the deeper you dig.

Some years ago I obtained a pair of photographs of a funeral - but who was being buried, and it took about 5 years to be certain it was the funeral of Sir Walter Gilbey, of Gilbey's Gin fame, who was being buried in Bishops Stortford in 1914

Earlier this week I was looking at an account of the 1915 AGM of the Tring Agricultural Society, which described Sir Walter's contribution to the Society in these words:  

"Sir Walter had been a member of Tring Show for 22 years, and he must often in his younger days have trodden the ground where our annual show is held, when a pupil on the Tring Park Estate."

I wanted to know more - and then more ... If you are intrigued to know why a very rich man such as Sir Walter started out a "a pupil on the Tring Park estate" see Auctioneer's Apprentices in Tring, 1828-1848

The "new" 1853 Cemetery at Tring

The Account Book

As part of my project to document selected entries in William Brown's account book I have examined his account with the Churchwardens at Tring. In June 1851 he was asked to make drawings and estimates for a wall round the proposed new cemetery, and in November 1852 he sold off wood from a piece of land purchased from Mr Norman, which would appear to be the Cemetery site. I have added a map, a press account of the consecration of the site, and links to modern pictures showing what is there now.

Tring

The folio in the account book also refers to a "lighting rate" (to pay for gas street lighting), work on an unidentified property in Frogmore Street, and work to be done on Tring's Poors Land.

September Progress Report

All in all a satisfactory month, with over 7,500 page views of the Newsletter (the best month yet) while the main web site had nearly 22,000 visitors. While there were only 20 new posts on the Newsletter several of the updates involved a lot of work. The level of background emails was lower than last month, and I have decided not to produce a summary this month.. 

The project to digitise unique documents I hold (and which I will be passing to suitable repositories) continues. Work on the William Brown ledger has resulted in an extensive review of information on the Tring Grove Estate. While going through the family papers I have posted pictures of First World War remounts relates to my grandfather's work as a vet.

In October I plan to produce more "Tales from an Estate Agent's Account Book."  I will also start going though my extensive notes, originally collected for a major book on Bernards Heath, to ferret out material relevant to Sandridge 900, to be held next year. (September's work on Hawkswick is related as the house is over the parish border with Sandridge and was covered by some of my old notes).

On the administration front I have rewritten the Ask Chris page, to simplify the handling of emails from people who expect free help (and probably have no intention of making a donation) and who can't be bothered to find out what service is on offer before posting their query.

One of the problems with this web site its that it has grown like topsy over the years. The original plan was to have one page for every town or village in the county. When I got too much information for one page I started to divide up the pages, with an individual menu, and for some of the large towns this work has been "in progress" for several years. I have decided that for places which still have a single page I will take a modified approach - as can be seen with Widford. The left hand menu remains the default "places" menu, and links are moved to the right hand side of the village page. This is far quicker and simpler for me as it doesn't mean changing any existing inter-page links, while if I create a dedicated left hand menu I sometimes have to change twenty or more links.

Finally a WARNING. When using the British Newspaper Archive, FindMyPast lists the start and end years for a newspaper - but doesn't warn when there are missing years in the sequence. During the month I discovered that the 1852 copies of the Bucks Herald (which is very good for the Tring area of Hertfordshire) are missing. This type of problem is not uncommon  - you do a search and get no results - and the package you are using doesn't warn you that the null result is because the relevant documents are not in the data base!

Researching a small estate - Tring Grove

This month's analysis of the entries in William Brown's Account Book relate to the sale of the Tring Grove Estate in 1854. See Lord Lake & Sale of Tring Grove in 1854.

Tring

William Brown was asked to sell the Tring Grove Estate as a result of a dispute in Chancery relating to the will of Lord Lake, of Aston Clinton. The account book describes the preparation for the sale, and expenses relating to the sale - but it does not detail the property -which would have been described in a prospectus. To demonstrate the kinds of information involved in researching a property of this nature I look at various sources.

• I start by summarising the folios in the account book - with links to the original text.
• I identify Lord Lake, and briefly refer to the Court of Chancery case - This would make an interesting story in its own right - but will have to wait.
• I use the British Newspaper Archive to locate the advert for the sale, and an account of the sale which gives the winning bids - but does not identify the buyers.
• I then look at various printed maps between 1766 and 1898. The early maps show a large house in a park - but this vanishes from the maps - and is not mentioned in the sale. This raises an additional task to solve.
• I check the main histories of Hertfordshire, and books on Tring. One book lists the owner and tenants at the time of inclosure in 1797 - but otherwise there was nothing relevant. The older histories undoubtedly failed to mention it because it was not a historic manor.
• I then search the Access to Archives data base to see what kind of material is available in various records offices. Following this up is a later task, but it is useful to know what information will be available later.
• The next stage was to check the British Newspaper Archive for references to owners and occupiers prior to the sale. The earliest local papers date from the 1830s but some useful earlier references were found. Sometimes information comes in unexpected forms. An article on the advantages of living in America ended with a list of the bigger houses at Tring - which makes it clear that Grove House had been demolished (probably in the 1810s. (If your ancestor left Tring for America in 1828 this article will explain why!)
• Having identified some names I uses the census to get more details of the farming families in 1851 and 1861. This made it clear that while Grove Park Farm and Tring Grove Farm were separate in 1851, after the sale the two merged to form one larger farm.
• I then checked some details with county trade directories.
• In addition to the Account Book I also have minute books for the Tring Agricultural Association and extracted relevant information about the farms.
• I then summaries what I have learnt about the nine properties which were included in the sale. 
• I end with an overall summary of what has been achieved so far. In theory I would now be extending the research by visiting various archive offices to look at the documents they have. Because of other demands on my time I have no immediate plans to take this further, but if I am visiting any of the archives for other purposes I will try and find time to consult relevant documents.

What is an Arbele Tree?

When you are working with any old documents you will come across words whose meaning you don't know - and they may be archaic or dialect words. In looking at Folio 41 of William Brown's Account Book I found the above entry in the account for Joseph Grout of Tring Park.

The entry is clear. In 1851 Harris (possibly Joseph Harris, builder, of Berkhamsted) cut down a number of arbele trees, and a few months later cut down two more. While the exact location is not stated William Brown handled other transactions for Joseph Grout relating to a farm at Wilstone occupied by William Greening.

So what is an "arbele" tree. It is clearly not an Ash, which is mentioned on the same page, and an 1850 newspaper advert also rules out beech, elm, sycamore and fir. I turned to my collection of modern printed dictionaries and none of them included it. My Webster's Dictionary (1860 edition) does not have it - the nearest word being "arbalist" which was an old word for a cross-bow. Perhaps arbele wood was used to make the shaft of a cross-bow I thought - but I am sure Harris did not want to make crossbows. The original printed Oxford English Dictionary didn't have it either - but its coverage of agricultural and other technical terms has many missing words. However the online edition of the Oxford English Dictionary gives the following definition:

The white poplar tree, Populus alba. Formerly also the grey poplar, Populus X canescens (obs.)

  This is where you must be careful not to jump to conclusions "just because the dictionary tells you." The quotations used to support this definition are in most cases unclear about which species of poplar tree is being mentioned. If we visit the area of William Greening's farm there are black poplars everywhere. They were obviously deliberately planted in the hedge rows (because there are only male trees they could not be self seeded) and the oldest trees might well be a couple of hundred years old. All the older ones have been pollarded. All the evidence suggests that they were considered as a commercial crop. There is one problem. They are black poplars, not white poplars.

See The Black Poplars of the Wilstone Area for the evidence for arbele being used to describe black poplars - at least in the Vale of Aylesbury area.

Please let me know if you find other places where the word has been used.

Exploring the History of Hastoe House, near Tring.

The Account Book

Folio 105 of William Brown's Account Book  records that a Mrs Chesterman asked him to let Hastoe House and value some furniture.

Why?

William Brown also managed the property affairs for the Rev. James Williams, who lived in Tring Park. Folio 68 shows that in April 1852 the house was advertised to let. In May Mr Chesterman agreed to rent the house at £80 per year and on 16th of June Mr Chesterman brought the furniture in the house for £120. Ubfortunately he died on 1st July, 1852 - so clearly did not have much time to enjoy Hastoe House.  William Brown's Account Book shows that the Chesterman executors continued to pay the rent until 1856 so I decided to see what happened to Mrs Hannah Chesterman - only to find that in 1853 she married William Brown's brother James!

I was hooked - and I decided to see what I could find out about the other tenants. This was made possible because all the 19th century editions of the Bucks Herald (published in nearby Aylesbury) are available on the British Newspaper Archive. A certain amount of intelligent deduction was needed - helped by the fact that Hastoe House was the only property in the Hastoe area which was posh enough to employ resident domestic servants. 

The many tenants included Baron Rothschild in 1843 (he probably used it as a hunting lodge), the son in law of the Bishop of Chichester, a "retired squatter" (not what you might think), and William Brown's business partner. It seems that another tenant, a William Burns, died shortly after taking the tenancy. The only significant gap between 1841 and 1901 is that I was unable to discover the name of the tenant who was resident at the time of the 1861 census - as only their domestic staff are recorded.

For full details, including copies of the relevant sections of the account book, various press adverts, maps, and two modern views see CHESTERMAN & Hastoe House, Tring, circa 1838 - 1901

It should be pointed out that it was possible to find so much out, comparatively quickly, because Hastoe House was the only "gentry" accommodation in Hastoe, which itself had a very small population. 

John Amsden of Tring sells off some brewing equipment.

I have chosen a relatively simple entry as my first example of how useful William Brown's Account Book can be at highlighting an event in someone's life.

In December 1854 William Brown "received instructions to sell Brewery Plant &c by auction taking inventory and drawing catalogue" The goods sold for £11 15s but after paying for "printing & posting Bills and catalogues, advertisements & criers, &c." and commission so John Amsden only received £8 1s.

Read AMSDEN, Tring, circa 1854 to find out why John Amsden was selling up - and find out what he did afterwards.

John may have sold the beer he brewed from his house in Frogmore Street and one thing I failed to find out was whether there was a pub sign outside his house - and if so what was the pub called.

Project: William Brown's Account Book

Tring

The first of my priority projects to get underway (see Future of this Site - Thinking Ahead 2013-2018) concerns an old account book that had belonged to William Brown, estate agent, of Tring during the 1850s. I had purchased it on ebay with a view to passing it to the Tring Local History Society after I had properly indexed it, etc. About 4 years ago I had put some extracts from the book on this web site with a view to doing more - and the project stalled.

The book provides a unique record of property related activities in and around Tring (in Buckinghamshire as well as Hertfordshire) especially as William Brown acted as land agent for the Rev. James Williams, who occupied Tring Park during the period covered by the book. It contains much of interest to local and family historians and needs to be readily accessible. The project involves making it generally accessible, and the following stages are planned.

Brown's Account Book

1. To get all 283 folios and the original manuscript index online  and accessible. This stage has now been completed, and may be accessed at www.hertfordshire-genealogy.co.uk/links/tring-brown.htm 
2. Draw up a calendar of the folios which records the subject of each folio, including key place and personal manes. A draft listing identifying each folio with the folio title has been completed - but the additional text has only been done for the first 20 folios. The aim is to do a bit each week and complete by the end of the year.
3. Complete a page contains a biography of William Brown. 
4. Produce about 25 detailed reports relating to the information contained - to act as a demonstration of the kinds of information in the document and how it can be used. Three are currently in draft stage and will be announced over the next two or three weeks. The aim is to produce one or two such reports a month. In addition I hope to encourage others to "adopt" a folio and produce further reports.
5. Produce a talk on the document - and probably two or three articles.
6. Find a home for the original document. As it has been digitised I no longer need the original to complete the project.

A progress report will be included in each month-end report.

You are invited to explore the page of the account book and let me have your comments.

A List of Later Project Reports

John Amsden of Tring sells off some brewing equipment.

Exploring the History of Hastoe House, near Tring.

What is an Arbele Tree?

William Brown's Account Book - A Major Project

W. Brown's Account Book

A few years ago I acquired the client account book of William Brown, Estate Agent of Tring for most of the 1850s. Part was put online at the time and the aim was to make it all available. This got delayed and I have decided to give the matter top priority for at least the rest on 2013, with some continuing into 2014.

The plan for documenting this manuscript book is as follows: