February 2010

Our new programmes of outings and meetings are now available, but please note that in the outings list on the membership form an error has crept in. The Woburn visit is on the 5th August, but the day shown is incorrect: it's a Thursday.

Nothing to report on the Museum and the Town Hall at the moment as North Herts District Council has put off making its decision for another week. We have another book launch coming up later this year. This book is on the history of the Triangle area by the Triangle History Group, and the launch will be on Saturday 30th October 2010 at Holy Saviour Church Hall in Radcliffe Road. The title of the book has yet to be decided - more news nearer the date.

Hitchin Museum's Summer Exhibition

David Hodges, curator of the museum, has put out a request for information for this summer's exhibition. The subject is "Hitchin's Horrid History" and it focuses on all the disgusting and disreputably fascinating parts of the town's history we normally don't hear much about. This includes man traps, cock-fighting, slums, sewers and the like. If you have any anecdotes, memories or artefacts which the museum could include in the exhibition, David will be very pleased to hear from you. The exhibition will run from 10th July to 4th September.

Benslow Trees

In December we reported that HHS had offered its support to North Herts District Council for placing Tree Preservation Orders on the line of historic beech trees in Benslow Rise. We believe the trees were planted in the mid-1800s soon after the railway was built, and formed an avenue between the new Women’s College at Benslow House and the station.

We now hear that one tree in the row, the one nearest the station at The Bungalow, was felled a couple of weeks ago. We understand permission was granted on grounds that the tree was, to our surprise, in poor health, with the proviso that a new, established tree be planted in its place. We also have a report that trees higher up the slope may be infected with Honey Fungus, which is fatal to beech trees and highly contagious, and we feel this needs looking into quickly and seriously so that as many as possible of these trees can be saved.

We have asked NHDC to respond to our concerns about this row of trees, as they have not answered our letter of support or even registered our letter on their website.

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The Delmé-Radcliffe Papers and Hitchin Priory

HHS helped save this collection for the county, and Sue Flood, Hertfordshire's County Archivist, came to our last meeting to talk about some of the 17th and 18th century documents we’ve helped to preserve. The county has a huge amount of material about the Delmé-Radcliffe family, its employees, houses and lifestyle. Hitchin Priory forms part of the Delmé-Radcliffe estate so Sue concentrated on that, and a fascinating history emerged.

Sir Ralph Radcliffe, 1633-1720, lived to a great age and married three times. His 2nd wife, Sarah, was a wealthy widow, and this enabled him to build a new front to the Priory’s Cloister Wing, possibly emulating the style of the recently-modernised front of Hatfield House.

Sir Ralph’s five grandsons became Levant traders, managing the business from London with some of them working in Turkey. His grandson Ralph Radcliffe inherited the Priory and returned to live in Hitchin. He erected a wall around the park on the town side and fenced in the other sides so that he could keep deer in the park. A deer park in Hitchin – quite a surprise. The papers show he bought hundreds of hollies at this time, presumably to create this fence.

Ralph left no children and bequeathed the estate to his fourth-oldest brother, John, which caused consternation in the family. The Ralph’s second-oldest brother, Edward, challenged the will and won. However, John and his wife Jane continued to live at the Priory until Jane died in 1742, after which the house and park were shut up and the deer removed.

Edward also left no children and, because John’s oldest son died aged 22, John's second son, John, was recalled from Turkey so that he could inherit in due course. For his journey back to England John was given a letter of safe passage signed by King Louis XV of France himself. This letter still exists in the collection. This John was extremely rich by 1767. He paid £9000 to become the Member of Parliament for St Albans, although once elected he did not make any speeches in the House, and married the daughter of the Earl of Carlisle, Frances Howard. He added what is known as the Adam Wing to the Priory, maintained two phaetons (carriages) and employed a very highly-paid cook (£40 a year). Adam did not actually design this wing of the Priory but he did supply some plans, which the family rejected. They seem to have kept some aspects of Adam’s design, though, and the name “Adam Wing” stuck.

John Radcliffe MP’s other projects included enlarging the park to over 100 acres, laying it mainly to grass with clumps of trees and building a lodge at the Gosmore end. This created a very fashionable entrance drive to the Priory which wound through the park with glimpses of the house and lake through trees as visitors approached in their carriages. He also built a heated building for growing exotic fruit and an ice house for making ice cream. All the bills for these projects together with payments to staff and workmen, including many local craftsmen, are preserved in the collection.

In the late 1700s Ann Radcliffe married Emilius Delmé, who changed his name so that he and their children could inherit the estate. The Delmé-Radcliffe papers then become more scarce so that far less is known about the Priory in the 19th century, but by 1916 the Priory was in poor condition as water had seeped into the newer parts of the building. The then owner, Sir Ralph Delmé-Radcliffe, repaired the building and employed Gertrude Jekyll to provide planting plans for the garden.

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Next Society meeting

Our next meeting is on Thursday 25th February, when John Lucas will be talking about his Regency ancestor Phebe Lucas - a Worthy Daughter of Hitchin, following publication of his book Phebe's Hitchin Book - Memories of Life in Regency Hitchin

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This page updated 13th December 2009