Abstract
This chapter introduces the existing literature surrounding the landed estate and argues that the historiography has yet to fully research the financial history of the estate beyond the country house and its consumption. More generally, it examines how the Dorset and Somerset estate of the Marquis of Anglesey was created, how it came to be in his possession and its management by the Castleman family. In essence it lays out the narrative of how an estate was the sum of a range of socio-economic and political processes which were interlinked by the same financial underpinning surrounding the decision-making process.
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Notes
- 1.
See, for example, C. Beardmore, S. King and G. Monks, (eds) (2016) The Land Agent in Britain: Past, Present and Future (Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars); C. A. Beardmore, (April, 2016) ‘The Rural Estate through the Eyes of the Land Agent: A Community in Microcosm c1812–1854’, Family and Community History, 19:1, pp. 17–33; C. A. Beardmore (2015) ‘Landowner, Tenant and Agent on the Marquis of Anglesey’s Dorset and Somerset Estate, 1814–1844’, Rural History 26:2, pp. 181–199; G. Monks (2018) ‘William Gould, Land Agent and the Rural Community in Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire’, Family and Community History, 19:2, pp. 67–81 and L. A. Rees, C. Reilly and A. Tindley (eds) (2018) The Land Agent 1700–1920 (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press).
- 2.
Irene Jones who wrote The Stalbridge Inheritance while on holiday in Anglesey in 1990 found the archivist of Bangor University sitting on six sacks of paper relating to Anglesey’s Dorset and Somerset estate. She immediately set about having them transferred to the Dorset History Centre.
- 3.
E. Laurence (1743) The Duty and Office of a Land Steward (London: J. and P. Knapton, T. Longman, H. Linto and J. and H. Pemberton), p. 37.
- 4.
See J. V. Beckett (1983) ‘Absentee Landownership in the Later Seventeenth and Early Eighteenth Centuries: The Case of Cumbria’ Northern History, 19:1, pp. 87–107.
- 5.
P. Roebuck (1973) ‘Absentee Landownership in the Late Seventeenth and early Eighteenth Centuries: A Neglected Factor in English Agrarian History’, The Agricultural History Review, 21:1, p. 1.
- 6.
Ibid., p. 2.
- 7.
Ibid., p. 88.
- 8.
Beckett ‘Absentee Landownership in the Later Seventeenth and Early Eighteenth Centuries’, p. 89.
- 9.
There are four surviving anonymous letters written to the Marquis of Anglesey regarding William Castleman. As to how many might have originally been sent, it is impossible to know.
- 10.
Beckett (1983) ‘Absentee Landownership in the Later Seventeenth and Early Eighteenth Centuries’, p. 106.
- 11.
For recent studies on the country house, see, for example, J. Stobart (2016) The Country House: Material Culture and Consumption, (Swindon: Historic England); J. Stobart (2017) Travel and the British Country House: Cultures, Critiques and Consumption in the Long Eighteenth Century (Manchester, Michigan: Manchester University Press); J. Stobart and M. Rothery (2016) Consumption and the Country House (Oxford: Oxford University Press); B. McDonagh (2018) Elite Women and the Agricultural Landscape, 1700–1830 (Abingdon: Routledge) and E. L. Jones (2018) Landed Estates and Rural Inequality in English History: From the Mid-Seventeenth Century to the Present (London: Springer).
- 12.
E. T. Hurren (2016) ‘The Making of the Modern Land Agent in Victorian Times’, C. Beardmore, S. King and G. Monks, The Land Agent in Britain: Past, Present and Future (Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars), 169.
- 13.
See, for example, G. E. Mingay, (ed.) (1981) The Victorian Countryside Vols I and II (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, Ltd.); G. E. Mingay, (1977) Rural Life in Victorian England (London: Heinemann); F. M. L. Thompson (1971) English Landed Society in the Nineteenth Century (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul) and D. Spring (1963) The English Landed Estate in the Nineteenth Century Baltimore: John Hopkins Press).
- 14.
R. W. Hoyle, (ed.) (2013) The Farmer in England 1650–1980 (Farnham: Ashgate).
- 15.
R. A. Houston (2014) Peasant Petitions: Social Relations and Economic Life on Landed Estates, 1600–1850 (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan).
- 16.
V. Doe (2018) Improving Agriculture in Nineteenth Century Rutland: The Life and Achievements of Richard Westbrook (1797–1861), Steward of the Exton Estate (Oakham: Rutland Local History Society).
- 17.
F. Wood & K. Wood (1992) A Lancashire Gentlemen: The Letters and Journals of Richard Hodgkinson 1763–1847 (Stroud: Alan Sutton Publishing Ltd).
- 18.
B. Reay (1996) Microhistories: Demography, Society and Culture in Rural England, 1800–1930 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), pp. 257–258.
- 19.
C. A. Beardmore, (April, 2016) ‘The Rural Estate through the Eyes of the Land Agent: A Community in Microcosm c1812–1854’, Family and Community History, 19:1, p. 17.
- 20.
D. R. Mills (1973) English Rural Communities: The Impact of a Specialised Economy (London: Macmillan).
- 21.
See C. Griffin (2014) Protest, Politics and Work in Rural England, 1700–1850 (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan).
- 22.
L. Patriquin (2007) Agrarian Capitalism and Poor Relief in England, 1500–1860: Rethinking the Origins of the Welfare State (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan), p. 62.
- 23.
R. Tames (1972) Economy and Society in Nineteenth Century Britain (Abingdon: Routledge), p. 61.
- 24.
P. Horn (1880) The Rural World 1780–1850: Social Change in the English Countryside (London: Hutchinson), p. 72.
- 25.
Tames Economy and Society in Nineteenth Century Britain, p. 61.
- 26.
Horn (1880) The Rural World 1780–1850, p. 72.
- 27.
Ibid.
- 28.
Quoted in D. Grove Barns (2006) A History of English Corn Laws From 1660–1846 (Abingdon: Routledge), p. 147.
- 29.
C. Cook (2005) The Routledge Companion to Britain in the Nineteenth Century, 1815–1914 (London; New York: Routledge), p. 198.
- 30.
See M. Reed and R. Wells (1990) Class, Conflict and Protest in the English Countryside, 1700–1880 (London: Cass).
- 31.
Ibid.
- 32.
J. Caird (1852) English Agriculture in 1850–1851 (London: Longman, Brown, Green and Longmans), p. 503.
- 33.
J. Lawrence (1806) The Modern Land Steward (London: H. D. Symonds, T. Ostrell, W. J. and J. Richardson), p. 72.
- 34.
J. D. Chambers and G. E. Mingay, (1966) The Agricultural Revolution, 1750–1880 (London: B. T. Batsford Ltd.), p. 165.
- 35.
Quoted in G. E. Mingay, Rural Life in Victorian England, p. 52.
- 36.
R. W. Hoyle, (2013) ‘Introduction: Recovering the Farmer’ in R. W. Hoyle, (ed.), The Farmer in England 1650–1980 (Farnham: Ashgate), p. 1.
- 37.
Ibid.
- 38.
F. O’Gorman, (May, 1992) ‘Campaign Rituals and Ceremonies: The Social Meaning of Elections in England 1780–1860’ Past & Present, 135, p. 107.
- 39.
K. D. M. Snell (1985) Annals of the Labouring Poor: Social Change and Agrarian England 1660–1900 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), p. 375.
- 40.
A. L. Bowley (December, 1898) ‘The Statistics of Wages in the United Kingdom During the Last Hundred Years. (part 1)’, Journal of the Royal Historical Society, 61:4, p. 704.
- 41.
D. O. P. Okedon (1830) A Letter to the Members in Parliament for Dorsetshire on the Subject of Poor Relief and Labourers’ Wages, 2nd edition (Blandford: John Shipp), p. 5.
- 42.
See F. M. L. Thompson (May, 1981) ‘Social Control in Victorian England’ Economic History Review, 32:2.
- 43.
See P. McCann (1977) Popular Education and Socialisation in the Nineteenth Century (London: Routledge).
- 44.
Jones, Landed Estates and Rural Inequality in English History, p. 114.
- 45.
The Marquis of Anglesey (1961) One Leg: The Life and Letters of Henry William Paget K.G. 1768–1854 (London: Jonathan Cape), p. 346.
- 46.
I. Jones (1993) The Stalbridge Inheritance 1780–1854 (Dorchester: Friary Press), p. vi.
- 47.
The Marquis of Anglesey One Leg, p. 346.
- 48.
Jones, The Stalbridge Inheritance, p. x. The family had changed their name by royal licence to Paget from Bayley when Henry Bayley became in 1770 the tenth Baron Paget.
- 49.
- 50.
S. G. Mackay (1986) Milborne Port in Somerset (Milborne Port: Remus Ltd), p. 55.
- 51.
The Marquis of Anglesey, One Leg, p. 346.
- 52.
Ibid., p. 19.
- 53.
Throughout this volume Henry William Paget is referred to as the Marquis of Anglesey although technically this title was not bestowed until 1815.
- 54.
- 55.
Bristol Mercury, 20 May 1809, although the letter was dated 30 March 1809.
- 56.
The Morning Post, 31 May 1809.
- 57.
The Marquis of Anglesey, One Leg, p. 110.
- 58.
The equivalent today of almost four million pounds.
- 59.
The Marquis of Anglesey, One Leg, p. 114.
- 60.
Admiral Aylmer appears in the archive until 1814.
- 61.
The Marquis of Anglesey, One Leg, pp. 114–115.
- 62.
- 63.
The first term was cut short when he was recalled for his Catholic sympathies.
- 64.
- 65.
Quoted in Jones, The Stalbridge Inheritance, p. 30.
- 66.
DHC, D/ANG/B5/17, 1 July 1814.
- 67.
Salisbury and Winchester Journal, 13 August 1804.
- 68.
Jeffry Wyatville was a successful architect who worked for 17 Earls and 4 sovereigns. Much of his work involved improvements, remodelling and extending existing properties including some of the great houses such as Longleat, Wiltshire, Wollaton Hall, Nottinghamshire, Chatsworth, Derbyshire, Woburn Abbey, Bedfordshire and Windsor Castle. No one has yet been able to fathom how Castleman was able to persuade an architecture of this stature to work for him on this more modest property.
- 69.
Dorset History Centre background to the Anglesey estate.
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Beardmore, C. (2019). Introduction. In: Financing the Landed Estate. Palgrave Studies in the History of Finance. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-14552-1_1
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