Landed families of Britain and Ireland

This site, which was short-listed for the Society of Architectural Historians (GB) Colvin Prize in 2019, presents my research into the landowning families of the British Isles and the country houses which they owned. Comments, especially in the form of corrections, additional information or new illustrations, are very welcome. Please use the Contact Form in the right hand side bar to contact me privately or the comments facility at the bottom of the page to make a public comment.

Sunday, 9 August 2026

(642) Blackburn of Hayne

This family came to affluence as one of the leading wine exporters on the Portuguese island of Madeira. Their business at Quinta da Palmeira is said to have been established in 1760 or 1784 by Thomas and John Blackburn, or by Henry Blackburn, and was inherited by the brothers Robert and George Blackburn, who may have been brothers or cousins. Robert Blackburn (1779-1841), with whom the genealogy below begins, was perhaps responsible for building the rather English-looking house at Quinta da Palmeira, where he lived with his family for much of the early 19th century.

Quinta da Palmeira, Madeira, in 1843.

He then moved back to England, taking a house at Clapham (Surrey) and establishing a wine importing business at 58 Old Broad St., London; the firm later traded as Blackburn, Temple & Robinson. In 1810, Robert married Mary Bellas (1783-1829), who had recently inherited the Brampton Hall estate near Appleby (Westmld) from her uncle, the Rev. Lancelot Bellas, although the hall itself had fallen out of gentry use long before and was never occupied by the Blackburns. Robert and Mary had four sons and three daughters. Their eldest son, the Rev. Robert Blackburn (1812-99), who inherited the Brampton estate, was sent to Oxford and became a Fellow of Brasenose College before taking holy orders and serving as rector of Selham (Sussex) for more than fifty years. The next two sons, Edward Blackburn (1815-87) and Herbert Cautley Blackburn (1816-76), inherited their father's wine importing business, although their interests in Madeira were probably sold in the 1840s. Instead, the brothers opened a wine merchant's business in New York (USA), and acquired a house in Brooklyn which became their American base for the next half century. Edward seems to have managed the New York business and Herbert the London company. Their youngest brother, Henry Leith Blackburn (1822-1905) was never involved in the wine business, but joined the East India Company's Bengal Army. He retired from this service in 1856 and thereafter exhibited increasingly erratic behaviour, which be blamed on sunstroke in India. After a string of prosecutions for indecent assault on young women, he was confined for much of his life in a lunatic asylum.

Edward Blackburn spent much of the 1840s and 1850s living in New York and developing his wine merchant business, although he is known to have made several trips home during this time. By 1855, he evidently felt that the business could be left in the hands of a manager, and he returned to England full-time. After renting houses in south Devon for a number of years, in 1867 he purchased the Hayne estate at Stowford (Devon), where an attractive early 19th century Gothick house had been built about fifty years before. According to one account, the house had been damaged by fire in the 1860s, and repairs were not quite complete at the time of the sale, but I have been unable to find any evidence of a fire, although there do seem to have been alterations and additions to the house at this time. Edward Blackburn and his wife Charlotte Brooking had a large family of six sons and four daughters. Their eldest son, Edward Brooking Blackburn (1844-1900) was born in New York and educated at Oxford, but was largely cut out of his father's will, being left only a modest (and discretionary) annuity. It is unclear what caused the rift between them, but the result was that the next surviving son, Arthur Blackburn (1849-1930), was sent to New York to manage the family business in the 1870s, and eventually inherited the Hayne estate, while the younger sons received increased cash bequests. Ernest Murray Blackburn (1856-1943) gave up his post as assistant master at Westminster and used his legacy to found his own prep school at Park House, Southborough (Kent), from which he retired by 1901.

Little Thakeham: the house built by Lutyens for Ernest Murray Blackburn in 1901-03, which he sold in 1918.
Image: Nicholas Kingsley. Some rights reserved.

He then bought a small estate of around 130 acres at Thakeham (Sussex) on which he built a new country house, Little Thakeham, to the designs of Edwin Lutyens, although he sold it about 1918. Harold Bellas Blackburn (1859-1942) at first farmed one of the Stowford farms but in 1896 bought Donhead Hall at Donhead St. Mary, which was sold in 1943 following his death. Edward's third daughter, Laura (c.1854-1937), married the rector of Stowford, whose father, the Rev. John Bidlake Woolocombe, published a volume of reminiscences which is one of our chief sources for the history of Hayne and the families associated with it.

Donhead Hall, Donhead St Mary, from the sale particulars of 1943.

Arthur Blackburn (1849-1930), who inherited Hayne in 1887, married in 1875 Manuela Stubbs, the half-Peruvian daughter of an English merchant. She bore him a son and two daughters, but in 1885 she applied for a divorce on the grounds of his cruelty and adultery. Her application was withdrawn and instead she agreed a separation from him in 1886. For some twenty years she maintained her own household with her daughters. In 1906 she again applied to the courts for a judicial separation and alimony after further evidence of his persistent adultery, and this was granted, but by 1911 she was again living with her husband at a house called Rock End in Torquay. Hayne seems to have been let or unoccupied at this time, and Arthur sold it in 1923. Rock End remained the couple's home until their deaths in 1930 and 1934, and was then sold. Their son moved permanently to New York in about 1904, where he was employed in a stockbroking firm; their elder daughter married a retired New York stockbroker who had settled in Bermuda, but after his death returned to Devon and rather improbably married a Plymouth ironmonger; and their younger daughter lived all her adult life at Paignton (Devon), where she died unmarried in 1963.

Hayne, Stowford, Devon

There has been a residence on the estate since shortly after the Norman Conquest, when the Hayne family built Stowford Castle on high ground to the east of the present house. In the mid 16th century John Harris, serjeant-at-law, 'fairly rebuilded his house at Hayne', making 'a gentile and commodious dwelling for himself and his posterity', and reusing stone from the old castle. Nothing is known of the form of the Tudor house, although it has been suggested that the present service wing may incorporate parts of the building, and the foundations of outbuildings have been discovered north-east of the house. It was a large mansion, being taxed on 26 hearths in 1674, making it the third or fourth largest house in the county.

Hayne, Stowford: engraving of the house from the north-east in about 1850

The present house was built in the first decade of the 19th century for Isaac Donithorne (later Harris), and was evidently completed by 1810. It has distinct similarities to nearby Lifton Park, begun in 1815, and it seems likely that the two houses were designed by the same person; both houses had belonged to the Harris family, although by the early 19th century they had descended through the female line to men who added the Harris name to their patronymic. In his 1898 memoir, From morn till eve, the Rev. John Bidlake Woollocombe, who lived at Stowford and came from gentry family of Great Bidlake, stated that Lifton was designed by George Webber, a relative of the owner, who is not recorded as an architect, and must have been a gentleman amateur. Both houses seem slightly old-fashioned for their date in the limited extent to which they are influenced by the more archaeological approach to Gothic design that became popular in the early 19th century, and there is an amateurish feel about the eclectic choice of motifs used in the designs. Webber therefore seems a more likely candidate than Sir Jeffrey Wyatville (whose authorship of Hayne was first asserted by Sabine Baring-Gould in 1919). Wyatville's career is well documented, and there is nothing to connect him with these houses except that he designed Endsleigh Cottage, a few miles south of Lifton, for the Duke of Bedford in 1810.

Hayne, Stowford: the entrance front in 1984, when the house was semi-derelict.
Image: Nicholas Kingsley. Some rights reserved.

The rubble stone entrance front faces north-east and is balanced in outline but not symmetrical in detail. Its nine bays are grouped 2-1-3-1-2, and are united by a castellated parapet, with angled buttresses at the corners, topped with pinnacles. Set into the walls are varied Gothick windows with robust but un-historical tracery, some of it executed in timber.

Hayne, Stowford: the house from the south in the late 19th century. The pyramid-roofed tower is absent from the earlier engraving
and was presumably added in the work of the 1860s.

The south-east and south-west fronts use the same palette of castellations, buttresses and tracery, but have three central bays flanked by a tower at one end and a gabled bay at the other. The north-west side forms the service wing and is an irregular L-shape, with a turret in the angle. It overlooks the kitchen court and the kennels and stables which formed the raison d'être of the estate in the early 19th century. There are reports of a fire in the 1860s, and there seem to have been additions at that time - including a pyramid-roofed tower - but it was apparently financial difficulties which forced the sale of the house in 1864, and the repairs are said to have been unfinished at that time. By 1898, the reception rooms were divided between the ground and first floors, and Woollocombe describes the hall, billiard room and dining room being on the ground floor, with the library and drawing room on the first floor, but the internal layout has been further altered since then.

In the later 20th century the house was caught up in an unfortunate family dispute between two branches of the Chichester family, one of whom wished to sell while the other did not, with the result that house rapidly decayed and the grounds were completely neglected. In 1987 Hayne was described as 'semi-ruinous', but the shell was restored over the next five years by Mr & Mrs Brian Richardson, who stripped out many of the decayed interior fittings. In 1994 they sold the estate to the Earl and Countess of Stockton, who embarked on a comprehensive programme of restoration, creating new interiors within the historic shell to the designs of Michael Brooke. The most striking of the new rooms is the remodelled entrance hall, which was given a rib-vaulted Gothick ceiling rising from slender colonettes executed in plasterwork by Hales & Howe of Bristol. At the same time, a long L-shaped galleried library was created out of former service accommodation to the right of the hall. In the south-east corner of the house is the former dining room, which retains a timber-ribbed ceiling and a Gothick chimneypiece, moved here from the hall. Between the dining room and the hall is the main staircase, converted from its original imperial form into a cantilevered dog-leg flight built with slate treads, iron balusters, and a brass rail. The Gothick theme of the house is continued by arched screens on the landing and the details of the skylights. On the first floor the former drawing room has become a ballroom, linked by folding doors to the library next door; both rooms retain their ribbed ceilings and chimneypieces, although the panelling was a casualty of 20th century neglect.

Hayne, Stowford: the house and grounds in 1883 from the Ordnance Survey 1st edn 25" plan

The Tudor house at Hayne was evidently accompanied by a terraced garden, of which some traces were recorded on the first Ordnance Survey 25" plan in 1883. What exists today, however, is the result of a landscaping scheme carried out for Christopher Harris in the early 19th century, and restored and enhanced for the Stocktons around 2000. Harris' ruling passion was hunting (he was a friend of the hunting parson, the Rev. Jack Russell), and in a shallow old quarry in the Wilderness, he created a curious structure which was known as St. Hubert's Hall.

"St Hubert's Hall", Hayne in 1984: the monument to a shared passion for hunting created in the early 19th century by Christopher Mohun-Harris.
Image: Nicholas Kingsley. Some rights reserved.

This consisted of 22 granite seats set in a circle, each dedicated to one of his hunting companions; according to Woollacombe 'the seats presented a picturesque appearance and were ornamented with a flat wooden fox's head and coat of arms at their back', while over each seat was hung a flag bearing the arms, motto and residence of the stallholder. It is not clear whether gatherings at St Hubert's Hall were abandoned after Harris gave up hunting in 1834, perhaps in response to the death of his huntsman, who was eaten alive by the hounds in the estate kennels. The other main survival in the grounds is a grotto, built of cyclopean masonry, with a shallow pedimental gable and a rustic entrance arch. Inside there were niches around the walls and a vault faced with flints and shells. Woollocombe also mentions a pagoda and a temple in the grounds, but no trace of these remains.

Hayne, Stowford: the grotto in 1984. Image: Nicholas Kingsley. Some rights reserved.

Descent: John Harris (1507-51); to son, William Harris (c.1526-91); to son, Arthur Harris (1561-1628); to son, John Harris (c.1586-1657); to son, Sir Arthur Harris (d. 1686), 1st bt.; to first cousin once removed, Christopher Harris (fl. 1718); to son, John Harris (d. 1767); to brother, William Harris; to son, Christopher Harris (d. 1775); to son-in-law, Isaac Donithorne (later Harris) (d. 1848); to son, Christopher Harris Mohun Harris (1801-86), who sold 1867 to Edward Blackburn (1815-87); to son, Arthur Blackburn (1849-1930), who sold 1923 to Mrs Lillian Wingfield; sold 1951 to Gp. Capt. Chichester... sold 1987 to Mr & Mrs Brian Richardson; sold 1994 to Alexander Daniel Alan Macmillan (b. 1943), 2nd Earl of Stockton; sold 2007

Blackburn family of Hayne

Blackburn, Robert (1779-1841). Son of John Blackburn (1733-98) of Sneaton (Yorks) and his wife Bethiah Turner, baptised at Old Malton (Yorks NR), 11 June 1779. Wine merchant at Quinta da Palmeira on the island of Madeira, in partnership with his brother or cousin George. He married, 3 March 1810 at St Chad, Rochdale (Lancs), Mary (1783-1829), daughter of Rev. Thomas Bellas of Rochdale and Long Marton (Westmld.), and had issue:

(1) Mary Eleanor Blackburn (1811-92), born 3 August, and baptised at the English church, Madeira, 26 August 1811; married, 17 January 1838 at St Mark, Kennington (Surrey), Robert Chapman (c.1803-80), of Old Charlton, Greenwich (Kent), inspector general of customs, son of Robert Chapman, gent., and had issue at least one son and three daughters; probably the woman of this name who died at Weymouth (Dorset), 24 July, and was buried at Semington (Wilts), 29 July 1892;
(2) Rev. Robert Blackburn (1812-99), born 17 October and baptised at the English church, Madeira, 29 October 1812; educated at Sherborne School, Queen's and Balliol Colleges, Oxford (matriculated 1830; BA 1834); Fellow of Brasenose College, 1834-44; ordained 1838; rector of Selham (Sussex), 1842-99; inherited the Brampton estate from his father in 1841; married, 11 April 1844 at North Cadbury (Som.), Eliza Frances (1810-75), younger daughter of Charles Casper Clutterbuck of North Cadbury, and had issue one son and two daughters; died 17 January 1899; will proved 20 February 1899 (estate £10,764);
(3) Edward Blackburn (1815-87) (q.v.);
(4) Herbert Cautley Blackburn (1816-76), born 16 December and baptised at the English church, Madeira, 25 December 1816; succeeded to his father's business as a Madeira wine merchant in Old Broad St., London; admitted a freeman of the city of London, 1856; married 1st, 22 June 1851 at St Paul, Edinburgh, Catherine (d. 1855), niece of Sir William Allan RA PRSA (1782-1850), artist, and 2nd, 12 December 1860 at Edinburgh, Alice Horner (1836-91), daughter of Robert Nasmyth of Edinburgh, by whom he had two sons and two daughters; died 25 June 1876 and was buried at Paddington Old Cemetery (Middx); will proved 16 October 1876 (effects under £18,000);
(5) Emma Blackburn (1818-58?), born 20 April and baptised at the English church, Madeira, 30 April 1818; married, 16 February 1841 at Kennington (Surrey), Edward Digby Bickerton Murray (1812-76), of Liverpool and later of Portsea (Hants), insurance broker and later wine merchant (who m2, 20 December 1864 at Cheetham (Lancs), Mary (1821-91), daughter of William Holdsworth), son of Admiral Robert Murray (c.1763-1834), and had issue two sons; probably the Emma Murray who died in Liverpool in 1858;
(6) Henry Leith Blackburn (1822-1905), born in Madeira, 12 February 1822; educated at Sherborne and Winchester; an officer in the East India Co.'s Bengal Army (Ensign, 1842; Lt., 1844; Capt., 1852; retired 1856), who was court martialled for 'conduct unbecoming' in 1848 and severely reprimanded; he later claimed to have suffered from sunstroke in India with permanent effects on his mental health, and he spent periods in mental hospitals at Hackney and Carmarthen; he was prosecuted for indecent assault and exposing himself on three occasions, in 1859, 1869 and 1873, and on the last occasion was sentenced to three months in prison with hard labour, but was removed to the Royal India Lunatic Asylum, Ealing (Middx), where he seems to have spent much of the rest of his life; he died unmarried in the Royal Naval Hospital, Great Yarmouth (Norfk), 9 April, and was buried at Great Yarmouth,14 April 1905; administration of goods granted 1 July 1905 (estate £5,281);
(7) Frances Elizabeth Blackburn (1823-61), born 15 October 1823 and baptised at Holy Trinity, Clapham (Surrey), 7 April 1824; lived in an all-female household at Bishop Tawton (Devon), and died unmarried, June 1861.

He lived at Quinta da Palmeira on the island of Madeira, and later at Clapham Rise (Surrey). He bequeathed his estate in Madeira to his brother and nephew, as trustees for sale. In 1809 his wife inherited, from her uncle, Rev. Lancelot Bellas, the manor house of Brampton Hall nr Appleby (Westmld).

He died 22 January, and was buried at Clapham (Surrey), 27 January 1841; his will was proved in the PCC, 19 March 1841. His wife died 17 May 1829.

Blackburn, Edward (1815-87). Second son of Robert Blackburn (1779-1841) and his wife Mary, daughter of Rev. Thomas Bellas of Rochdale (Lancs) and Long Marton (Westmld.), born 9 June and baptised at St George, Bloomsbury (Middx), 1 July 1815. Educated at Sherborne. Wine importer in New York (USA) and London. He married, 11 July 1843 at Dartmouth (Devon), Charlotte (1822-1919), daughter of Nicholas Brooking of Dartmouth, and had issue:

(1) Edward Brooking Blackburn (1844-1900), born at Brooklyn, New York, 5 April 1844; educated at Marlborough and Brasenose College, Oxford (matriculated 1863; BA 1868; MA 1899); lived at Stowford Cottage; excluded from his father's will apart from a discretionary annuity of no more than £500 a year; died unmarried in Florence (Italy), 4 December 1900; administration of goods granted to his eldest sister, 22 January 1901 (estate £192);
(2) Emma Brooking Blackburn (1845-1919), born 4 October and baptised at St Saviour, Dartmouth, 31 October 1845; lived in Westminster (Middx); died unmarried at Brighton (Sussex), 11 May 1919; will proved 28 July 1919 (estate £26,300);
(3) Henry Blackburn (1847-48), born about February 1847; died in infancy at Brooklyn, New York, 14 November 1848;
(4) Arthur Blackburn (1849-1930) (q.v.);
(5) Mary Charlotte Blackburn (1851-1947), born in New York, 28 February 1851; married, 25 September 1905 at St Peter, Bournemouth (Hants), Henry Francis Garnier le Patourel (1871-1906), son of Messurier le Patourel, of St Peter Port (Guernsey), journalist, but had no issue; died aged 96 on 17 September 1947 and was buried at Torquay (Devon); will proved 9 January 1948 (estate £65,887);
(6) Laura Blackburn (c.1854-1937), born in the USA; married, 2 January 1878 at Christ Church, Lancaster Gate, Paddington (Middx), Rev. John Henry Bidlake Wollocombe (1854-1930) of Stowford (Devon), son of Rev. John Bidlake Wollocombe of Great Bidlake (Devon), vicar of Lamerton (Devon), and had issue four sons; died 4 January 1937; will proved 16 February 1937 (estate £7,858);
(7) Alice Maud Blackburn (1855-1939), born in New York, 7 March 1855; married, 30 April 1881 at St Augustine, Queen's Gate, South Kensington (Middx), as his second wife, Stephen Roland Woulfe (1822-99) of Tiermaclane House* (Co. Clare) and London, and had issue one son (who died young) and one daughter; as a widow lived at Shaftesbury (Dorset); died 18 October 1939 and was buried at Donhead St Mary (Wilts); will proved 2 January 1940 (estate £56,521);
(8) Ernest Murray Blackburn (1856-1943), born 26 November 1856 and baptised at West Teignmouth (Devon), 26 January 1857; educated at Winchester and Corpus Christi College, Oxford (matriculated 1876; BA 1880; MA 1882); schoolteacher; assistant master at Westminster, 1881-86; headmaster of Park House Preparatory School, Southborough (Kent), 1887; he retired by 1901 and built a country house at Little Thakeham to the designs of Sir Edwin Lutyens, which he sold in about 1918; married, 28 July 1891 at St Mark, Broadwater, Frant (Sussex), Fanny Julia (1870-1954), third daughter of George James Greystone Reid, and had issue two sons and four daughters; died 13 February 1943; will proved 9 July 1943 (estate £4,475);
(9) Harold Bellas Blackburn (1859-1942), born 6 July and baptised at West Ogwell (Devon), 24 July 1859; educated at Winchester College; purchased Donhead Hall, Donhead St Mary (Wilts), in 1896 and lived there until his death**; married, 1 January 1895 at St John, Bathwick (Som.), Constance Verena (1869-1956), younger daughter of Rev. Richard Thomas Blagden (1826-98), vicar of Broadwoodwidger (Devon), and had issue two daughters; died 25 January 1942; will proved 28 May 1943 (estate £14,952);
(10) Robert Blackburn (1860-1926), born 28 July and baptised at West Ogwell, 14 October 1860; merchant; said to have married but had no issue; died at Levallois-Perret, Paris (France), 6 October 1926.

In 1861 he was living at West Ogwell (Devon). He purchased the Hayne estate at Stowford in 1867.

He died 27 August, and was buried at Stowford, 1 September 1887; his will was proved 9 January and 14 March 1888 (effects £92,117). His widow lived latterly in London and died aged 96 on 26 February 1919; administration of her goods was granted 12 November 1919 (estate £30,901).

* Tiermaclane House was in ruins by 1840, possibly following a fire.

** It was sold in 1943, following his death.

Blackburn, Arthur (1849-1930). Third son of Edward Blackburn (1815-87) and his wife Charlotte, daughter of Nicholas Brooking of Dartmouth (Devon), born 21 August 1849. Manager of his father's wine importing business in New York (USA) in the 1870s. His wife sought a divorce in 1885 but withdrew her petition and agreed a separation the following year; she was granted a judicial separation in 1906 on the grounds of his repeated adultery with Bessie Pengelly (a servant at Hayne) and Maria Augusta Dalton, but had returned to live with her husband by 1911. He married, 4 August 1875, at St James, Paddington (Middx), Manuela Georgina Alice (1853-1934), second daughter of Charles Edward Stubbs of Arequipa (Peru) and later of London, and had issue:

(1) Claud Arthur Charles Blackburn (1876-1941), born in New York 15 June 1876 but was brought to England by his parents; returned to New York about 1904; employed as clerk at Chisholm & Chapman, stockbrokers, on Broadway, New York; married, 12 November 1902 at the Church of the Resurrection, Richmond Hill, New York, Edna Isobel Summerfield (1875-1953), but had no issue; lived at Brooklyn, New York, and died there 25 April 1941; will proved 13 December 1945 (estate in England, £13,647);
(2) Violet Ethel Blackburn (1877-1965), born 9 September and baptised at All Saints, Margaret St., Marylebone (Middx), 5 October 1877; married 1st, 10 May 1923 at the Church of the Transfiguration, New York, Alexander Ewing Tucker (1852-1934) of Paget (Bermuda), a retired American stockbroker and a member of the Bermudan Parliament; and 2nd, 19 November 1941 at St Jude, Plymouth (Devon), as his second wife, (Thomas) Harold Hearn Martin (1886-1967); died 13 March 1965; will proved 14 March 1966 but subject of a Chancery order, 28 April 1967 (estate £7,146);
(3) (Kathleen) Olive Blackburn (1884-1963), born 1 September and baptised at Stowford, 19 October 1884; educated at Queen Anne's School, Caversham (Oxon) and Kensington High School (Middx); lived at Paignton (Devon) and was president of Paignton Cage Bird Fanciers' Society, 1942-48; died unmarried, 2 February 1963; will proved 10 April 1963 (estate £14,968).

He inherited the Hayne estate from his father in 1887, but sold it in 1923. He was already resident at Rock End, Torquay in 1911; it was sold by the executors of his widow in 1935.

He died 1 April 1930 and was buried at Torquay Cemetery; his will was proved 27 May 1930 (estate £34,040). His widow died 5 November 1934 and was buried with her husband at Torquay Cemetery; her will was proved 11 March 1935 (estate £3,621).

Principal sources

Burke's Landed Gentry, 1952, p. 194; Rev. J.B. Woollocombe, From morn till eve, 1898; B. Cherry & Sir N. Pevsner, The buildings of England: Devon, 2nd edn., 1984, pp. 465-66; H. Meller, The country houses of Devon, 2015, pp. 496-98;

http://www.rawes.co.uk/families/brooking/brookingmanuscript.htm.

Location of archives

No significant accumulation is known to survive.

Coat of arms

None recorded.

Can you help?

Can anyone provide evidence for the fire that is supposed to have occurred at Hayne in the 1860s, or what was done by way of post-fire reconstruction?
Does anyone know what caused the rift between Edward Blackburn (1815-87) and his eldest son, Edward Brooking Blackburn?
Can anyone provide portraits or photographs of the people whose names appear in bold above, for whom no image is currently shown?
If anyone can offer further information or corrections to any part of this article I should be most grateful. I am always particularly pleased to hear from current owners or the descendants of families associated with a property who can supply information from their own research or personal knowledge for inclusion.

Revision and acknowledgements

This post was first published 9 August 2026 and was updated 17 August 2026.

Saturday, 1 August 2026

(641) Blaauw of Beechland

Blaauw of Beechland

This family claimed descent from the innovative and successful 17th century Dutch cartographer Willem Blaeu (1571-1638), and may have had long-standing connections with England (the will of a Willem Blaauw of Amsterdam was proved in the PCC in 1728), but I have traced them back no further than Gerrit Blaauw (1708-75), a prominent merchant and banker in Amsterdam (Netherlands), who arranged the refinancing of a large part of the national debt of the States General in the mid 18th century. His younger son, Gerrit Blaauw (1750-1825) became Burgomeister (Mayor) of Amsterdam, 1816-24 and was also employed in diplomatic contacts between the French republic and the Dutch States in the 1790s. The mayor's elder brother, Willem (later William) Blaauw (1748-1808), settled in London in about 1788 as a widower with one surviving daughter, and the following year married an Englishwoman as his second wife and produced a second family. He may have come to London initially for business reasons, but neither official sources nor contemporary newspapers contain any reference to him being involved in business or public affairs, and he was always described as 'esquire' in legal records. He was naturalised as a British subject in 1790, and anglicised his forename to William, but neither he nor his descendants sought to anglicise the spelling of their obviously foreign surname. By his second wife he produced a son and two daughters, and the daughter of his first marriage also stayed in England and married into an Essex gentry family.

William's only son was William Henry Blaauw (1793-1870), who was educated as an English gentleman at Eton and Oxford. In 1834 he purchased the modest Beechland estate in Sussex for £7,000 and enlarged the house. From the windows of his new abode he had a distant prospect of the site of the Battle of Lewes (1264), which is said to have stimulated an interest in the constitutional conflicts of the 13th century, and led him to write a history of The Barons' War (1844), which was well-regarded and remained a standard work into the late 20th century. Two years later, Blaauw played a leading part in the founding of the Sussex Archaeological Society, becoming its secretary and editor of its journal, and in 1850 he was elected a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries. Blaauw was married twice. His first wife, Harriet King (1797-1828) brought him an additional income of £1,000 a year for life, which may explain how he was able to afford the estate in Sussex, but their two daughters both died young. His second wife, Margaret Emily Gillman (1798-1881), was the daughter of an obscure Irish baronet and probably did not contribute much to his exchequer, but gave him two sons and a daughter. After Eton and Oxford, his eldest son, Henry William Gillman Blaauw (1834-57), undertook a Grand Tour with friends, which took him rather adventurously to Egypt, where he sadly contracted a fever and died. The heir to Beechlands was therefore his younger brother, Thomas St. Leger Blaauw (1839-93), who inherited on his father's death in 1870.

Thomas inherited the estate but not the thousand a year which his father had received under his first marriage settlement, and this perhaps made a critical difference to the sustainability of the estate. He continued to live at Beechland, but when he died in 1893 the value of his personal estate was only two-thirds that of his father, and his widow Fanny (1839-1912), who inherited a life interest in Beechland, promptly let it and moved to a suburban villa in Bournemouth. Their elder son, Henry Thomas Gillman Blaauw (1874-1949) went to Oxford and then attended the Royal Agricultural College at Cirencester, but his heart does not seem to have been in estate management. In 1911 he was working as a bookbinder and he later employed a farm manager to run the estate. He himself was an officer in the army during the war until he was invalided out after being severely injured in the leg in 1917. He then found himself unable to move around easily enough to manage the farm, and in 1920 he sold the entire Beechland property and moved to a rambling Edwardian house at Wivelisfield (Sussex) called Towning's Place, and later to a smaller house at Chailey (Sussex). He married in 1912 but he and his wife had no children, and eventually adopted a daughter, who took his name and married into an Irish gentry family. His younger brother, Bertram William St Leger Blaauw (1876-1946), who was a nurseryman and fruit grower in Sussex, also had no issue, so the Blaauw name died out in England with this generation.

Beechland, Newick, Sussex

Earlier called Fuller's Lands and Mount Pleasant, the estate was renamed Beechland(s) in about 1820. The house may have genuine Tudor or 17th century origins, but it seems to have been extensively remodelled or rebuilt in the early 1820s as a large gabled gentleman farmer's house with a central porch, elaborately carved bargeboards on the gables, and hood-moulds over the mullioned and transomed windows. Sale notices of 1820 and 1824 suggest that the remodelling was carried out between those dates, and it was acquired in 1824 by William Thomson, one of the founders (and first president) of the Newick Horticultural Society. A highway diversion order in 1825 allowed Thomson to move a public road and footpath to expand his grounds. The only visual record of the house at this time is an engraving showing the grounds in use for the Horticultural Society's annual show in the early 1830s.

Beechland, Newick: the house in the 1830s, from an engraving in Horsfield's history of Sussex, 1835.

In 1834 the Beechland estate was bought by William Henry Blaauw for £7,000, and soon after gaining possession he added two wings on a larger scale to the existing house. His architect is unknown, but the plain ashlar walls with plate glass hood-moulded mullioned and transomed windows, projecting square bay windows and oriels, and steep-sided gables with a profusion of stubby pinnacles, are reminiscent of the work of William Burn or David Brandon.

Beechland, Newick: north-west (entrance) front as remodelled c.1835-37

Beechland, Newick: the house from the south in the mid 20th century.

Beechland, Newick: south-east front of the enlarged house built c.1835-37.

At the end of the 19th century, Beechland was let to a series of tenants, and the estate was sold by the Blaauw family in 1920. It remained in use as a private house, but after the Second World War, the house was subdivided into three units, which remains the case today.

Descent: sold 1820; sold 1824 to William Thomson, who sold 1834 to William Henry Blaauw (1793-1870); to son, Thomas St. Leger Blaauw (1839-93); to widow and then to son, Henry Thomas Gillman Blaauw (1874-1949), who sold 1920 to Charles L. Bower... divided into three dwellings c.1955. The house was let by Mrs. Blaauw after 1893 to Edmund Deacon (fl. 1895), Capt. Harcourt Rose (fl. 1899) and his widow (fl. 1915). The central portion of the house (Centre House) was owned after subdivision by Dr. Blake, who sold 1962 to Daphne MacDonald (d. 1977) and Naomi Whittle (d. 1985), who sold 1980 to Mr & Mrs Poffle.

Blaauw family of Beechland

Blaauw, Willem (later William) (1748-1808). Elder son of Gerrit Blaauw (1708-75) of Amsterdam (Netherlands), merchant and banker, and his wife Maria Agneta (1710-77), daughter of David van Heijst, born in Amsterdam, 9 November 1748. He settled in England about 1788 and was naturalised as a British subject by private Act of Parliament, 28 April 1790. He married 1st, 5 April 1772 at Amsterdam, Anne Charlotte (1747-82), daughter of M. Charles Le Maitre, and 2nd, 1 August 1789 at Woodford (Essex), Louisa (1754-1842), daughter of Christopher Puller of Woodford, and had issue:

(1.1) Marie-Anne Blaauw (1773-1821), born 20 December and baptised at Amsterdam, 23 December 1773; married, 6 February 1796 at St Marylebone (Middx), Thomas Gardiner Bramston (1770-1831) (who m2, 1823, Charlotte (1782-1847), daughter of Sir Henry Hawley (1745-1826), 1st bt. of Leybourne Grange (Kent) and widow of Rev. Brook John Bridges (1782-1812)), of Skreens (Essex), briefly MP for Essex, 1830, and had issue two sons and six daughters; died 6 February 1821;

(1.2) Charlotte Julie Blaauw (1777-87), born 19 April and baptised in Amersterdam, 15 May 1777; said to have died young, 1787;
(2.1) Louisa Agnes Blaauw (1790-1876), born 20 September and baptised at St George, Hanover Sq., Westminster (Middx), 21 October 1790; married, 24 April 1813 at St Marylebone, Capt. Charles Robert Manners Molloy (1787-1824) of the Grenadier Guards, son of Capt. Anthony James Pye Molloy RN (c.1746-1814); died 18 January 1876; will proved 10 February 1876 (effects under £20,000);
(2.2) Frances Elizabeth Blaauw (1792-1878), born 24 January and baptised at St George, Hanover Sq., Westminster, 25 February 1792; married, 14 June 1817 at St Marylebone, Frederick Burmester (1783-1856), a founder director of the Westminster Bank, son of Henry Burmester (d. 1823) of Gwynne House, Woodford Bridge (Essex), corn merchant; died 30 May 1878; will proved 14 June 1878 (effects under £100,000);
(2.3) William Henry Blaauw (1793-1870) (q.v.).

He lived at Queen Anne St., Marylebone; his house was later occupied by his daughter Louisa.

He died 27 December 1808; his will was proved in the PCC, 16 January 1809. His first wife was buried in Amsterdam, 11 April 1782. His widow died 26 October 1842; her will was proved in the PCC, 9 December 1842.

William Henry Blaauw (1793-1870)
Blauuw, William Henry (1793-1870). Only son of William Blaauw (1748-1808) and his second wife, Louisa, daughter of Christopher Puller of Woodford (Essex), born 25 May and baptised at St Marylebone (Middx), 26 June 1793. Educated at Eton and Christ Church, Oxford (matriculated 1812; BA 1815; MA 1818), and incorporated at Cambridge University (MA 1854). JP and DL for Sussex; High Sheriff of Sussex, 1859-60. His chief interests were antiquarian, and he was the author of The Barons' War (1844; revised ed. issued posthumously, 1871), which remained the standard work on the subject for more than a century. He was on the council of the Camden Society, 1848-65; was elected a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries in 1850 and also of the Royal Geographical Society; and was the leading founder of the Sussex Archaeological Society in 1846. He edited (and until 1861 was a frequent contributor to) the latter Society's Collections, 1846-56 and was its honorary secretary, 1846-67. He married 1st, 14 June 1825 at St George, Hanover Sq., Westminster (Middx), with £1,000 a year for life, Harriet (1797-1828), daughter of John King MP (1759-1830), and 2nd, 16 June 1832 at St Marylebone, Margaret Emily (1798-1881), fourth and youngest daughter and co-heiress of Sir John St. Leger Gillman (1756-1817), 1st and only bt. of Curraheen (Co. Cork), and had issue:

(1.1) Louisa Henrietta Blaauw (1826-41), born 16 August and baptised at All Souls, Langham Place, Marylebone, 13 September 1826; died young, 14 July, and was buried at Newick, 21 July 1841;
(1.2) Caroline Jane Blaauw (1827-28), born 19 November and baptised at Danbury (Essex), 18 December 1827; died in infancy, 6 May, and was buried at Clifton (Glos), 10 May 1828;
(2.1) Emily Hannah Blaauw (1833-1919), born 9 March and baptised at St George, Hanover Sq., Westminster, 22 May 1833; married, 30 October 1860 at Newick, Maj. the Hon. Charles Cornwallis Chetwynd (1834-84), fourth son of Richard Walter Chetwynd (1800-79), 6th Viscount Chetwynd, and had issue two sons and seven daughters; as a widow lived at Cissbury, Ascot Heath (Berks); died 24 September 1919; will proved 12 December 1919 (estate £29,936);
(2.2) Henry William Gillman Blaauw (1834-57), born 9 March 1834; educated at Eton, Christ Church, Oxford (matriculated 1852; BA 1856) and Lincoln's Inn (admitted 1856); an officer in the West Sussex Militia; died unmarried at Cairo (Egypt), 25 March 1857, and was buried at Newick, 8 April 1858;
(2.3) Thomas St Leger Blaauw (1839-93) (q.v.).

He purchased Beechland in 1834 and extensively remodelled and enlarged it c.1834-37.

He is said to have become increasingly melancholic after the death of his elder son, and ceased new writing on antiquarian subjects from 1861; he died 26 April and was buried at Newick, 3 May 1870; his will was proved 4 July 1870 (effects under £40,000). His first wife died 26 May and was buried at Clifton (Glos), 31 May 1828. His widow died 13 August 1881; her will was proved 4 November 1881 (effects £19,518).

Blaauw, Thomas St. Leger (1839-93). Second, but only surviving, son of William Henry Blaauw (1793-1870) and his second wife, Margaret Emily, daughter and heiress of Sir John St. Leger Gillman (1756-1817), 1st bt., of Curraheen (Co. Cork), born 1 July 1839. Educated at Trinity Hall, Cambridge (matriculated 1859). An officer in the Sussex Light Infantry militia battalion (Ensign c.1864; Lt., 1865; retired 1868). JP for Sussex. He married, 6 June 1867 at Ightham (Kent), Fanny Alice (1839-1912), second daughter of Charles John Bigge (1803-46) of Linden Hall (Northbld.), and had issue:

(1) Alice Agneta Emily Mitford Blaauw (1868-1935), born 31 March and baptised at Newick, 3 May 1868; lived latterly at Bournemouth (Hants); died unmarried, 2 May 1935; will proved 17 June 1935 (estate £999);
(2) Frances Catherine Blaauw (1869-1948), baptised at Newick, 31 October 1869; lived latterly at Bournemouth; died unmarried, 25 February, and was buried at Newick, 28 February 1948; will proved 26 May 1948 (estate £5,293);
(3) Margaret Louisa Blaauw (1871-1928), baptised at Newick, 1 November 1871; died unmarried, 16 December, and was buried at Newick, 20 December 1928; will proved 9 February 1929 (estate £5,167);
(4) Henry Thomas Gillman Blaauw (1874-1949) (q.v.);
(5) Bertram William St. Leger Blaauw (1876-1946), born 6 May and baptised at Newick, 12 July 1876; in partnership with Hubert Patrick Gray as a nurseryman and fruit and flower grower to 1916; served in Second World War as a special constable; married, 11 April 1913 at Hampton Hill (Middx), Edith (1881-1947), daughter of Rev. Henry Mellowes, rector of Moor Monkton (Yorks WR), but had no issue; died 27 September 1946; administration of goods (with will annexed) granted 11 July 1947 (estate £6,762).

He inherited Beechland from his father in 1870. At his death it passed to his widow for life, but she lived at Bournemouth (Hants) and let the house.

He died at Binfield (Berks), 11 September, and was buried at Newick, 15 September 1893; his will was proved 28 November 1893 (effects £28,162). His widow died 20 November and was buried at Newick 26 November 1912; her will was proved 20 January 1913 (estate £3,323).

Blaauw, Henry Thomas Gillman (1874-1948). Elder son of Thomas St. Leger Blaauw (1839-93) and his wife Fanny Alice, second daughter of Charles John Bigge of Linden Hall (Northbld.), born 4 July and baptised at Newick, 9 August 1874. Educated at Christ Church, Oxford (matriculated 1893; BA 1898) and Royal Agricultural College, Cirencester (Honour Diploma, 1901). Before the First World War he worked as a bookbinder. During the First World War he was an officer in the army (2nd Lt., 1915; Lt., 1916; severely wounded in leg and invalided out 1917). JP for Sussex, 1925. He married, 29 August 1912 at Holy Trinity, Weymouth (Dorset), Mary Verner (1878*-1963), younger daughter of Maj. James William Anderson of the Indian army, and had no issue, but adopted one daughter:

(A1) Margaret Esme Blaauw (b. c.1915); married, 9 July 1940 at Chailey (Sussex), Capt. Conor John O'Callaghan-Westropp (b. 1913) of Maryfort (aka Lismehane), Tulla (Co. Clare), which he demolished in 1967, and had issue one son; death not traced.

He inherited Beechland on the death of his mother in 1912, but continued to let it until he sold the estate in 1920. He lived subsequently at Towning's Place, Wivelisfield (Sussex) and later at Marriners, Chailey (Sussex).

He died 6 February 1948; his will was proved 27 May 1949 (estate £63,047). His widow died 10 November 1963, and was buried at Ditchling (Sussex), 14 November 1963; her will was proved 16 December 1963 (estate £3,675).

* Her date of birth and/or age are given inaccurately in several official sources, but this appears to be the correct date, based on her baptism in India.