Title
The de Grey family had been connected with a
manor at Carlton at the beginning of the 14th century,
but their interest, whatever its nature, was brief and
their next appearance as landowners in the village is
some 450 years later. The purchase of two properties
there is documented in this section; in addition there
are a few leases of some of the appertenances of one
of these estates in Pavenham, a neighbouring village.
The purchase deeds reveal that the accepted
descent of the properties is erroneous (Victoria County History 111, 51).
The mistake seems to have been due to the treatment of
the manors of Staismore and Carlton Hall as one instead
of two estates; in fact in about 1650 both seemed to
have been in the hands of the same man as they were
after 1830, but between those dates for the greater part
of the period they were owned by different people.
Before 1650 their history remains obscure.
Their owners in about 1650 were the Reynolds'
family (L3/1, L3/54, V.C.H. 111, 51). The manor of
Carlton Hall was bought somewhere about that date by
Edward Reynolds, Bishop of Norwich, from Sir Thomas
Alston, whose family were considerable landowners in
the district and owners of another of the manors in the
village of Carlton. The relationship of Carlton Hall
to this manor which the Alstons continued to hold is
unknown. Edward Reynolds, son of the bishop, and
himself Archdeacon of Northampton, settled Carlton Hall
on his son, a third Edward, when the latter married
Susannah Halford in 1687. Susannah's family lived in
Leicestershire and it is doubtful if the Reynolds ever
lived at Carlton. The manor house was occupied by
Thomas Boddington in 1687 and apparently the same family
may have been its occupants in 1736 (L3/6). Edward
Reynolds and his descendants seemed to have lived first
at his wife's home at Newhouse Grange, Leicester, and then
at Atherstone in Warwickshire (L3/2 et seq). By 1736
the Reynolds were in financial difficulty and eventually
following a chancery law suit a quarter of a century later
the land was sold to the executors of the Duke of Kent in
1764.
It is to the manor of Staismore (L3/63 et seq)
that the V.C.H. refers when it discusses the property
mortgaged by Francis Reynolds, supposedly a son of one
of the Edwards; to Francis Cutts. Cutts became owner
of the manor and sold it to Uriah Bithrey probably
before the middle of the 18th century (L3/54, L3/71,
V.C.H. 111, 51-2). The exact date when the property
was bought by Thomas Palmer of Olney, Bucks., is still
unknown but it seems that one, William Bithrey sold it
to him some time between 1764 and 1769 L3/53, L3/54,
V.C.H. loc. cit.) Thomas's namesake and nephew to whom
he bequeathed the manor of Staismore apparently left the
country and settled at Philadelphia in Pennsylvania,
and within a few years of the end of the American War of
Independence sold the land to Thomas Battams, a grazier
of the nearby parish of Clifton Reynes, Bucks. Battams
added a considerable amount of land to the property by
his purchases in 1803 (L3/52) but in the difficult years
which followed the end of the Napoleonic Wars this
family in its turn found itself in financial straits
and in 1831, apparently to fulfill the provisions of the
will of Robert Battams, the manor of Staismore was sold
to provide money for the education of Robert's children
(L3/72, L3/75, L3/84). The purchaser was Thomas, Lord
Grantham to whom the manor of Carlton Hall had descended.
The two properties after a separation of perhaps 150
years were re-united.
The capital messuage of both manors can still be
traced, though the large dove house attached to that of
Carlton Hall is nowhere mentioned in surviving documents.
This house stands on the Turvey boundary of Carlton
parish, while that of Staismore is at the South end of
the High Street. Its recent rebuilding together with
subsidiary farmhouses is mentioned in Thomas Battams
will in 1818 and in a deed of 1825 (L3/63, L3/75).
Some sidelights in the documents dealing with the
land bought by Battams in 1803 deserve notice (L3/23 - 52).
There are the family affairs of the Warners' ; the rights
of Mary, wife of John Warner of Chellington, to retain
after her husbands' death those chattels which she brought
to their married life was carefully safeguarded in her
husbands will against possible acquisitive relatives,
1688 (L3/23). The friendly settlement made by John's sons
after their father's will was seen to be ambiguous also
survives (L3/24). The Warner land was eventually bought
by Nathaniel Costin in 1769 (L3/38). Two years later
Costin bought land which had belonged to the Knight
family of Pavenham (L3/44), horsedealers. In 1744
William Knight made his will which contained what we
must hope was a fulfilled wish that 'my daughter
Elizabeth shall be a little kind and give some little
matter what she pleases to my brother Charles during
her life'. The Costin family were connected by marriage
with the Bithrey's, owners of Staismore (L3/51) and they
were well known non-conformists and drapers in Bedford.
Gideon, in a will dated 1785 left bequests to the support
of the minister of the then new Congregational Chapel
erected by John Howard (L3/47). His father, Nathaniel,
in his will had made bequests to various dissenting
ministers in the county (L3/46). The land which John
Costin sold to Thomas Battame in 1803 amounted in round
figures to 100 acres in Carlton and Chellington, 30 in
Haynes, 120 in Wilshampstead and 4 acres in Olney, Bucks.
The leases made by the Earl of Hardwicke, husband
of Jemima, Marchioness Grey, of the land largely in
Pavenham, but part of the manor of Carlton Hall between
1770 and 1779 are few (L3/113 -119). It is noticeable
however that as at Blunham covenants that a tenant should
practise the improved rotation of crops though absent in
leases of 1770 and 1775 are included in one of 1779.
The documents here catalogued were received in
three large bundles of about 40 items and the order in
which they appear below is synthetic.
SCHEME OF CATALOGUE
I. Manor of Carlton Hall (1678-1764) L3/1-22
II. Manor of Staismore & Appurtenances
IIa. Land bought by Nathaniel Costin 1769 (1688-1769) L3/23-38;
IIb. Land bought by Nathaniel Costin 1771 (1744-1771) L3/39-44;
IIc. Costin property and sale to Battams 1803 (1743-1803) L3/45-52;
IId. later deeds of above lands and manor of Staismore (1768-1831) L3/53-112;
III. Leases in Carlton and Pavenham (1770-1779) L3/113-119
IV> Additional documents (1731-1739) L3/120-121