Bedfordshire Archives Service Catalogue
  • Reference
    SL
  • Title
    Shuttleworth Collection & family of Old Warden
  • Admin/biog history
    The Ongley Family. The Ongley family first became connected with Bedfordshire in the late 17thcentury when Sir Samuel Ongley, a London merchant of Kentish origins, bought the Old Warden estate. Sir Samuel’s origins are obscure – one suspects deliberately so, that he maintained a conspiracy of silence, and even his will, which mentions numerous relatives, does not give much information as to their exact identity. He died unmarried and left his property to his nephew, another Samuel Ongley. This Samuel, like his sister, Judith, married into the Harvey family of Ickwell, but as he had no children, the property on his death, went to his niece’s third, and only surviving son, Robert Henley, who in accordance with Sir Samuel’s will, took the surname of Ongley. Sir Samuel in his will had made Robert’s father his heir after his nephew, Samuel, but as the father and two elder brothers all died before Samuel Ongley, the property descended to the third son, Robert. It was this Robert who was created Baron Ongley, of Old Warden, an Irish Peerage, created so that he could continue to sit in the House of Commons as an M.P. By his wife, Anne, he had six children, his eldest son, Robert Henley Ongley, succeeding him as the 2nd Baron, in 1785. The papers in this collection are mainly concerned with the 2nd Lord Ongley and his son, also Robert Henley, 3rd Baron Ongley, who was the one who sold the estate to Joseph Shuttleworth in 1872. It was the 2nd Lord Ongley who seems to have started a policy of consolidation of the estates, concentrating his interests on Bedfordshire. He appears to have disposed of the London estates which he had inherited and the Kent estates also by about 1802. The Kent estates were sold to James Whatman. Under the enclosure he exchanged much of the property he had inherited in Bedfordshire with Samuel Whitbread to make the property more compact and he also bought up many small estates. However as the century progressed the 3rd Lord Ongley began to mortgage the property. Perhaps this may have been due, in part at least, to make proper provision for his mother and sisters. His father had made a will in 1802 before his eldest son was born, in which, after providing for his eldest son, he left £20,000 to be divided among his other children, which in the event meant that this sum had to be divided between five. Lord Ongley made a second will in 1810 but because it was attested by two witnesses only (three being needed if real estate was concerned) it was this earlier will which was proved on Lord Ongley’s death on 24 August 1814. In 1824, therefore, when his son, the 3rd Baron, was 21, he made a grant giving his mother the annuity proposed in the second will. In 1837 the estates were mortgaged for £24,000 at 4% interest. In 1843, having repaid £4,000, he borrowed another £5,000. In 1847 he borrowed another £4,000 and a further £5,000 in 1848 (perhaps to provide marriage portions for his two sisters) – a total of £38,000. An interesting insight into Lord Ongley and his brothers occurs in the will of Frances Ongley, widow of their uncle Samuel. She left £4,000 each to her nephews Lord Ongley and his next to youngest brother, George, and £200 to each of the other brothers. Lord Ongley took out a further mortgage for £7,000 in 1850, at which time it was mentioned that his rent roll was £2,858, whereas the interest on his loans must have amounted to about £1,800. On 9 October 1861, however, Lord Ongley paid off the total sum due but then took out a fresh mortgage for £16,000 with the Clerical, Medical and General Assurance Society. His rent roll, though, was now nearly £4,000 per annum. In 1872, however, after his last brother died unmarried and there, were therefore, no heirs to the peerage, came the sale of the whole property. Already Lord Ongley had ceased to live in the mansion house and it had been let – to Henry Browning, esquire in the early 1860’s (the lease to expire in 1875). The majority of the estate – 2023 acres in Old Warden and Southill – went to Joseph Shuttleworth of Hartsholm Hall, Lincolnshire, for £150,000 plus between £15,000 and £16,000 for the timber. The date of this sale was 27 September 1872. The outlying portions of the estate (i.e. those near Biggleswade) were sold to various purchasers at a cost of about £27,652. Lord Ongley died on 21 January 1877 at Teddington, Middlesex, and was buried at Old Warden. He was survived by his sister, Mrs Frances Tucker. In his will after various bequests he left the bulk of his property to the Misses Priscilla and Anna Ottley.
  • Scope and Content
    For the purchase of Old Warden and Southill from the Earl of Bolingbroke see X95/411/160 & 161 For sale catalogue of house, 1872, see X65/61
  • Level of description
    fonds
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