High Elms Manor
High Elms Manor is a grade II listed[1] Georgian country house located near Garston in Hertfordshire, England. It was built in around 1812, and was originally known as High Elms Manor, but from the 1890s to 2010 it was called Garston Manor.[2]
In the post WWII years the house was a rehabilitation centre, but it later fell derelict. In the 1990s an American named Sheila O'Neill bought and restored it and used it as a Montessori School.
In 2011 the house was the subject of a Channel 4 television documentary presented by hotelier Ruth Watson as part of her Country House Rescue series. The official renaming as High Elms Manor by the Mayor of Watford was shown on the programme. Mrs Watson encouraged Mrs O'Neill and three of her four daughters, who teach at the school and live in the house with their families, to develop their weddings and events business to generate the extra income needed to maintain the house.
References
- ^ "British Listed Buildings". http://www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/en-158672-garston-manor-garston. Retrieved 2011-04-05.
- ^ William Page, ed (1908). "Watford: Manors". A History of the County of Hertford. Victoria County History. 2. pp. 451–464. http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=43308. Retrieved 2011-04-15. "The manor of GARSTON extended into the parishes of St. Albans, Watford, Abbots Langley, and Leavesden. By an undated charter, probably of the thirteenth century, Nicholas son of John de Garston gave to John de Westwick and Ellen his wife a messuage and land at Garston; the manor was apparently held of the kitchener of St. Albans, who held a fourteenth part of a fee in Garston during the fourteenth century. In 1355 Margaret wife of John de Westwick granted to Thomas Purchacour for life a capital messuage and land in Watford and elsewhere, which she held of Bartholomew Blaket. Bartholomew, in 1368, conveyed the manor of Garston to John Curteys of Wymington. In 1412 John Burgeys of Maldon and Joan his wife held it for the life of Joan, and they in 1427 granted it to Robert Darcy. By the middle of the fifteenth century it had come into the possession of William Halle of Shillington, co. Beds, 'a good and benevolent man,' of whom Abbot John of Wheathampstead purchased this manor in 1453. At the time of the Dissolution the manor was held by Richard Carter under a lease made in 1534 for thirty years, and was granted by Henry VIII in 1544 to the said Richard and Thomas Palmer together with woods called Mote Grove and More Grove. Richard and Thomas in the same year obtained licence to alienate half the manor to John Randoll and Agnes his wife. Richard Carter died seised of half the manor in 1558 leaving William his son and heir, on whose death in 1567 it passed to his son Robert, then a minor. The other half passed from John Randoll and Agnes to co-heirs, William Pierson and Agnes his wife, Richard Haysse and Cecily his wife, and Michael Sare and Margaret his wife, the ladies probably being daughters of John Randoll. These co-heirs in 1582 conveyed their moiety to Henry Sare and Richard Wood, who were probably trustees for Michael Sare and Margaret, for they in 1586 granted half the manor to Robert Carter and Petronilla his wife, who already held the other moiety. In default of issue of Robert and Petronilla the manor was to pass to Walter, Francis, and Richard Curll, sons of William Curll in tail male, with remainder to the heirs of Robert Carter. Robert died seised of the manor in 1632, holding one half in demesne and the other in tail male, leaving William his son and heir. William sold the manor in 1666 to John Edlin and William Kentish, who were probably trustees for John Marsh, who was lord of the manor in 1672, and whose house at Garston was licensed in that year as a place of worship for Nonconformists. He died in 1681 and was buried in Watford church. The manor passed to his son Joseph, whose daughter and heir Anne married Thomas Beech. Thomas and Anne conveyed the manor in 1728 to Samuel Raymond, who may have been a trustee for Richard Capper of Bushey, to whom the manor passed at about that time. On his death Garston came to his son Francis, whose eldest son Richard succeeded to the estate on the death of his father, and on whose death in 1800 it passed to his son Robert. In 1814 Robert Capper conveyed it to Stephen Moore, but this conveyance was probably made for the purposes of a settlement, as Robert sold it two years later to John Falcon, who held it till his death in 1854, when it was sold under the terms of his will to Henry Cobb, on whose death in 1873 it came to his widow, Mrs. Mary Anne Cobb, who was residing there in 1899. Garston House is now the residence of Mr. Thomas Farries."
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