Berkshire: Of woods and woodmen, and the head teacher who disappeared
The Kent family, an ancestral line on the Granny Gilvray side of the Harley family, lived in a small corner of Berkshire not far from Reading.
They were:
Their son, EdwardKent (1834-abt 1878) and two older daughters, Emma and Matilda
Edward’s son, William Henry Kent, who was Head of Kendrick School for Boys, Reading, about 1885 to 1890.
A day’s drive west from Reading would take you to several places with Kent connections.
BUCKLEBURY is about 15 miles west of Reading, in what has been described as “some of Royal Berkshire’s most beautiful wooded countryside”. St. Mary the Virgin is the parish church, and there are a number of country homes and estates. This is where William was born in 1801.
The village dates back to pre-Norman times; in the earliest recorded reference – a charter of 956 AD – the Anglo-Saxon King Eadwy (or Edwig) “the fair” (955-959) granted wood from Hawkridge forest for use by Abingdon Abbey for the rebuilding of Abingdon Church (in Oxfordshire).
Bucklebury Common is 900 acres of managed heather and woodland, owned by the Bucklebury Estate but open to ‘commoners’, who had grazing and wooding rights. The manor’s timber yard was once one of the principle places of employment for villagers.
Several notable ancient woodlands remain, notably at Holly Wood, and The Slade. A number of veteran trees on the Common including the Coronation Oak near Vanners, and a fine avenue of trees planted in the 18th century. Others have been planted to commemorate royal occasions during the twentieth century. On a clear day you can see Windsor Castle from the highest point, 443 ft., near the Three Crowns Inn.
At the eastern border of the common is the Blade Bone Pub – so called because its copper sign encases the bladebone of a mammoth found in the Kennet valley in the 17th century – a butchers, a Doctor’s Surgery and a tea shop.
Woodlands feature prominently in the Kent story. For William was a woodman, an occupation described in The McLaughlin Guides for family historians as “working in an estate wood, felling old trees for sale, pruning misshapen ones, planting new saplings etc.” While there are two or three estates in the area, the most likely candidate is the Bucklebury Estate. Or perhaps not, for he left Bucklebury for Aldworth by 1826. But the estate looks worth a look.
Bucklebury House, at the center of the estate, is a large and comfortable farm house which originally made up one of the great country houses of Berkshire. The original building on the site once belonged to the great Abbot of Reading, until Reading Abbey was dissolved in 1539. Its lands were seized and the old Abbey Grange torn down, to be replaced by a fine brick mansion. This was the Winchcombe family residence for about 160 years. The last of the family, Lady Frances Winchcombe, married Henry St. John, Viscount Bolingbroke, ally of Robert Harley, Earl of Oxford and first minister to Queen Anne – who famously (only to us) was NOT our ancestor. (See Family Mythtory for the unraveling of the family story and The Favourite for a romping version of the history.) And please note: this is not the home of Kate Middleton, who grew up in Bucklebury.
According to the Bucklebury Estate website “The Estate has a long tradition of woodland management.” They also have extensive Estate records and archives going back to 1540 – which may or may not list the names of such as the gamekeeper (probably not). The Estate’s website describes the House and Gardens extensively and provides directions, but there is no indication that it is open to the public.
You might try The Bucklebury Farm and Deer Safari Park instead; take a tractor-ride to see the herd of red deer which grazes on the hillside, or wander the nature trail through woodland, commonland, over fields, and around the lakeside to watch the dragon flies skim the water and dart between the reeds and wild flowers. Alternatively, visit the Church, where William was baptised.
The Church of St. Mary the Virgin: The Church of England parish church of Saint Mary the Virgin is of consistent style to have been that built in the second half of the 11th century. The structure is nationally listed for heritage and architecture in the highest category, Grade I.
Also of historical interest: The supporters of the 1830 Machine Riots of West Berkshire marched through Bucklebury, burning hay ricks and smashing several farming machines. And in 1835 at the time of the Enclosures Act, the parishioners under the leadership of John Morton, a local tenant farmer and lay preacher, defended their commoners’ rights at Westminster and preserved the Common for future generations.
FROM BUCKLEBURY you can drive 6 miles north to ASHAMPSTEAD where William’s wife, Elizabeth (Nokes) Kent, was born in 1810.
ASHAMPSTEAD. The village was known as Esshamstede in the 13th and 14th centuries, and the name apparently refers to an ‘Ash tree homestead’. Elizabeth Nokes will have been baptised in St. Clements parish church, both the Methodist and the Baptist chapels having been established several decades after she was born.
The parish church: St. Clement dates from the 12th century, has frescoes from the 13th, and a wooden bell turret from the 15th century. The only remaining bell dates from 1662.
Nothing much else to see, so I’d recommend driving on a few miles north to ALDWORTH.
ALDWORTH On the high ground of the Berkshire Downs, Aldworth is prettily wooded, and though small is scattered, the cottages being mostly built along two or three small by-roads; these are of no great antiquity, but the Roman road The Ridgeway runs through the north of the village, and there is a centuries old woodland, Long Copse, that is still coppiced and carpeted with bluebells.
The parish church is another St. Mary the Virgin. William and Elizbeth were married here (1826), and their first daughter, Emma, was born/baptised here (1829); possibly also Matilda, baptised 1832. In the churchyard stands an old yew of considerable girth.
William the woodman may have worked for the La Beche Farm. Once a fortified manor or castle, La Beche Castle was the main residence of the De La Beche family. They were a family of medieval knights since at least 1260, and powerful landowners in the 14th century. Many of them were retainers to the king, warders to the Tower of London and Sheriffs of Berkshire and Oxfordshire, and they were embroiled in royal intrigue during the reigns of Edward II and Edward III. La Beche Farm is all that remains of the estate, but the line of the moat may still be traced and is marked by one or two small ponds.
The new Aldworth Village Hall, opened in 2016, looks well worth a visit. Located in an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, it overlooks the recreation ground to the right of The Bell Inn. (It is a striking contrast to the Town Hall of Arrowsic, Maine.)
Turn south to HAMPSTEAD NORRIS (or NORREYS).
HAMPSTEAD NORRIS Edward Kent was baptised here in 1834. The village is noted for its Norman parish church, yet another St. Mary the Virgin, and the remains of a motte and bailey castle. Consisting mainly of red brick houses and cottages with slate and tiled roof, a few cottages have timber framing and thatched roofs. The population is chiefly agricultural, but there is a whiting and lime manufactory. There are earthworks, one known as Grimsbury Castle, in Fence Wood at the south of the parish, the other in Park Wood, just to the south of the village. A Roman villa, near Wellhouse, was discovered about the year 1833, and many Roman coins have been found in this neighbourhood.
Various charities provide the purchase of five white fustian greatcoats for shepherds or labourers and the balance is distributed in sums of 2s. 6d. or 3s. among indigent widows; blue serge for petticoats, distributed among widows and poor women with large families; a substantial greatcoat to be given to a labourer who should have served ten successive years on the same farm; gifts of coal, blankets and flannel vests, and beef and doles at Christmas.
In March 2011, a community shop was opened in the village, run by local volunteers. Shares in the shop were sold to village residents. It was the first community shop to be opened in a West Berkshire village since the 1990s.
Hampstead Norris is the site of The Living Rainforest, an ecological and education centre, where three glasshouses hold rainforest plants and animals, including rare and endangered species of global conservation value.
From Hampstead Norris head back toward Reading, but stop in the village of TILEHURST.
TILEHURST was the home of William Kent, woodman, and his family in 1841. It is situated on the high ground some three miles to the west of central Reading. The area is bounded by the Rivers Thames, Kennet, Pang and Bourne. In contrast to the gentle rise from the Thames to the east, the drops into the other valleys are steep.
The manor house, Calcot Park, built by John Blagrave in 1755, was for many years the home of the Blagrave family, whose members include the mathematician, John Blagrave, and the regicide, Daniel Blagrave. The present Calcot Park was built by John Blagrave in 1755 and the family lived there for two centuries. It is a splendid seven bay, two storey red brick house with a beautiful pilastered facade and portico. The surrounding park once had herds of fallow deer. While I have no evidence that William worked for Colonel Blagrave, a news account in 1855 demonstrates that Edward certainly did.
On April 22 1855 Edward Kent, gamekeeper to Colonel Blagrave caught poachers with fish from Holy Brook at Tilehurst, as reported in the Reading Mercury May 5, 1855
READING From Tilehurst you are practically in Reading, where the thing to do is visit Reading Grammar, and reflect on the hidden histories that lie in our past. For we have a fine story associated with the school.
William Henry Kent, Edward Kent’s oldest son and our great great uncle, was a school teacher. He became headmaster, first of a private school in Barnes, Surrey. Then he was head of Kendrick School for Boys in Reading, Berkshire, a school with a considerable endowment, which was later absorbed into Reading Grammar. Kendrick School for Girls is still alive and quite well and a history was published in 2017 by Daphne Joyce Barnes-Phillips, entitled Long May Our Lions Roar, which included the story of the disappearance of William Kent in 1880. (Liz Macnee has a copy.)
After the death of his wife, Elizabeth, in 1889, William continued teaching at Kendrick until the following spring. At Easter in 1880 he announced that he was taking his two daughters, Maud and Winifred, to Kent for the holidays. When he failed to return the school hired someone to find him or determine his status, even placing an advertisement in the newspapers asking for information on his whereabouts. But as far as the school is concerned he simply disappeared, and was never heard from again. What they failed to discover was that he, the two girls and his mother, Mary Ann (Joy) Kent, my great great grandmother, left Liverpool for New York, where they arrived on April 28 1880. From there they headed for California, where William purchased a farm in Kern County.
Elizabeth’s funeral was held at Earley St Peter’s Church. I swear I have seen a death certificate for Elizabeth, one which conceals the cause of death and is suggestive of a need to keep private a case of tuberculosis, or consumption as it was often called in those days. But if I have I have carefully hidden it from myself. But a death certificate would be useful. A trip to Kew next?
Kent related places in Berkshire
Bucklebury: Birth, baptism, William Kent, 1801
Ashampstead: Birth, baptism, Elizabeth Nokes, 1810
Aldworth: Marriage, William Kent & Elizabeth Nokes, 1826
Aldworth: Birth, baptism, Emma Kent, 1832
Town unknown: Birth, baptism, Matilda Kent, 1832
Hampstesd Norreys (or Norris): Birth, baptism, Edward William Kent (baptized William Edward) Kent, 1834
Tilehurst: Home of the Kent family (William, Elizabeth, Matilda Edward), 1841 census.
Bradfield: Death, William Kent, 1879 (certainty level not high)
Reading: Death, Elizabeth (Yates) Kent, 1889
Other Berkshire places with family connections include:
Cumnor: Birth/Baptism, Ann Wisdom(Douglas Macnee’s great great grandmother), 1749
Farringdon: Birth, Charlotte() Yates William Henry Kent’s mother-in-law, 1832
Wokingham: Birth, Barbara Hodson Mackenzie(Keith Mackenzie’s great-aunt), 1902
For more information
The New Berkshire Village Book, Countryside Books, Newbury, 1985.
Bucklebury’s Heritage, by Cecilia Millson, 1975, revised 1994
You might also be interested in this: https://whoownsengland.org/2017/04/17/the-thirty-landowners-who-own-half-a-county/