Skrine of Warleigh

CHAPTER 3-C

The Skrines of Warleigh Manor

I t would be an interesting speculation, how much Henry Skrine's own tastes andcharacter owed to that same "worthy veteran" the Rev. Mr. Graves, whosepreparatory school at Claverton he attended in his early years.Henry Skrine's Will, (P.C.C. 484 Marriott), is dated at Walton-on Thames, 8thJune 1800, witnessed by Thomas D'Oyly, Clerk, William Clement and William Adams,and was proved by his widow and relict, Letitia, with four codicils, 20th May1803. The executors were the widow, Letitia, Nicholas Ridley of Gray's Inn, andJohn Calthorpe Gough. Later (5th July 1825) an administration was granted to the Rev. John HarcourtSkrine, the Will having been left unadministered by the widow Letitia Sarah MariaSkrine. This Will refers to an earlier Will of 17th May 1790, executed during his father'slifetime, and since superseded and destroyed, (of which the executors had beenNicholas Ridley, Thomas Manners Sutton and John Gough), and to the four codicils,dating from 7th July 1791 onwards, which remain operative. He speaks of "havingnow (1800) laboured under a state of very painful and often alarming ill-healthfor near nine years (the issue of which is still uncertain after two vain expeditionsin 1799 to Cheltenham and Weymouth)", and says "I now take advantageof every present interval of tranquility to revise, etc.". His anxietiesfor the welfare of his young second family were increased by his responsibilityfor a considerable portion of the unnecessarily large dower which his fatherhad promised his elder sister on her marriage, and to which Henry, then a youngand quite inexperienced man had subscribed his signature. Besides funded property,of which he gives details, he mentions freehold property in Walcot, Bath, andfreehold farms at Dorking and elsewhere in Surrey, in addition to the familyestates which, of course, passed to his eldest son, Henry, along with certainpersonal gifts. HENRY SKRINE, eldest son and heir (see below). HARCOURT SKRINES, issue of Henry Skrine and Letitia his second wife.

a. Rev. John Harcourt Skrine, Clerk in Holy Orders, of Teddington, co. Middlesex, born 6 May 1791 at Green Street and baptised at St. Marylebone Church, London. Married 15 August 1815 at Richmond, co. Surrey, to Eleanor, youngest daughter of Henry BALDWIN Esqr. of New Bridge Street, London, and Richmond, Surrey. Issue:

(1) Rev. Harcourt Skrine, Clerk, Rector of Sunbury-on-Thames, born 3 July 1817 at Hampton, Middlesex, and baptised at Teddington; matriculated at Wadham College, Oxford, 27 October 1836, aged 19 years: B.A. 1840, M.A. 1843; died 14 November 1886. He married Louise, 4th daughter of the Rev. W. GREENLAW, Rector of Woolwich, and gd. da. of Sir Robert BAKER. She died 27 October 1912. Issue:

(i) Katherine Louisa, spinster, died 24 May 1935 at Northolt, Sunbury on Thames, and there buried. (ii) Charles Harcourt Skrine, died at sea 1882, s.p. (iii) Alfred Harcourt Greenlaw Skrine, died 1880, s.p. (iv) Eleanor Frances of Northolt, Sunbury - on - Thames, spinster. (v) Mary Mildred, spinster, died 1917.

(2) Charles Henry Skrine, born 28 November 1821 at Teddington; matriculated at Wadham College, Oxford, 20 February 1840. (3) Ellen Maria, born 11 January 1826 at Teddington, spinster.

b. Thomas Henry Skrine, born 30 May 1792; died unmarried at Muttras in Bengal, August 1815. c. Isabella, born 14 May 1793, and baptised at St. Marylebone, London, died unmarried in 1870. d. Letitia, born 22 June 1794, and baptised at St. Marylebone, London, died in infancy. e. Anne, born 18 July 1795, and baptised at St. Marylebone, London, died 28 November 1795, and buried at St. Marylebone. f. Henrietta, born 20 July 1797, at Walton-on-Thames, and there baptised. Married the Rev. Edward Butler; died without issue 1832. g. Catherine, born 19 July 1799 at Walton-on-Thames; died there September 1814, and there buried.

HENRY SKRINE, only child and heir of Henry Skrine, Esqr., by his first wife Marianne,of Warleigh Manor, co. Somerset, of Portman Square in the parish of St. Marylebone,and of Stubbings House, co. Berks, Esqr., born 23rd January 1788 at WarleighManor; educated at Westminster School; matriculated gentleman-commoner of CorpusChristi College, Oxford, 5th December 1804, aged 16 years (as son of Henry Skrineof London, armiger); died in London 10th September 1853, aged 65; and buried17th September following in the family vault in Stubbings churchyard. Over thevault stands a massive tomb with an inscription, and heraldic carvings displayingthe arms of Skrine and Spry. His Will is dated 15th March 1826, and was proved8th December 1853 in the Prerogative Court of Canterbury. He married 21st January 1812 at Westbury-on-Trym, co. Glos., Caroline Anne, daughterand eventually sole heir of the second marriage of the Rev. Benjamin Spry, Rectorof St. Mary Redcliffe, Bristol, and Prebendary of the Cathedral Church of Salisbury,by Catherine his (second) wife, daughter of the Rev. Richard Huntley of BoxwellCourt, co. Glos. She died at Stubbings, 18th July 1867, aged 73, and was thereburied on 25th July in the family vault. She bore her husband nine children. Henry Skrine left a Memoir of his Life for the use of his children, which wasfound among his papers at his death, and is still preserved. The Memoir is writtenin a religious and sententious tone, and much of it is concerned with the philosophyof life and conduct, particularly in relation to the upbringing of his children;but parts of it are of considerable interest as family history. The narrativeis somewhat sombrely coloured by the writer's own introspections; and by theunfortunate and miserable experiences of his unhappy early life, when owing tohis father's remarriage and busy occupations, and later ill health, he was leftalmost entirely in the hands of his grandparents and aunt, and was in fact verymuch in the position of an orphan child. The following account is summarised from the more historical parts of the Memoir. It begins with his grandfather, Richard Dickson Skrine, who married the heiressof "General" Tryon of Collyweston, co. Northants, and who, he says,had received his education in London, and subsequently lived at Warleigh on afamily estate of (then) about 400 valuable acres of land. He was a magistrate,and he had a house in Belmont at Bath as well as the manor house at Warleigh. Of his father Henry Skrine he says that he was a barrister of Stone Buildings,Lincoln's Inn (which seems to suggest actual legal practice); and that he marriedthe elder daughter of a thriving wine-merchant in Mincing Lane of the immigrantHuguenot family of Chalié, who had married his first cousin Susanna Clarmont.(Mr. Chalié was, in fact, something more than "a thriving wine-merchant",being a very wealthy man of repute and position; and a friend, for example, ofthe Prime Minister, Pitt). Matthew Clarmont, the father of Susanna (the Mme.Chalié this narrative), was a man greatly respected in his day, and ofsuch position as to have been elected Governor of the Bank of England for twoyears in succession. This branch of the family was originally noble in France,from which country the whole connection was driven by that Act of Louis XIV whichrevoked the Edict of Nantes. John Chalié's home was at Wimbledon, andhis two daughters were highly educated and accomplished ladies, the younger ofwhom married William Garthshore, Esqr., M.P. for Weymouth, seven years afterthe marriage of her elder sister to Henry Skrine, senior. The young Henry, whose mother, never recovering from her accouchement, died beforehe was three months old, and whose father married again two years later, livedalternately with his grandparents at Wimbledon and at Warleigh, until he wassix years old. He says that until that date his only times of happiness wereat Wimbledon; since at Warleigh his father's unmarried sister, his aunt Elizabeth,used to whip him very severely. Of his aunt Sarah, who had married Mr. RobertStill of Mere, we hear nothing in the Memoir. At the age of six he was sent to a small private school at Mitcham but his healthwas not good there, and he was soon removed to the Rev. J. G. Hannington's atHanwell. Mr. Hannington prepared boys for Eton, and had usually about fourteenpupils, most of whom were sons of the nobility, or of persons in high politicalor official station. He gives the names of a number of his schoolfellows of theformer class, e.g. Lord Dartmouth and his brother, Lord Saltoun and his brother,Lord Beverley's brother, etc. The education provided consisted chiefly in a thoroughgrounding in the Classics; but the discipline was severe. Mr. Hannington, thougha kind-hearted man with gentlemanly feelings, was passionate, "nor couldthere have been more floggings and beatings". Bullying was rampant too;so that young Henry's six years here were years of misery, except for the happyholidays with his grandmother at Wimbledon. He adds "my father came to seeme sometimes; but seldom". On leaving Mr. Hannington's at the age of twelve, he refused to go to Eton fromfear of meeting there the boys who had bullied him so cruelly already. He was,therefore, sent to Westminster "where Mr. Garthshore, a Scotchman in highfavour with Mr. Pitt, and a friend of Dr. Vincent (the Headmaster) had greatinfluence". Here he spent halcyon days and also greatly enjoyed passing some of his holidays with the Garthshoresat Weymouth, where his aunt constantly took him out with her into society whenhe was fourteen years old. But this happy association was broken by Mrs. Garthshore'searly death. Henry's health again became unsatisfactory; so he was taken away from Westminsterafter only a year and a half, and given a private tutor, who proved to be rathera stern and unsympathetic preceptor. At this period his father died (February1803); and then in August came the sudden loss of his grandfather, John Chalié,who died of an apoplectic stroke in his city office, where he was discoveredin a seizure with his head resting on an open Bible on the table before him.A new disaster was the death of Mrs. Garthshore who, on hearing the news of herfather's death, herself succumbed in giving birth to her child. The child quicklyfollowed its mother to the grave, and Air. Garthshore overwhelmed with griefat his loss gradually went out of his mind and became hopelessly insane. The unfortunate Mme. Chalié, Henry's grandmother, now felt herself tobe very much alone in the world; and though her brother-in-law, Matthew Chalié,most kindly gave her all the assistance possible in her business affairs, shebegan to rely more and more completely on Henry's tutor - a young man of about24 - who had now taken Holy Orders, and had been brought in to live in the housewith his pupil. But Henry, who had at first given him his full youthful confidence,had been repelled by the sternness of his criticism and censure, and his constantdisparagement, and withdrew more and more within himself. After some two years and more of this regime, broken only by a tour of six weekseach summer into the west country and Wales in the company of his tutor, Henrywas entered as a gentleman commoner at his tutor's College, Corpus Christi, inDecember 1804, shortly before his seventeenth birthday. Here he had an allowanceof £500 a year, with a horse and a servant. Following on the death of his father and grandfather two important law-suitshad to be undertaken by Mme. Chalié. As the result of the first of theseshe found that she was entitled to only one half of her husband's fortune, theother half passing in equal shares to Henry and the heirs of the living childthat had been born to Mrs. Garthshore. Thus it came about that one fourth ofthe estate eventually passed into the hands of Mr. Garthshore's cousin, a Mr.Maitland. The other action had to be fought on Henry's behalf by Mine. Chalié, whowas one of his guardians under the Court of Chancery, to recover from his deceasedfather's estate the £10,000 which bad been his own mother's marriage portion.His step-mother hoped, (as he says), by retaining it to persuade him, when heshould come of age, to relinquish this money to her and her children. The suitwas, however, decided in Henry's favour. At Oxford his life was probably agreeable enough at first. He had been admittedas one of the six gentleman-commoners of Corpus in the place of "the lateLord Dudley", who had just gone down, and he seems to have liked his companions.But unfortunately they all left the College during his first year, and were replacedby others some of whom proved less to his liking. Among them was a Mr. Johnson,whose father was a man of property in the Isle of Axholme, with whom and withwhose family he maintained his intimacy after leaving Oxford. There was the sonof Mr. Gore-Langton, the Member for Somerset, whom he found rather reserved andsilent; but whose granddaughter was afterwards to marry Henry's eldest grandson.There was also a Mr. X., the son of a brewer at Windsor, and heir to £8,000a year, who had been expelled from Christ Church; a Mr. D., son of an officerin the East India Service; and there was an Irishman who, in his second year,insulted Henry publicly and unforgivably in the presence of guests by exclaiming(probably when half-drunk) "does the nephew of a wine-merchant presume toargue with a gentleman?" Henry's practical reply was the contents of a tankardthrown in his attacker's face. A bitter quarrel ensued which, though formallymade up by the intermediation of friends, resulted in a permanent estrangement. This insult was never forgotten; indeed it seems to have rankled throughout Henry'slife, and he refers to it again several times later on in the Memoir, but alsotakes pleasing pride in having treated this man with kindness and considerationin later life when he had fallen on evil days. On another occasion at Corpus,when he was giving the customary wine party to the whole College, unfriendlyspirits converted it into a scene of wild uproar and ragging, which became alarming.Obviously there must have been a certain lack of social success in his Collegelife; and it would be remarkable indeed if such youthful experiences, followingon the over-discipline and terrorisation of his infancy and boyhood, had notproduced a profound effect on the character of a proud, shy, and delicate youngman. In a youth of so sensitive and highly-strung a temperament as his they seemto have led to a reserve amounting almost to suspicion. However, in middle agehe acquired a kindly and humorous outlook, not unfortunately reflected in theMemoir. Henry's third year at Oxford was marked by another disaster in the occurrenceof a grave accident which nearly cost him his life. Hurrying home one day fromhunting, and endeavouring on a tired horse to overtake the servant, who had becomeweary of waiting at the appointed place and had gone on, he was heavily thrown.He lay unconscious for days, and was paralysed on the left side. Recovery wasvery slow, and he had to take an "aegrotat" degree. When he was atlast able to travel his grandmother took him away to various watering places,and subsequently he made a tour in Wales. In the autumn (1808) he visited theJohnson family, above referred to, at Exmouth, and then took a lodging in Bathto be near his grandmother who now had a house at Bathford. In January 1809 Henry came of age, and began to be more independent. After makingsome stay at Harrogate, he proceeded to London and took chambers in the Albany.Next year he visited Harrogate again, and then Cheltenham, returning to his chambersin London where he fell ill and was laid up for two months. On recovering hegave up the chambers and went down to Bathford to his grandmother, who presentlypersuaded him (probably in 1811) to build a new Manor House at Warleigh, andundertook to help him by paying half the cost. This project, he tells us, absorbedhalf his income until its completion in 1815. The architect was Mr. Webb "ofStaffordshire". Meanwhile he had visited Cheltenham again in 1811, and saw much of the Johnsonswho were staying there at the time. At their house he met and quickly becamedeeply attached to his future wife, Miss Caroline Anne Spry -"we met inSeptember, and married in the following January two days before my birthday (21stJanuary 1812)". After their marriage the young couple lived first at a cottagewhich they hired at Middle Hill, near Bath; but they soon moved to Ashley House,a mile distant, on the road from Bath to Chippenham. After this they took a weddingtour visiting among his new relations, and returning home for his wife's approachinglying-in. The first child, a boy, who was named Henry Hume, died in a few monthsfrom croup. In the following year they moved to Bath, purchasing a house at 8,Catherine Place, and here a second son was born (February 1814). Probably at this time the relations of Henry and his young wife with Mme. Chalié werenot altogether as cordial and affectionate as they might have been, nor theirattentions as frequent as the old lady would have wished. At any rate she nowinvited to visit her in Bathford a son of the French branch of her family (Clarmont).He came at once, and soon completely won her regard, so that she determined toreturn with him to France. The first that Henry knew of it was by the receipt of a letter telling him thatshe had quitted Bathford, and was on her way to France; and explaining that hersudden departure without making her plans known to him was meant to obviate thepain and grief of leave-taking. At the same time she sent him a present of £1,000for furnishing the drawing-room at the new Warleigh, which was now approachingcompletion; and she left him the contents of her Bathford house. But her journeytowards France was interrupted, when she had got no further than Winchester,by the news of Buonaparte's return on his escape from Elba. Subsequently shewent on to Rochester where she fell ill. Henry visited her there, and their relationsbecame again very friendly and affectionate; and after her recovery and permanentestablishment in France (at St. Cloud) she continued to keep in touch with himin affectionate correspondence. Some five years after this she died (at Boulogne),and was buried in Père-la-Chaise cemetery in Paris, 2nd March 1821. Herpencil portrait by Dance is at Warleigh Manor. Henry Skrine and his family went into residence at the new manor house at Warleighin or before 1816, and the house in Bath was sold. The date 1816 is entered inthe Memoir in pencil in the writing of H.D.S.; but as he himself (H.D.S.) wasborn 22nd May 1815, and is said to have been born at Warleigh (and baptised atBathford), there is still some uncertainty as to the exact date when the newhouse came into occupation. Old Mme. Chalié died in 1821, (though the Memoir wrongly gives the dateas 1820), and at her death it was found that most of her fortune was entailedon Henry's children; but that she had already given away to the French Clarmontsby Deed of Gift somewhere between £30,000 and £40,000. About thistime Henry and his wife became dissatisfied with Warleigh Manor as a place ofresidence. The near neighbourhood of Bath, as it was at that date, gave riseto constant trouble and anxiety with the household staff; the climate was damp,and the children often seriously ill; and in 1819, Alfred, the second son died.Accordingly the decision was taken to move, and in 1821 a house was bought atFelpham, near Bognor, where they went to live. Henry tried to sell Warleigh,but happily without success, and after having it in hand for several years, helet it to Mrs. Ricardo who proved an excellent tenant. Shortly after (in 1825) he bought Stubbings House, Berks, near Maidenhead, andpart of the estate from Lord Dorchester and moved his family thither. Later on(1833-34) he added to the property by the purchase of Stubbings farm, which hevery much improved and let to Mr. Lawrence. At Stubbings the family lived a veryretired life at first, neither seeking nor encouraging much acquaintance withtheir neighbours; but they also had a house in London, in Portman Square, wherealso lived at this time (at No. 47) Mr. John Harman, who became a near connectionthrough his mother Marianne, a sister of Mr. William Mills of Saxham Hall, co.Suffolk (see Chapter VI). Mr. Skrine subsequently bought other property in the neighbourhood of Stubbings,as shown by two extracts from the Victoria County History of Berks, as follows: Vol. iii, p. 127-8. "The Manor of Great Bradley was sold in 1837 by EdwardFrancis Colston to Henry Skrine." Vol. iii, p. 125-6. "The Manor of Cookham was purchased in 1849 of Mrs.A. M. Vansittart by Henry Skrine of Stubbings and Warleigh." After they had lived at Stubbings for about fifteen years, Mr. Skrine decidedto build a church there for the use of his family and the convenience of theresidents in that portion of Bisham parish. Accordingly he purchased land atCamley Corner from G. H. Vansittart, Esqr., of Bisham Abbey, and a Corner Stonewas laid 1st May 1849 for the Church of St. James the Less at Stubbings. Thechurch was consecrated 16th April 1850 by the Right Rev. Samuel Wilberforce,bishop of Oxford; and it was served at first by the Rev. Edward Thring (afterwardsHeadmaster of Uppingham, and the schoolmaster of many Skrines), and by the Rev.G. N. Hodson incumbent of Cookham Dene. Mr. Skrine next proceeded to build avicarage and to endow the living, to which his second surviving son, the Rev.Wadham Huntley Skrine was presented, and went into residence 5th November 1852.The pious founder died in 1853; and in 1854 his widow gave the East window inhis memory, his two eldest sons Henry Duncan and Wadham Huntley at the same timegiving two other windows (St. Philip and St. James). Twenty years later, in 1874, the parish of Stubbings was created (16th October)out of parts of Bisham, and Cookham parishes. The first vicar died in 1880; andtwenty years later his eldest son the Rev. Herbert Henry Skrine was institutedas fourth vicar, and held the living until his resignation 5th February 1919.The presentation is still held by a member of the family, though the Stubbingsproperty has since been sold. The children of Henry Skrine and Caroline Anne his wife were:

a. Henry Hume, born 12 December 1812 at Ashley House, near Bath, and died 6 April 1813; buried at Bathford. b. Alfred John Hume, born 25 February 1814 at 8, Catherine Place, Bath; died 6 March 1819 at Warleigh Manor, and buried at Bathford, M.I. c. Henry Duncan, born 22 May 1815. d. Susanne Caroline, born 8 July 1816. e. Emily Anne, born I October 1817. f. Wadham Huntley, born 22 October 1818. g. Clarmont, born 28 January 1820. h. Frances Catherine, born 31 May 1825. i. Mary Anne Agnes, born 1 April 1830.

To Henry Duncan Skrine, eldest surviving son and heir, we shall return aftergiving an account of the marriages and issue of the younger children.