Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 1.djvu/190

 182

NOTES AND QUERIES. t* s. L MA*, s,.

Some information regarding the grants made by Otho FitzWilliam to the Knights Templars may be found in Park's 'Topo- graphy of Hampstead,' p. 192. Included in the grant were "70 acr' bosci cum ptin' in Hamstede," and Park suspects that this was the Shuttup Hill estate, though it seems doubtful if that property was ever comprised within the manor of Lilleston, of which the seventy acres in question were stated to form a part. The Templars also held land in Hendon parish, amounting to 140 acres of arable, valued at fourpence an acre, two of meadow, at one shilling and sixpence, and thirty-five shillings in rents (Inq. a. q. d. Edw. Ill quoted in Evans's 'History of Hendon,' p. 68). This land also seems to have been an appur- tenance of the manor of Lilleston.

The downfall of the Templars occurred in 1308, and at the beginning of that year Nicholas Picot and Nigel Drury, the Sheriffs of London, were ordered to take into custody the Knights and to seize their lands and tenements, goods and chattels, of which in- ventories were to be made. In the accounts of receipts and expenses submitted by these officers we find that Lilleston was unpro- ductive, having been granted rent free for the term of his life to one William de Clyf. A careful inventory of the stock, &c., in Lilleston, "cum membris, viz., Hamstede et Hendon," was made, from which we learn that in Lilleston there were 6 carthorses, 20 oxen, 6 plough cattle, 1 bull, 12 cows, 14 heifers, 115 sheep, 7 yearlings, 236 lambs, and 7 geese. The sheriffs only retained possession for a few months, for on 4 April, 1308, they transferred the manors of Cranford and Lilleston, with their live and dead stock and the land under tillage, to Nicholas de Tickhill, the flocks at Lilleston having in the meantime suffered considerably from the murrain (Gent. Mag., vol. cciv., May, 1858 p. 517).

How long Nicholas de Tickhill held th< estate seems uncertain. He may possibly have been a Crown agent, for the property very shortly afterwards came into the posses sion of the Knights Hospitallers of St. John who, by stat. 17 Edw. II., were granted the lands in England formerly belonging to the Templars. Park (p. 193) quotes a return to r writ directed to the escheator of Middlesex in 1 Edw. III., instructing him to certify intc the Exchequer what lands, &c., the Knight Hospitallers were possessed of within hi bailiwick, which runs in the following terms

" Vobis certifico q d prior hospit' Sc'i Joh'is Jer'lm in Angl' tenet in festo Sc'i Michis a r' r' E. terci post conq'm primo, man'ium de Lilleston, simul cun

acr' terr' & ij acr' p'ti in Hendon & Fynchele, & centum acr' terr', iij acr' p'ti in Hamstede n com' Midd' que maneriu' & terr' ab antique pectabant ad mag'rum et fr'es Milicie Templi, & ue man'ium & terr' Will' Langford modo tenet ad 'minum vite."

The Knights Hospitallers remained peace- ably in possession of the manor of Lille- ton, with its appurtenances in Hampstead jid Hendon, until the suppression of the >rder in 1540. The subsequent history of he manor is given by Lysons, chiefly on the authority of the original deeds in the pos- session of Mr. W. Bray, F.S.A., of Great Elussell Street. It was granted in 1548 to Thomas Heneage and Lord Willoughby, who conveyed it in the same year to Edward, Duke of Somerset. On his attainder it reverted to }he Crown, who conveyed it in the same year Jrown. After the death, in 1753, of his descendant, John Milner, Esq., it passed under his will to William Lloyd, Esq. In 1792 the manor was sold in lots by Capt. Lloyd, the largest lot, including the manor-house, being bought by John Harcourt, Esq., M.P., who built on the site a mansion for his own residence, at the corner of Harcourt Street and the Marylebone Road. This portion of the Harcourt estate was subsequently sold in separate lots, and Harcourt House was taken in 1810 for Queen Charlotte's Lying-in Hospital. One parcel of the manor, amount- ing to 270 acres, had been granted in 4 Henry VIII. by Sir Thomas Docwra, Prior of the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem, to John Blenerhasset and Johan his wife, for a term of fifty years, under the annual rent of eight pounds, payable at their house at Clerken- well. In 24 Henry VIII. the executor of John Blenerhasset granted the remainder of this term to William Portman and his assigns. Queen Mary, by letters patent in the first year of her reign, granted the reversion of the premises in fee to William Morgan and Jerome Hulley, their heirs and assigns, for ever; and by them it was conveyed! to Sir William Portman, Lord Chief Justice, in the hands of whose descendants it still remains.
 * o John Milner, Esq., then lessee under the

An indian - ink sketch in my possession shows that Lisson Green at the end of the last century still retained its rural character. Though not perhaps rich in historical asso- ciations, its connexion with the great knightly orders gives it a claim to recognition when a question of nomenclature is under considera- tion. W. F. PKIDEAUX.

Kingsland, Shrewsbury.