Chapter 8
Hemel Hempstead, according to Norden, owed its name (Heanhamsted) to the high hemp-land on the E. side of the town. Offa, King of the Mercians, gave six houses at _Hemelhamstede_ to the Abbey of St. Albans; but the remainder of the _vill_ remained in the hands of Saxon Kings until it was given to Earl Moreton by William I. The entry in _Domesday Book_ is in this case unusually interesting; the property held by Earl Moreton is thus described: "Earl Moreton held Hamelhamstede in Treung hundred, it was rated for 10 hides ... there are two Frenchmen born, with thirteen Bordars, ... there are eight Servants, and four Mills of seven and thirty Shillings and four Pence Rent by the Year, and three hundred Eels wanting five and twenty, Meadow four Carucates, Common of Pasture for the Cattle, and two Shillings Rent by the Year, Wood to feed one thousand and two hundred Hogs; in the whole value it is worth two and twenty Pounds, when he received it five and twenty Pounds, and Rent in the time of King Edward (the Confessor). Two were Brethren, Men of Earl Lewin, they held this mannor." From Priory Hill, W. from the church, a fine view may be obtained of the town below and the cornfields beyond. _Bury Mill_ is on the river Gade, at the foot of the hill. _Gadesbridge Park_ is on the left as you pass from High Street to Piccott's End; the House is on a beautifully wooded slope, W. from the Gade; it is the residence of Sir Astley Paston Paston Cooper, Bart., J.P., etc. A good deal of straw plait is still made by the women of this neighbourhood.
_Heronsgate_ (3 miles W. from Rickmansworth) is a hamlet on the Bucks border, with a small chapel-of-ease to St. Peter's, Mill End, 1¼ mile E. The building is modern, with one window of stained glass.
HERTFORD, the county town, is of immemorial antiquity. The origin of the name has elicited much learned conjecture, and Hertford is one of several places held to be the _Durocobrivis_ mentioned by Antonine. It is the _Herudsford_ (_i.e._ red ford) of the Venerable Bede. That it was a town of some importance on the river Lea even in the days of the Trinobantes seems indisputable. Norden conjectured that the true name of the town was Hartford, so called because in Saxon times, when the surrounding country was densely wooded, the harts crossed the river by a natural ford at this spot. However this may be, the old borough seal, three or four centuries ago, bore as a device a hart in shallow water. The rivers Rib, Beane, and Maran all unite with the Lea in the immediate neighbourhood. Some reference may be here made to the doings of Alfred the Great in this neighbourhood. By putting together what is recorded by William of Malmesbury, Henry of Huntingdon, Asser and others we learn that in the twenty-third year of Alfred's reign the Danes infested the Thames with their ships, sailed up the Lea in the lighter of their crafts, and built a fort about 20 miles from London, at or near what is now the town of Ware. Presently, in the course of their many foraging excursions, they sailed farther up the river towards Hertford, stripped the people in the town and burnt down many houses. They afterwards established a garrison near the town. Alfred brought his army down to the river side the following year and made a careful survey of the Danish fort and of the character and position of their ships. He is said to have passed from place to place in a boat, drawn by a horse, and to have carefully ascertained the depth of the water at different points. The precise nature of his subsequent operations is not well known, but he is said to have diverted the course of the river, to have erected a dam (Shass) at Blackwall, and by these means to have grounded the Danish fleet. The Danes held a treaty, and eventually withdrew into Cambridgeshire and Gloucestershire; the Londoners came down to the scene of Alfred's ingenuity and destroyed or appropriated the Danish ships.
Of the castle, built by Edward the Elder in 905, there still remain several large fragments of an embattled wall, partly Norman, and a postern gate. Of its history only a few leading facts can be mentioned here. William I. entrusted it to the keeping of Peter de Valoignes; it was besieged by Louis the Dauphin, and capitulated on the Feast of St. Nicholas in 1216; it was granted, together with the town, to John of Gaunt, Earl of Richmond, in whose time Kings John of France and David of Scotland were prisoners within its walls, and after the Earl had been created Duke of Lancaster he held a court in the castle for three weeks. It was the last prison house of Isabella, widow of Edward II. Henry IV. gave the castle to his wife Joan; Henry V. to his wife Katherine of France; and Henry VI. to his wife Margaret of Anjou. Elizabeth and James I. are both said to have visited this castle. Charles I., on 3rd May, in the sixth year of his reign, transferred it to William Earl of Salisbury. It was seized by the Parliament during the Great Rebellion.
The Roman Catholic Church in St. John Street stands on or near the site of the old Priory, founded during the reign of William I. by Ralph Limesy and by him conveyed to the Abbot of St. Albans, who placed here six Benedictine monks under Ralph, who became their first prior. The Priory was dissolved in the twenty-sixth year of Henry VIII.; but the church was rebuilt by Thomas Willis in 1629. It was "demolisht by order of the Bishop of Lincoln" towards the end of the seventeenth century. The church of All Saints, on high ground E. from the town, was destroyed by fire in 1891, when almost everything perished. It was immediately rebuilt as a Perp. structure of Runcorn stone, and consecrated in 1895. In the main, the plan of the old church has been followed, but the aisles are longer than formerly; note the fine clerestoried nave of five bays, and hexagonal N. porch. The old building contained monuments to Sir John Harrison, Kt., Farmer of Customs to Charles I. (d. 1669);[4] to Isabel Newmarch, maid of honour to Isabella, daughter of Charles VI. of France and second wife to Richard II.; and to Johannes Prest, "porter" (janitor) to Katherine, wife of Henry V. The two latter monuments were removed more than 200 years ago. Note the beautiful chestnut trees in the avenue near the church, and the many quaint epitaphs on the tombstones in the extensive graveyard. The Church of St. Andrew is modern; it occupies the site of an older Perp. edifice, originally founded before the Conquest. Close by in the market place is the Shire Hall, a large brick building of "questionable shape" erected towards the close of the eighteenth century. Malting, brewing and general trade in corn and its products form the larger part of the industries of Hertford. Between this town and Ware is the spot where Cromwell put a summary period to the insurrection of the "Levellers" by shooting a ringleader named Arnald.
[Footnote 4: This Sir John Harrison erected the fine brick mansion in Balls Park, S.E. from Hertford, once the property of Charles Townsend, Secretary of State to George II. His widow built four almshouses at Butchery Green, long ago decayed.]
_Hertford Heath._ (See Amwell, Little.)
HERTINGFORDBURY may be visited from Hertford, the station (G.N.R.) being 1½ mile S.W. The village is pleasantly situated on the river Maran, on the S. confines of Panshanger Park. The church, partly rebuilt by Earl Cowper in 1890-3, was founded during the fifteenth century. It contains little of architectural interest, but the monuments are numerous: (1) marble mosaic altar tomb to Sir W. Harrington, with alabaster effigies of himself and wife and inscription in rhyme; (2) slab to Thomas Ellis (d. 1608) and Grace his wife (d. 1612); (3) recumbent effigy in marble to Lady Calvert, wife of Sir George Calvert, Kt., who died in 1622; (4) to Dr. Jonathan Browne, Dean of Hertford (d. 1643); (5) very ancient brass inscription beneath chancel arch to two daughters of Robert de Louthe, and one of similar age to Robert de Louthe and his wife. The Cowper Chapel, N. side of chancel, contains many monuments to that family, particularly a fine alto-relievo by Roubeliac to Spencer Cowper (d. 1727), chief Justice of Chester in 1717.
HEXTON (about 6 miles N.W. from Hitchin Station, G.N.R.) lies on a tongue of the county surrounded W., N. and E. by Bedfordshire. The Church of St. Faith, W. from the village, was rebuilt, with the exception of the embattled tower, in 1824, as a Perp. edifice. The St. Nicholas Chapel, N. side of chancel, takes the place of the chapel bearing the same name in the former church. There is a memorial to Peter Taverner (d. 1601), who was, I suppose, father to that Francis Taverner, Esq., who compiled a record of the antiquities of Hexton and set it in the chapel. Little space can be spared for excerpts in this volume, but the details which Taverner brought together are so interesting that I transcribe a part of them from a copy in my possession:--
"Near unto the Roman military Way called Icknild or Ikenild-Street, which passeth by this Parish upon a very high Hill is to be seen a warlike Fort of great Strength, and ancient Works, which seemeth to have been a Summer standing Camp of the Romans: And near it on the Top of another Hill called Wayting-Hill, a Hillock was raised up, such as the Romans were wont to rear for Souldiers slain, wherein many Bones have been found. The Saxons call'd this Fort Ravensburgh, from a City in Germany, whereof the Duke of Saxony beareth the Title of Lord at this Day. And this Town, which the Britains perhaps call'd Hesk of Reed, which doth abound much in this Place; the Sazons call'd Heckstanes-Tune, that is the Town of Reed and Stones, if not rather Hockstanes-Tune, that is, the Town of Mire and Stones, for old Englishmen, call deep Mire, Hocks: Or may be from Grates set in Rivers or Waters before Floodgates, which are call'd Hecks; neither is it unlikely but that the Danes made some Use of this Fort, for a Parcel of Ground near thereunto is called Dane-Furlong to this Day. Some of these Conjectures may be true, but this is certain, that Offa, a Saxon King, of the Mertians about 795, founded the Monastery of St. Albans, in Memory of St. Alban, and that Sexi an honourable and devout Dane (as it is in the Chartulary of the Abby) about Anno Dom. 1030, gave to the said Monastery the Town of Heckstane-Tune and the Abbot of St. Albans held this Mannor in the time of King William the Conqueror.
"This Vill at that time did lie in the Half-hundred of Hiz, and from that time during the Space of 510 Years, the Abbots of St. Albans were Lords of the Mannors now call'd Hexton. They were also Patrons of this Church (dedicated to St. Faith, which Saint had her Statue erected over a Fountain near this Church Yard, call'd St. Faith's Well) for John de Hertford, the 23d Abbot, did appropriate this Church of Hexstoneston to the said Monastery. The Cellarers of which Monastery kept the Court Leet and the Court Baron, and received the Rents of the Demeasnes and Customary Tenants of this Mannor; and the Sacrists had the disposing of the Profits of the Rectory.
"The said Fort, which the common People call Ravensborough Castle, is cast up in the Form of an Oval, and containeth sixteen Acres, one Rood, and fifteen Poles of Ground, and is naturally strengthened with mighty deep and very steep Combs, which the inhabitants call Lyn.
"The Town of Hexton is seated at the Foot of the Mountains, whence issue many Springs of Water; the Mountains are a continued Rock of Stone."
HIGH CROSS (3 miles N. from Ware) is a village and parish on the Old North Road. It has a modern Dec. church of grey stone, containing several good stained-glass windows, but little of architectural interest. _Youngsbury_, a beautiful but small park, S. from the village, has a fine Georgian residence (C. B. Giles-Puller, Esq.). The little river Rib skirts the park on the S. side. There is a small hamlet of the same name 1¼ mile S.W. from[j] Radlett Station (M.R.).
_High Street_ is a small hamlet on the Cambridge Road, near the river Quin. Braughing Station (G.E.R.) is 1¼ mile S.
_High Wych_ (2 miles N. from Harlow Station, Essex) has an E.E. church, built in 1861; the marble reredos, finely worked, was added in 1871. The trade in malt is large for so small a place.
_Highley Hill_ (1 mile S.W. from Ashwell Station, G.N.R.) is on the Cambridgeshire border.
HINXWORTH, formerly Hamsteworde and Henxworth (4 miles N. from Baldock), is close to the Bedfordshire border. The parish is very ancient. The church of St. Nicholas was erected about 1400 on the site of an earlier structure. It is a mixture of several styles, partly restored in 1881. Note (1) two canopied Perp. niches in S.E. angle of nave, where was formerly the lady-chapel; (2) brass to John Lambard, a master of the Mercers' Company (d. 1487), and Anne his wife; (3) oak roof in chancel, added in 1892; (4) rood-stairs. William I. divided the _vill_ between three Normans, Peter de Valoignes, Hardwin de Scalers, and William Earl of Ewe, who owned much other property in Hertfordshire. The vill was subsequently divided into two manors, one of which belonged to William de Cantilupe, a Steward and Councillor to King John, and the other, during the reign of Henry VII., to John Lambard mentioned above. This manor was called Pulter; and the old house (now _Hinxworth Place_, ½ mile S. from the village) was once inhabited by some Cistercian monks of the Monastery of Pipewell (Northants). Note the clunch walls and mullioned windows, in one of which, designed in stained glass, are the armorial bearings of three former owners. Two hundred years ago the village consisted of thirty-five dwellings, three of which were almshouses.
HITCHIN is an ancient town, full of interest, 32 miles N. from King's Cross, G.N.R. It was formerly called Hitche, very probably from the little river Hiz, which rises at Well Head, about 1½ mile S.W. from the centre of the town. Roman coins and pottery, and even prehistoric implements have been found in great quantities in the neighbourhood, and there are traces of a prehistoric lake bed, to the S.E. _The Priory_, immediately S. (R. H. J. Delmé-Radcliffe, Esq., J.P.), occupies the site of a Carmelite monastery and Conventual church founded in the reign of Edward II.; and the Biggin Almshouses, close to the church, still preserve some of the old fabric of the Gilbertine Nunnery, founded in the reign of Edward III. The Church of St. Mary (formerly St. Andrew), just off the N.E. corner of the market-place, is thought to be the largest parish church in the county, the other claimant for that honour being St. Peters, Great Berkhampstead. The whole structure is embattled. The square W. tower is of unusual size, but low in proportion. Entering by the fine old S. porch we notice the niches for statues, none of which remain, and the vaulted roof, badly battered and marred by--as is supposed--the zealous iconoclasts of Cromwell's army. Opposite, over the N. porch, hangs a painting of the Adoration of the Magi, believed to be by Rubens; it was formerly over the communion table. The church has been restored at intervals since 1858; but the fine Perp. aisle-roofs still remain. The font, of Ketton stone, is ancient, and formerly had statues of the twelve Apostles in niches; these, however, have been mutilated almost beyond recognition; the beautiful oak canopy is new. Note the effigy in stone lying in the recess of the first window of the N. aisle, believed to be that of Bernard de Baliol, founder of the Preceptory of Knights Templars at Temple Dinsley (3 miles S.), and the mosaics of the reredos, representing the Last Supper, Christ and the woman of Samaria, Moses striking the rock, and other subjects from Scripture. The screens of carved oak, between the aisles and chancel aisles, are among the finest in the county. Memorials are numerous; some ancient brasses having been brought to light during restoration. Among the brasses are one (1) to John Beel, Margary his wife, and their eight children (1477); this is near the pulpit; (2) to James Hert, B.D. (d. 1498); (3) to John Pulter, a draper (d. 1421), and his wife Alice, the effigies almost obliterated; (4) to Nicholas Mattok, and his wife Elizabeth (d. 1485); this Nicholas was a fishmonger of London, and a merchant of the staple of Calais; (5) portion of a brass, near the chancel steps, to John Sperehawke, D.D., Canon of Wells (d. 1474).
Adjoining the W. end of the churchyard is Golden Square, once the residence of Eugene Aram, from which we may pass into Bancroft, one of the widest thoroughfares in the county. Close by is Tilehouse Street; the Baptist Chapel, on the left, some way up the street, was restored in 1894: it stands on the site of the building in which Bunyan preached; a chair which he gave is still shown in the vestry. It may here be mentioned that George Whitefield and George Fox are both known to have visited Hitchin during their missionary wanderings. A little farther W. is Mount Pleasant, thought to be the birthplace of George Chapman, the translator of Homer. That he finished his translation in this neighbourhood is matter of knowledge; but what is told of his family connections with Hitchin is little more than conjecture.
Between the town and the station, G.N.R., stands a modern church of red brick, dressed with Bath stone, E. Dec. in style. There are good oak stalls and a sedile in the chancel.
Hitchin was noted during the sixteenth century for its trade in wood and malt. There were at one time tan-yards beside the Hiz, and the buckle-makers of Bucklersbury gave that street its name. The malting-yards occupied much of the ground on both sides of Bancroft. The making of lavender water in the town is referred to in the Introduction.
HOCKERIL is now the E. suburb of Bishop's Stortford, the bridge over the Stort, near the Old Black Lion, connecting it with the town. It has a modern Gothic church. The E. extremity of Hockeril is almost on the border line between Hertfordshire and Essex.
HODDESDON (1½ mile N. from Broxbourne Station, G.E.R.) is an ancient market town, lying on high ground among beautifully diversified surroundings. It is known, at least by name, to all readers of _The Complete Angler_; but the old Thatched House, to which Izaak Walton often resorted, has long been a thing of the past. The Bull Inn still remains where it stood in the time of Prior, whose allusion to it in his _Down Hall_ is invariably quoted in local handbooks:
"Into an old inn did this equipage roll, At a town they call Hod'sdon, the sign of the Bull, Near a nymph with an urn that divides the highway, And into a puddle throws mother of tea".
The stone figure to which Prior refers is no longer to be seen. At the S. end of the High Street, on the right when entering the town from Broxbourne, stands _Rawdon House_, an embattled Jacobean mansion of red brick, built by Sir Marmaduke Rawdon in 1622. It was restored in 1877, and the stucco with which it was formerly coated was removed. A tower, with cupola roof, is at the rear of the house, which is now a convent for Augustinian nuns.
The Church of St. Catherine, close to the site of the old Thatched House, but W. from the opposite side of the High Street, dates from 1732; the tower was added in 1888. It is a large building of red-brick, in mixed styles, with small windows of stained glass in the chancel. It is not interesting.
_Hollesmore End_ (2 miles W. from Redbourn Station, M.R.) is a small hamlet.
HOLWELL is a village and parish transferred from Bedfordshire to Hertfordshire in 1897. It is about 1½ mile N.E. from Pirton (_q.v._); the nearest station is Henlow, M.R., 2 miles N. The Church of St. Peter, very much restored, was originally Perp. There is a xii century holy water basin, and a very curious old brass to Robert Wodehouse, a priest (1515), with figures of two _wodehowses_ (wild forest men) and of a chalice and paten.
_Hook's Cross_ (2 miles E. from Knebworth Station, G.N.R.) is a hamlet on the main road from Hertford to Stevenage. _Frogmore Hall_ stands in a small park ½ mile E.; it is a large modern mansion of red brick and stone facings. The grounds are very picturesque, and are divided by the river Beane.
HORMEAD, GREAT (2½ miles E. from Buntingford), has a restored fifteenth century church, perhaps 1400-20, containing a brass to a benefactor, one William Delawood (1694) and a mural monument to Lieut.-Col. Stables, killed at Waterloo. The village is close to the river Quin, which flows between the church and Hare Street on the Cambridge Road.
_Hormead, Little_ (½ mile S. from the above), has a quaint little Norman and E.E. church on the hill crest overlooking Hare Street. Leaving the Cambridge Road at the S. end of that village, and crossing the river Quin, the rounded arch of the Norman doorway on the N. side of the nave catches the eye as we approach the village. The door itself is partly of wrought iron work, seventeenth century; an engraving of it is in Cussans' _History of Hertfordshire_. There is excellently preserved work in the Norman nave. It has been surmised that "Hormede" was formerly one _vill_, that it was divided soon after 1100, and the two churches built on the hill less than ½ mile apart. Ralph Baugiard and Eustace, Earl of Boulogne, together held the manor of "Hormede" at the time of the Great Survey, and the names Hormead Magna and Hormead Parva are of later origin.
_Horse Shoes_ (½ a mile N. from Smallford Station, G.N.R.) is a hamlet in the parish of Colney Heath.
_Howe Green_, a small hamlet, is 1¼ mile S. from Cole Green Station, G.N.R. Pretty walks may be taken S. to Bedwell Park, or N.W. to the mill on the Lea, Rye Croft, and Mill Green.
HUNSDON (2 miles N.E. from Roydon Station, Essex) is a very ancient village. The E. Perp. church of flint is thought to date from 1400, and the N. porch of oak is probably coeval with the main structure. Note the finely carved Jacobean screen which divides the Cary Chapel in the S. transept from the nave, and, in the chapel, the imposing monument and alabaster effigies to Sir John Cary (d. 1617) and his wife. The monument is built into the wall; behind it is a rather long, but historically important inscription:--"Here resteth in Peace Sir John Cary, Knight, Baron of Hunsdon (being the fourth Son to the Right Honorable Henry Baron of Hunsdon) and the Lady Mary Hunsdon his Wife, Daughter to Leonard Hide of Throcking in the county of Hertford, Esq.; The Said Sir John Cary was sent to Barwick by the late Queen Elizabeth of Famous Memory, in the Year of our Lord, 1593, to be Marshall of the Town of Barwick, and Captain of Norham; afterwards he was made Governor of the said Town and Garrison of Barwick, and Lord Warden of the East Marches of England,... Scotland, and so he remained until he returned into England with the most famous King James, where he entered into the Possession of the Crown of England; and so having two Sons and two Daughters ended this transitory Life, in an assured Hope to rise again in Christ." In the chancel windows are some white roses, and a badge of the House of York; note also the canopies in these windows, and the figures of Apostles in the W. window. On the N. wall of nave is a fine brass to James Gray, showing a man shooting at deer with a crossbow; this Gray was gamekeeper for thirty-five years at _Hunsdon House_. Bishop Ridley preached from the pulpit on several occasions.