Author: Geoff Hartnell, Master of Apprentices

Orders of the day, Volume 32, Issue 4, 2000

In September 2000 the Lord Lindsey’s Company of His Majesty’s Lifeguard will be hosting a Mini Muster in the London Borough of Havering, which once boasted not one, but two royal residences and enjoyed tax-free status.

Since Saxon times there had been a royal hunting lodge or retreat at the village of Havering which nestled high on a ridge overlooking the lower Thames valley and was surrounded by the great Forest of Essex. The residence and area was much beloved of the late Saxon King Edward the Confessor; many believe that he died at the Palace of Havering and his body taken from there to Westminster Abbey for burial. The modern village is now called Havering-atte-Bower and the forest has dwindled somewhat.

There are several theories as to how Havering got its name. One is that Edward the Confessor was beset by brigands and having no cash on him, bought his freedom by handing over a ring: “Have-ring”. Another is that the same king, whilst attending the consecration of a new church dedicated to St John the Evangelist (John the Baptist), was approached by a man dressed in the garb of a pilgrim and asked for alms. Since (again) he had no cash, he handed him a ring with the words “Have ring”. The pilgrim later turned out to be St John himself! A third possibility stems from an analysis of the name: in Saxon, the word ‘haever’ means goat and the word ‘inga’ means pasture. ‘Haeveringa’ thus becomes ‘goat pasture’. We thus have three options as to how the name originated, one clinical and agricultural, the second the result of a Dark Ages protection racket, or the third in remembrance of a pre-Norman charitable donation or tax dodge - the choice is yours.

The Palace at Havering was a great favourite of Edward the Confessor, Harold Godwinson, William the Conqueror and many later kings. It was close enough to London to be convenient and far enough away to be free from the demands of government. The hunting was good and the views across the lower Thames, the wildfowl marshes of south Essex to the rolling hills of north Kent were inspiring. Today the view includes Tilbury Docks, the Queen Elizabeth Bridge at Dartford, the Ford Motor Works, Canary Wharf and the Millennium Dome. The price of progress is high.

The development of the Palace was somewhat haphazard, each monarch adding to the increasing jumble. In 1215 Henry II proved the decadence of the Plantagenets by installing, at great expense, a bath! I mean to say, what use is a facility that you only use once a year on the Feast of St. Maggwort the Unwashed?

In 1267 the Palace, village and the park - some 16,000 acres of forest, woodland, pastures and marshes - became the property of Queen Eleanor as part of the Queen’s Dower, and ‘atte-Bower’ was added to the name of the village. From this date onwards the Palace and Park became the property of the queens of England, but was still known as the ‘King’s House and Park at Havering’.

In 1465 Havering became ‘The Royal Liberty of Havering’, receiving a charter from Edward IV. This gave the area and its inhabitants freedom from ‘all taxes, tithes and tolls’ and the right to elect to be tried only at the Manorial Court, where the jury would be made up of other residents of the Liberty of Havering. The charter was endorsed by succeeding monarchs, including Charles II. The freedom from tolls was held ‘in any City, Borough, Town, Fair, Market or other place whatever’; inhabitants of the Manor could get a stamped passport under the Seal of the Manor declaring their immunity. Although the lands of the Manor, together with all its rights, were sold into private hands in 1828, these rights were not repealed until 1892 when an Order in Council dissolved the Liberty of Havering.

The arms of the modern London Borough of Havering, formed in 1965 (fig I), show the ring of Edward the Confessor and the motto ‘Liberty’, a reminder of better days. They also include the gatehouse of the Palace and the bull’s head of Hornchurch.

During the reign of Henry VIII the ownership of the Manor of Havering passed from queen to queen and certain familiar names start to appear. During the ownership of Jane Seymour the Keeper of the Park was one Richard Cromwell, a nephew of Thomas Cromwell, who was Steward of the Manor from December 1537 and ancestor of Oliver Cromwell. The infant Prince Edward spent his early life at Havering and the Princesses Mary and Elizabeth resided at Pyrgo, a neighbouring house owned by Sir Brian Tuke, Treasurer of the King’s Chamber. There are several portraits of Sir Brian in existence, all by Holbein. These portraits of a middle-ranking nobleman were a very expensive luxury, but not so incredible when one considers that Sir Brian’s duties included paying the salary of the Court Painter.

In 1544 or ‘45, Henry purchased Pyrgo as a second residence and as an alternative to the ageing Havering, but by the beginning of Elizabeth’s reign it passed back into private hands, being given by her to Lord John Grey, uncle of the ill-fated Lady Jane Grey. Lord John’s great grandson was created Earl of Stamford, who took a prominent though not too brilliant part on the Parliamentary side in the Civil War. His son, Lord Grey of Groby, was one of Charles I’s judges, signing the death warrant between Bradshaw and Cromwell.

For many years it was believed that during the Armada crisis Elizabeth stayed at Havering prior to joining her army which was mustering at Tilbury. It is known that her army commander, the Earl of Leicester, stationed 2,000 horse at Romford to act as escort and lifeguard. Modern researchers now believe that Elizabeth actually reached Tilbury by river, but the idea of her riding out the storm in the ancient palace of the Saxon kings does appeal to the romantics among us.

By the outbreak of the English Civil War, the Keeper of the King’s House was the Earl of Lindsey, who leased the rights from the Dowager Countess of Oxford. This Lord Lindsey commanded the Royal Army at the outbreak of the Civil War and was mortally wounded at Edgehill. His successor, after capture and compounding (paying his fines) in 1648, continued to live in the old Palace at Havering and carry out his duties. The holding must have been quite profitable, for in 1650 information was laid against him that he had omitted to mention, when compounding, the sum of £2,255 that he had “concealed in the herbage of Havering Park”. Also that he had declared the income from the Park as £150 when it was, in fact, £350. Tax evasion or what?

In 1651 Parliament decided that as the Earl of Lindsey had only a keeperage, not a hereditary title to Havering, the Park would be sold off. It is at this point that it appears that the Dowager Countess of Oxford had sold the lease on the keeperage not only to Lord Lindsey but to a consortium that included Colonel (later Admiral) Richard Deane, another regicide, and Lieutenant General Thomas Hammond. All parties had filed for and were claiming compensation for the sale. The sale of the park saw it divided into farms; pastures were created and trees felled, many of the great trees being used to build the burgeoning navy.

Dr John Hewitt, chaplain to the Earl of Lindsey, is worth a mention at this point. He was married to Lady Mary Bertie, sister of the Earl and, once the Park was sold off, became Vicar of St. Gregory by St. Paul’s. It was in this office that he performed the marriage of Oliver Cromwell’s daughter Mary to Lord Fauconberg, using the Prayer Book service, following a civil ceremony. It is not known if Cromwell approved of the marriage or not, but Dr Hewitt was beheaded in 1658 for his share in a Royalist plot. Perhaps he was an original Sealed Knotter?

The last monarch to spend the night at the Palace of Havering was Charles I, who in early November 1638, having met his mother-in-law, Marie de Medici the Queen of France at Chelmsford, was escorting her to London to visit her daughter. However the somewhat spartan Havering Palace was not to her liking and she stayed instead at the stylish Gidea Hall in Romford.

Following the death of Lord John Grey’s wife Mary, Pyrgo House and Park became the property of Sir Thomas Cheeke, a committed Parliamentarian and member of several Parliaments from 1621, including both the Short and Long Parliaments. During the Commonwealth he sat on the ‘Parliamentary Committee for Scandalous Ministers’, at which the mind boggles. In 1642 Sir Thomas’s second daughter Essex married Edward Montague, Earl of Manchester and General of the Eastern Association of the Army of Parliament.

After the Restoration the land was restored to the Crown and the Earl of Lindsey gained a lease to the eastern portion of the park and the Palace, but the royal family never lived at Havering again. The old Palace buildings were by this time crumbling into ruin; indeed in 1650 surveyors appointed to arrange the sale of the Park described it as a “confused heap of ruinous decayed buildings”. Repairs were futile and the government stopped further grants for repairs and let the Palace slip into ruin.

The only plans of Havering Palace that have come down to us are courtesy of a survey ordered by Lord Burghley in 1578, prior to one of Elizabeth I’s progresses. These plans (fig.2) show a jumbled collection of buildings, including two chapels: the Privy Chapel and the Great Chapel. The latter doubled as the village church, St. John’s, and was the last remnant of the Palace to survive but was unfortunately pulled down and replaced with the present building in 1878.

Sadly the old house at Pyrgo was pulled down in the 18th century and the last building on the site was a 19th century Italian-style manor similar to Osborne House (Isle of Wight), which had all mod-cons, including its own gasworks. It was demolished in 1940.

The title ‘Keeper of the King’s House and Park at Havering’ was a subsidiary title attached to the grander title ‘Lord Warden of the Forests of Essex’. This title over the centuries became a hereditary honour of the de Veres, the Earls of Oxford. However the duties attached to the title were onerous and successive Earls of Oxford ‘leased out’ the title or its subsidiaries to the title-hungry ‘nouveau riche’. Over the centuries many honourable, dishonourable and downright dishonest characters held the title of Keeper of the King’s House; prominent amongst them was William, Viscount Wellesley. This ancestor of the more famous Duke of Wellington is known in the family as ‘Wicked William’ and appears to have directly profited from the encroachments and enclosures against which he was supposed to defend the forests.

As one approaches Havering-atte-Bower, climbing Orange Tree Hill, one observes, to the right, Bower House. This was built in 1729 by John Baynes, who used the Havering Palace ruins as a quarry. A stone in the entrance hall of Bower House bears the inscription: “From the remains of the Royal Palace of Havering Bower, situated on the summit of this hill, this dwelling was founded by John Baynes, Sergeant-at-Law, that he might retire into sure ease, and have pleasant leisure for himself and his friends. AD 1729”. The stone bears the arms of Edward III. Bower House is now owned by the Ford Motor Company and access to the park and house is difficult.

One hundred years after the building of Bower House from the ruins of the Palace, the connection with the Crown ended on September 23rd 1828, when the Royal Manor was sold by public auction. The Liberty of Havering lasted until 1892, when the last symbol of royal patronage was dissolved by Order of Parliament and passed into history.

So there you are - something for loyal subject or rebellious knave, and early in September, why not come to the London Borough of Goat Pasture and take a right Royal Liberty! You will be most welcome.

• A History of Essex, A C Edwards, Phillimore 1978
• Essex - Rich and Strange, Richard Pusey, 1987
• A History of Havering-atte-Bower, Harold Smith, Benham & Co 1925
• The History and Antiquities of Essex, Phillip Morant, 1768