Hounslow Nursery Gardening Dynasties
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Jam Yesterday Jam Tomorrow is a community led project funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund to uncover and restore the history of market gardening in Middlesex through research, oral histories and the building of a model market garden to showcase traditional methods of growing and lost varieties. To find out more visit: www.jamyesterdayjamtomorrow.com. Factsheet: Hounslow Nursery Gardening Dynasties 1 Historical Context From the late 17th century the garden grounds of Hounslow, Isleworth, Brentford, Chiswick and Feltham (now the London Borough of Hounslow) were centres of profitable horticultural employment. The nursery gardens produced trees, shrubs and flowering plants as well as plants for the kitchen garden, while from the orchards and market gardens came fruit and vegetables for the population of London and beyond1. As far back as the Elizabethan era, Heston was noted for the excellence of its farmland and the quality of its wheat and Chiswick for its barley. The focus in Hounslow seems, however, to have been on grazing sheep and cattle. Brentford's weekly market, established by the beginning of the 14th century, was the major trading place for a wide area, specialising in grain. In the 18th century Chiswick became well known for asparagus while Brentford, Isleworth and Twickenham were better known for fruit, particularly raspberries and strawberries. After 1800 many nurseries became market gardens producing food for London’s growing population. Quite often the same families moved from nursery gardening to market gardening, maintaining the high reputation of the area. They were linked through shared expertise, business transactions, and involvement in local affairs. 2 Nursery gardeners The children of Hounslow nursery market gardeners often married those of other gardeners, joining families, businesses, land and property to form great gardening dynasties stretching over many generations. The scale of their operations shows these families to have had considerable power to provide employment for local people and others, probably on a seasonal basis2. They were literate and numerate men and women who knew how to manage their businesses, training their children and taking on apprentices to sustain them. Members of these families can be seen gradually to rise through the social ranks as they gained wealth and influence. Although most of the land they worked was leased from the aristocracy, when freeholds and property were obtained, so was the right to vote. Nurserymen and market gardeners became members of the vestry and church wardens, and began to be described as ‘gentlemen’ in church records as early as the 17th century. The women of the Hounslow dynasties undertook a prominent role, being actively involved in the work and management of nurseries and often owning property in their own right. It was not unusual for them to take over the family businesses after their husbands’ deaths. For instance, Esther Woodman kept her husband Henry’s nursery in Chiswick going for 23 years after his death. Esther’s grandson, another Henry, also continued 1 ‘Roots and routes: market gardening around Hounslow (1), file VF630 of Hounslow Library, 2 Val Bott. 2009. ‘Some nursery gardeners of Strand on the Green’. Brentford and Chiswick local hist journal. No. 18. 20-24. running the business jointly with his mother Eleanor after his father’s and his uncle’s deaths and Eleanor seems to have been an astute and successful business woman. 3 Gardening dynasties • The Parkers — Between 1685-1700 Nicholas ‘Goodman’ Parker (d 1714) supplied a good quantity of trees and other services to The Earl of Fauconberg3. He was a member of the vestry and his son, also Nicholas, is described in his will of 1725 as ‘Gardiner’ and man of land and property in Strand on the Green, Turnham Green, Little Sutton, and Catherine Wheel Yard, New Brentford. He thus had the right to vote. Either he or his father was also a churchwarden, giving, in 1709, £1 towards work on the church’s north aisle. Nicholas junior left land and property to his ‘kinsman’, Nicholas Compton, another gardener and his remaining lease on land in Sutton Field and the stock growing on it, to his ‘servant’ Henry Woodman, who is thought to have been the manager of his nursery. • The Woodmans — When Henry Woodman, ‘husbandman’ and ‘gardiner’ of Chiswick, died in 1701 his wife Esther (d 1724) appears to have kept his nurseries going until her sons Henry junior and John were old enough to take over. In 1728 his son Henry (1698-1758) married Eleanor Compton, the sister of two local gardeners. Eleanor and her son Henry (1732-1774) worked together after the deaths of her husband and her brother William, who left land and property in New Brentford and Strand on the Green to her son on condition that he worked in partnership with his mother. Eleanor is thought to have been a resourceful and reliable woman who was deeply involved in the nursery garden. Henry and Eleanor’s daughters Elizabeth and Eleanor also married local gardeners John Kirk and Thomas Allen, respectively, and they all jointly held property and small market gardens. • The Ronalds — 1726-1880 — Hugh Ronalds senior was from Inverness-shire and one of many Scottish gardeners who came to work in the area at the time. He was first based in New Brentford and then The Butts. He and his wife Mary (d. 1799 aged 77) had seven children, spawning several generations of Ronalds who were nurserymen and seedsmen in the area for more than 150 years. They had nurseries between The Butts and Boston Manor Road, in Isleworth, and another beside St Lawrences which was occupied by a Ronalds until 1880. Many Ronalds were buried at St Lawrence’s Church, although they had been actively involved in the management of Brentford’s Congregational Chapel where their children were baptised. Hugh Ronalds junior went on to become the most famous member of this gardening family. He was given considerable responsibility for the business from the age of 14 and later managed it with his sons John (1792-1850) and Robert (1799-1880). Active in local affairs, he had shares in the Grand Junction Canal Company, was on the committee of the Brentford Volunteers 1803-6, and became a council member of the Royal Horticultural Society (RHS). A 1798 indenture records his taking apprentice a poor boy funded by local charities. The Ronalds supplied upper class clients like the Clitherows of Boston Manor (for over 50 years), the Childs of Osterley Park and the Dukes of Devonshire at Chiswick House. They married into families with substantial business interests in Brentford, including the Montgomreys, who were also of Scots origin. The Ronalds used an engraved logo of an acorn on the printed headings of their invoices. • The Greenings — The heart of Thomas Greening’s (1684-1757) business was a Brentford End nursery close to Syon House. The Greenings’ substantial house stood on the north side of London Road opposite the footpath into Syon Park and was later a boys’ boarding school known as Syon Park House, which survived until the 1960s. Thomas left his lease and equipment to his second wife Lucretia, perhaps so that she could maintain the garden. Three of Thomas’ four sons went on to become royal gardeners. When Thomas Greening the younger (d 1757) wished to marry Sarah, daughter of Henry Marsh, a gentleman gardener of Hammersmith, a 10-year financial agreement was made in 1730 creating a co-partnership which gave him a half share in the business. Thomas the younger and Sarah’s son, Henry Thomas Greening (1730-1809), was the only royal gardener in the next generation, becoming George III’s gardener at Windsor. He married Ann Hooper, the daughter of a prosperous Herefordshire lawyer in 1755. He inherited property in Kensington from Marsh and a substantial fortune and the Newlands estate in Buckinghamshire from a distant relative provided he changed his name to Gott, which he did in 1769. He was knighted in 1774. Thomas Greening the elder moved comfortably in upper class circles and Thomas the younger reported on his conversations with the King. • The Masters — A George Masters of Chiswick is listed in the rate books at the south west end of Strand on the Green in the 1680s, with his father at London Stile from the 1670s. George had taken on his father’s property and the parish rate books show him to have been a vestry member in 1719. His sister 3 Bott, Val. 2009. ‘Some nursery gardeners of Strand on the Green’. Brentford and Chiswick local hist journal. No. 18. 20-24. Bott, Val. 2008. ‘Some Brentford nursery gardeners’. Brentford and Chiswick local hist journal. No. 17, 3-8. 2 Rebecca (b 1681), married Richard Clements (d 1734) from an Isleworth gardening family in 1708. In August 1734 George’s daughter Elizabeth married Philip Clements, while the widowed Rebecca married Rice Lewis, gardener to Lord Burlington at Chiswick. Rebecca described herself as a gardener in the will she made in 1735 which dealt with her own estate. • The Swindens — Nathaniel Swinden, who lived at Brentford End, wrote The beauties of flora display’d, published in 1778. The book reveals his expertise in flower garden design and as a seedsman his ability to supply over 200 varieties of seeds. The Swindens used an engraved strawberry as the logo on the printed headings of their invoices. They were famous gardeners and orchids were grown in their greenhouses and exhibited at the RHS just over 100 years ago. 4 Decline and fall The new railways enabled great cities to draw some fresh produce from further afield, including the continent, but this did not constitute a serious threat to the market gardens of Middlesex and Surrey.