The Hyde    

Entry to the walled garden at The Hyde, 2006                                                                                                            

In the 18th Century, the Hyde Estate was the property of Philadelphia, Lady Cotton who built the "present" house. She was the daughter of Thomas Lynch and therefore was Miss Lynch prior to her marriage to Sir Thomas Cotton, son of Sir Robert Cotton, 1st Bart. and Lady Hester Cotton (nee Salusbury.)
Mrs Thrale (daughter of Hester Maria Salusbury [nee Cotton] and John Salusbury), widow of the local brewer apparently went to live with her. As Miss Hester Salusbury she had lived at Luton Hoo and was reportedly the inspiration for several visits to that house by Dr Samuel Johnson. It may be noted that Dr Johnson lived with the Thrales for 16 years and had his own apartment in two of their grand homes, Streatham Park and Brewery House. 
Subsequent ownership by Dr John Bettesworth, who died on 22nd September 1779, passed eventually to his grandson Robert Hibbert in 1806. Robert, a devoutly religious man gave scholarships "for the spread of Christianity" and founded the "Hibbert Lectures".
In January 1819, he gave 12 cottages in Castle Street, Luton for 24 "poor widows or other persons" together with funds for their maintenance. Later, Mrs Ashton’s Charity of Dunstable, owners of the land behind these properties, wishing to undertake new building and gain frontage on Castle Street, negotiated with the Trustees to demolish the old cottages and in exchange built new almshouses on a new street off Castle Street, to be called Hibbert Street.
Levi Ames of Ayot St Lawrence purchased The Hyde in 1833 and considerably enlarged the house. His son, Lionel took up residence together with his wife in 1835.
(In 1839, Levi Ames purchased Sibley Farm at Chiltern Green, which had been owned by the Sibley family since 1535).
Educated at Eton, Lionel gained the rank of Colonel with the 17th Lancers during a peacetime career that included service in Ireland. On returning to civilian life he became qualified as a magistrate for Bedfordshire and took up his seat at Luton Division Petty Sessions, later becoming Chairman. In all he spent 26 years as a Magistrate.
He was also Chairman of the Trustees of Luton Savings Bank and Director of the Hertford, Welwyn, Luton and Dunstable Railway.
A newspaper tribute commended the good husbandry of his modest estate by the "Model Country Gentleman" who was reportedly well respected and liked throughout Luton and adjoining parishes. Mrs Ames was apparently much involved in establishing this popularity. The ’paper reported a special beneficence as each year Mrs Ames presented a red cloak to each woman in the village of Hyde. The report commented that it was a "Novel and uncommon sight to see them thus attired walking in and around the village on Sundays".
Such was the impact of Lionel Ames that, as a mark of respect, the shops of Luton closed on the day of his funeral in 1873 and a fountain (drinking rather than water feature) monument was erected in front of the Corn Exchange in 1874. The popularity of Ames was not extended to the design of the monument. In November, within a month of its unveiling a correspondent to the Luton Advertiser in a lengthy diatribe remarked that the design "suggests a huge pepper box or a pigeon cote". It was subsequently to become commonly known as "the Pepperpot". (It was pulled down in 1925.)
The Ames "family home" had remained Ayot St Lawrence and as ownership of The Hyde passed successively to Neville Frederick, Oswald and Capt. (subsequently Lieut. Col.) Gerard Vivian Ames (sometimes referred to as Ames-Lyde) it would seem that they did not take up residence. Accounts in the late 19th Century refer to it as the country seat of the Earl of Albemarle and Kellys Directories in 1885 and 1898 record Francis Bowes Lyon and Cecilia, Countess of Iddesleigh respectively as occupiers of The Hyde.
R.H. Campbell rented the house from 1909 to 1916. A keen sportsman, he had a golf course, a cricket pitch and a football pitch laid out.
In 1920, the Estate was sold to Sir John Harrington. Sibley Farm, now called Laburnum Farm was sold to F. Piggott. Sir John was a personal friend of the Prince of Wales (later Duke of Windsor) who visited frequently, particularly for Hunt meets.
Maps and sale particulars at this stage produce some insight into an aspect of large house living, maybe reflecting the growing importance of mains electricity. Sale documents record the presence of a Gas Works, though a 1924 map had shown this as disused.
On Sir John’s death in 1925, the estate was purchased by Charles Thomas Hambros with his wife, Edith. Their eldest son, John Henry inherited after Charles’ death in 1933.
The Hambros banking involvement was brought closer to home during the Second World War when an office of some one hundred staff was evacuated from London to the estate.
In 1952/3, much of the 19th Century extension and external plaster improvement was removed to reveal the original "Luton Grey" brick. At the same time the front door was moved from the south to north edifice.

The Hyde - facing South, photographed 1967, for Betty Draycott’s dissertation on Hyde

Facing north 2006

The first of two marriages of John Henry Hambros produced children, David and Tessa. David Hambros, married to Helen, inherited The Hyde following his father’s death in 1965.

The Mills
There were three mills, two in East Hyde, one in West Hyde.
Both Brache Mill off Park Road in West Hyde and Hyde Mill appear in twelfth century records. (See above reference to Fulk de la Hyde, 1197). Brache Mill was pulled down in the late 19th Century.
In 1461, Abbot John de Wheathampsted bought a manse and seventeen acres at East Hyde and erected a mill at New Mill End, so called to distinguish it from Hyde Mill. It was also pulled down in the late 19th Century when the Luton Hoo Estate was headed by Mdme de Falbe.

Hyde Mill, the last survivor, was once owned by the Sibley family who sold it to Edmund Illott of Hertford. It has now been in the possession of the Cole family for more than 120 years.
The present building was largely constructed in 1835 and straddles the Bedfordshire / Hertfordshire border. The 1835 wooden mill wheel was replaced with an iron one in 1932. Report of the mill’s demise as a corn mill, which appeared in the Bedfordshire Magazine, Summer 1950, was apparently premature according to a letter to the Editor from B. Cole & Son, printed in the Spring 1951 edition. However, by the 1970s milling was confined to preparation of animal feed and has now ceased altogether.

Holy Trinity Church  

                                                                                           (Architect: Benjamin Ferrey of London) first daughter church of the Parish Church of Luton, St Mary, was built by subscription after the Marquis of Bute gave the land. The Marquis also contributed £600 towards the total subscription of £3096 and the Ames family gave £700 the organ and the communion plate. (The single bell bearing the inscription "Thomas Mears Founder London 1840" apparently came from the famous Whitechapel Foundry.)
Mrs Ames laid the foundation stone in 1840 and construction finished in the following year.
It was consecrated, on 24th May 1842, by the Bishop of Ely and Rev E B Webster was installed. The Register of Baptisms and Funerals commenced in that year, but the Marriage Register started in 1859 after East Hyde became a separate parish.

Schools
In the 19th Century there were two schools.
Hyde School was described as being on the Wheathampstead Road. It was supported by the owners of The Hyde and 40/50 children attended. The building survives as a domestic property on the East side of the Lower Harpenden Road nearly opposite Hyde Mill.
The other at New Mill End was supported by voluntary contributions and was "designed for the reception of infants preparatory to going to the Hyde School".

In 1901, Hyde School moved to new premises, on land donated by Julius Wernher, more adjacent to the Church and continued as part of the state education system until, as Hyde Lower School it finally closed at the end of the school year 1984.
From December 1984 the building took on the role of East Hyde Village Hall – venue for social occasions, Polling Station and Parish Council meeting place.

The Leather Bottle
As evidenced by parish records, e.g. 1725 Geo. Prior, servant from the Leather Bottle, buried , there was a long history to the public house, which was finally to become a domestic property towards the end of the 20th Century.
The last Leather Bottle was built in 1814 and in the late 19th Century was part of a chain owned by Luton brewers, J W Green. Family recollection tells that the second owner of that property, Edmund Broach, made wine from locally grown grapes.
The public house’s long trading history ceased in 1994 and the building became a domestic property. In doing so it shared the fate of The Swan, a beer house at New Mill End, which closed many decades before.

The Village Post Office and Store
Along with the Pubs and the water cress beds, which once supplied London markets, the store at Viaduct Cottages, that featured as an active business in Betty Draycott’s 1969 account of Hyde, has long since gone.

River Lea (Lee)
Clearly significant to the area as evidenced by the presence of three mills, it also enabled the creation of the ornamental lakes at Luton Hoo.
However, its water flow through Hyde from normal run off has much diminished from the past. It is supplemented by outflow from the water treatment centre serving Luton, which was opened in September1942, the installation of which involved the cutting of a new channel for the Lea.
Though modest in size, the Lea still required bridging for roads, but traffic in the 16th Century was much lighter so bridges could be of simple trestle construction. The building of Brache Bridge in 1551 was apparently held up because, as a Manorial Court record shows "John Camfeild had taken away 6 planks"
Hyde Bridge on the Luton Hoo Estate was constructed in 1831 at a cost of £475. An iron bridge, its span is twice that of previous bridge of that type in Bedfordshire.
Oat Bridge above New Mill End, which carried the road beside Birch Wood before it was replaced by West Hyde Road is largely unremarked, whilst Ash[well] Bridge on Cooters End Lane is a regular platform for people viewing the River and meadow southwards to Hyde Mill.

Those who look northwards from Ashwell Bridge may make out some signs of the watercress beds that once existed and involved a formalised channel, which carried the waters diverted from the River on a second course under the Bridge.

Someries

and Someries Castle

In his "History of Luton", published 1855, Frederick Davis says that, situated 2½ miles East of Luton, the ancient village and manor of Somarii was held by a family of that name before the Norman Conquest.
However, W. Austin in "History of Luton and its Hamlets", published (after his death) in 1928 says that Davis and other scholars were misled by the term "de somario" that appears in the Domesday Book and other documents of that time. It refers, he says, to a packhorse and an estate’s obligation to provide one to the Crown, much as other tithes and rents might be due.
At the time of the Domesday Book the manor belonged to the Crown. Austin attributes the name to the Somery family who held the land in the 13th Century. Certainly, a little later, there is unusual documentary evidence from the List for a Tournament at Dunstable in 1309, which names Sir Giles Argentian, John de Somery and John de Aygnell of Someries and East Hyde.
In 1460, John, Lord Wenlock owned nearly half of the old Manor of Luton and in Luton Church there was a Chapel appurtenant to the Manor of Someries, which formed part of the north transept. Someries was at that time owned by John Aylesbury of Edeston.
Lord Wenlock acquired the Manor and the rights to the Chapel in 1461 and between 1464 and his death in 1471, arranged the building of a substantial brick mansion. Some eighty years later, Leland, Henry VIII’s antiquary, wrote "A fair place within the parish of Luton called Somerys, the which house was sumptuously begun by Lord Wenlock, but not finished".
It is notable that "Castle" does not appear in Leland’s description, but there is earthwork evidence that a Norman Castle had been on an adjacent site and consisted of keep and minor buildings surrounded by ditch and rampart.

It has been assumed the comment "not finished" related only to the position at the time of Lord Wenlock’s death and that this mansion was completed subsequently, but it may well be that the existing mansion continued as accommodation for the owners and Wenlock’s building never amounted to much more than the Chapel and Lodge, the ruins of which we see today.

Construction using bricks of burnt clay was a "new" building technique of the 15th Century in England, reliant in part on imports from the Continent, although the evidence is that it was more accurately a re-introduction.

Forfeit to the Crown on Wenlock’s death, the Manor passed (along with Farley) via King’s courtiers to Thomas Rotherham, Archbishop of York who handed it down to his son, John who in his turn passed it to his son, Christopher and he in turn to his son, Thomas.
In 1661, Someries together with Stopsley and Luton was purchased by Robert Napier of Luton Hoo and later sold to W. Herne and then to the Earl of Bute.

Print , G. Kearsly 1778, described as "Remains of the Tower at Luton, Bedfordshire" from a picture by the noted Paul Sandby R.A. (1730-1809)        Courtesy of Ash Rare Books

A farmhouse adjacent to the mansion and Castle site was the home of Joseph Conrad, the author, 1907-09.

Copt Hall                                                                                                           Described by Frederick Davis in his 1855 book as – a neat pleasant mansion house, for seventeen years the residence of the late Archbishop of Armagh when vicar of Luton.

The Railways
Nationally and locally, within little more than a century, a complex network was created and then cut back.
Since 1848, a line from Dunstable, owned by the London and North Western Railway Company, had linked to their main line station at Leighton Buzzard. In 1852, the Luton and Dunstable Railway Company (L&DRC) was established to build a line that would extend that link to Luton, but some directors were more ambitious and carried through plans to extend further to link with the Great Northern Railway (GNR) at Welwyn Junction.
Another company was building a branch link from Hertford to Welwyn and in 1858, the L&DRC, now the Luton, Dunstable and Welwyn Junction Railway Company even though it had yet to build beyond Luton, amalgamated with the Hertford and Welwyn Junction Railway Company.
The line between Luton and Welwyn opened on 1st September.
GNR, which absorbed the Hertford, Luton and Dunstable Railway Company in 1861, insisted on extending the branch lines so that their junction with the main line was at Hatfield. (There was no station at Welwyn until 1926).

Photograph of Luton Hoo [foreground] and Chiltern Green Stations courtesy of A. Willmott

There was a station at New Mill End, which was renamed Luton Hoo in 1891 and a siding was created to accommodate handling for Hyde Mill.
The line was closed on 24th April 1965 as part of "The Beeching Plan".
Conflicts often arose between railway companies in the nineteenth century over links and sharing arrangements and so it was that The Midland Railway Company, frustrated by problems with Great Northern Railway (GNR) decided to build their own main line into London from Bedford instead of relying on their link from Bedford to GNR’s line at Hitchin. Thus the Bedford to St Pancras line was built, opening fully on 1st October 1868.

Chiltern Green Station opened in July 1868, when the line terminated in London at Moorgate Street. Its title was later extended to "Chiltern Green for Luton Hoo". It closed to passengers in April 1952, but freight sidings remained open until March 1967. Today a house is all that remains of the Station building.  

                                                                     
(It should be noted that the Hemel Hempstead to Harpenden (Nickey Line) when it opened in 1877 ran to Luton. It curved round Harpenden and turned northwards to join the main line so that Chiltern Green was the stop for transfer to London trains. With a track section curving southwards to a new Harpenden Junction, trains ran into Harpenden Station from 1888.)

Roundwood Halt -  signal and part of the platform remain of the route, which is now a public footpath.