Fardell

The documents scheduled here were deposited with the County Record Office by Mr. J. V. Bullen of Fardells, the Ryde solicitors, on his retirement in 1969. The bulk of the material records the activities of John Wilson Fardell (d.1896), his successors and their clients. Some records, however, pre-date Fardell who did not make his apperance till about 1859 when he was employed as a clerk in the Ryde office for John Henry Hearn. Fardell subsequently married Hearn's daughter, Frances, was taken into partership about 1871, D/6, and took sole charge four years later, D/7. Thereafter the business was known as Fardells.

The firm was in fact established about 1825 by William Hearn, the father of John Henry, who was until that time senior clerk for Clarke & Sewells, solicitors in Newport. While J. H. Hearn and his father operated in both Newport and Ryde, Fardell concentrated almost exclusively on Ryde and its neighbourhood. Whatever estate business that was going in the West Wight was snapped up by the old established Newport firm of Sewells (formerly Clarke, later Jerome), a fact to which eloquent testimony is born by the enormous size of their deposit. Fardell, more modestly, helped himself to the stewardship of the Carter and Oglander estates. This activity is represented in the deposit by numbers of draft leases for each estate, FAR/DD/59-68 and DD/70-78 respectively, and two very handy estate books, FAR/DD/69 and DD/83/2, and the stewardship cash books, Class K. The Carter estate book and schedule, FAR/DD/69, is particularly valuable as it contains detailed material on the early development of Sandown and Shanklin. Loose Oglander estate accounts 1768 - 1825 will be found at FAR/DD/83/1.

Apart from the records of these two major clients, the deposit also contains a long series of general ledgers, Class D, other financial books, Classs E-J and a rather miscellaneous array of account books, Clases L-S, some of which, for instance the account books of a Ryde plumber, are quite unconnected with a solicitor's own business. The bulk of what remains is made up of draft leases, particularly development leases. Those relating to Ryde, Sandown and Shanklin are bundled alphabetically under the names of the lessors, FAR/DD/1-47. After these come a second series of bundles for the smaller scale lessors, arranged alphabetically by parish, FAR/DD/48-55, and three bundles of draft leases, FAR/DD/56-58, in which the solicitors J. H. Hearn and J. W. Fardell were themselves the lessors.

Finally, in a class of its own, B, there are the papers of Dr. Joseph Grove, who was related through his mother with the well known Island family of Roach. The Roaches, notably John Roach of Arreton 1760 - 1844, are well represented in this rather miscellaneous collection, but there is nothing to suggest that the Sir William Roach of FAR/B/34 was connected with the Isle of Wight at all.

The first accession was deposited by J G Fardell of Ryde on the 10th September 1964 (Ac 64/21). Between that date and 15 July 1981 there were numerous additional deposits. The core part of the collection consists of items deposited by Mr J V Bullen in 1969.