Records for Kington Manors

This collection contains records mainly for the manors of English and Welsh Huntington and Kington, with a few additional items for the manors of Hergest and Eardisland.

In 1840 James Cheese sold the manors of English and Welsh Huntington and Kington to James Thomas Woodhouse of Leominster. After a mortgage to R.R.G.Banks in 1849 and subsequent bankruptcy of Woodhouse, the estate was sold. The Woodhouse family succeeded in buying back the diminished manors, which remained with the family until their purchase in 1904 by William Hartland Banks.

This collection contains a number of title deeds to the manors. These are mainly solicitor's copies, and were probably made at the time of the Woodhouse bankruptcy, or the later sale to Banks. There are also a number of deeds to copyhold lands within the manors. The manorial records, as well as Court Books from the seventeenth century, include a quantity of steward's working papers, accounts and correspondence. These give a particularly full documentation for the story of enfranchisement within the manor of English Huntington which took place mainly in the 1860's. There are also a few miscellaneous estate records.