The Timber Industry at Middleton Hall

Historically, what was the primary revenue source generated by the Middleton Estate? This is a frequent question posed to tour guides at Middleton Hall. There is a single answer. For centuries, the principal profit-making resource on the Estate was its timber.

Anciently, the Middleton Estate was part of the great Forest of Arden, the edge of which was the nearby Watling Street. This woodland gradually cleared as the settlement developed. Timber is known to have been sold commercially from at least the 13th century. This is known because court documents from that time state that Philip de Marmion, 5th Baron Marmion of Tamworth, had commercially felled and sold some of the timber at Middleton.

The Middleton Manuscripts note the presence of receipts of timber sales but unfortunately do not provide any specific details. However, other documents within the Manuscripts provide comments on this commercial activity. As mentioned in a previous post, there is a letter in 1525 from Thomas Grey, 2nd Marquess of Dorset, requesting the assistance of Sir Henry Willoughby to transport 500 cartloads of wood. This request was based on not only Sir Henry’s proximity to Sheldon woods but also his vast experience in transporting timber from Middleton.

There is another letter in the Manuscripts that contains information of a request conveyed to Sir Francis I Willoughby. It was dated about 1568, which was very soon after Francis acquired full possession of his Estates. The request was from Edward Clinton, Lord High Admiral, and it said that he desired, that whenever Francis would sell his wood at Middleton, that Francis would consider selling it to him first before any other and he added that it would be very convenient for Francis if he did so due to their houses being so near to each other.

In another letter, which was written in 1571 when Sir Francis I Willoughby was considering undertaking ironmaking, he was advised by his servant John Tryor that he would earn more money by the continued selling of his timber from Middleton than from ironmaking. Moreover, he added that Sir Francis would in effect doubly lose because that same wood would be needed to be consumed as charcoal to produce the iron.

It has been noted that the wood produced at Middleton was of a high quality. Furthermore, this fact has been cited as the explanation for the exceptionally high-quality timber-buildings constructed at Middleton Hall. However, it is also known that the wood was used to keep the tenants’ residences in good condition and provide firewood.

This high quality of the timber at Middleton is particularly evident in the Jettied Building at Middleton Hall. The Jettied Building contains a number of very large, curved, tension and arch braces. An alternative common name for this type of timber was ship’s timber. This is because this type of curved timber was primarily used for making the hulls of ships. These timbers were often then re-used within manor houses as braces.

The presence of these braces led to a false story that the Jettied Building was constructed out of the old timbers of the Bona Esperanza, the ship on which Sir Hugh Willoughby had attempted to find a north-east passage to China. However, just as Sir Hugh had perished on that journey, so did the Bona Esperanza because it was lost in a storm in the North Sea when it was being recovered. Beyond the known evidence of the history of the ship, this story has also been proven categorically false because the timbers have been dated to c.1530-1540, more than a decade before Sir Hugh’s journey. Furthermore, and crucially, all of the timbers were unquestionably brand new when used in the Jettied Building, which reinforces the claim of the wide availability of this kind of high-quality timber at Middleton Hall.

Part of an 18th century painting of Middleton Hall with timber transportation in foreground. Photograph taken 2021 by Glen Segal. Courtesy of Lord Middleton.

Timber production continued to be a commercial activity of the Estate until the Middleton Estate was sold at auction in 1924. The auction catalogue revealed that, at that time, not only did Lord Middleton still have full possession of the various woods on the Middleton Estate but he also had a tree nursery where trees would have been grown from seeds, cuttings or grafting and saplings would have been nurtured. 

Further Reading: W. H. Stevenson, Report on the Manuscripts of Lord Middleton, Historical Manuscripts Commission, 1911. pp.494-495, 514, 530.

Author - Debbie Jordan, Middleton Hall Volunteer.

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