IN MEMORIAM

Few men in Essex have been so respected, so beloved, or so revered as the venerable squire of Hallingbury, John Archer-Houblon, whose lamented death took place on October 6th last.

In Dr. Smiles' Huguenots we read: "Among other notable Flemish immigrants may be numbered the Houblons, who gave the Bank of England its first governor, and from one of whose daughters the late Lord Palmerston was lineally descended." It was Peter Houblon, a flourishing merchant of Lisle, who settled as a refugee in England about the year 1568. His son John became an eminent merchant in London, and his grandson James is known as the father of the Royal Exchange. On November 11th, 1620, James married Mary Ducane, of another Huguenot family, who settled and became well known in Essex; by her he had ten sons and two daughters. Two of these sons, Sir James and Sir John, and their mother's brother, were all Aldermen of London; Sir James was M.P. for the City in 1698, and Sir John was first governor of the Bank of England, Lord Mayor in 1695, and one of the Commissioners of the Admiralty. Another brother, Abraham, was also a director and governor of the Bank. Jacob, the fourth son, was rector of Moreton, in this county, and the late John Archer-Houblon was his great-great-great grandson.

The Late squire whose father was John Archer-Houblon, M.P. for Essex, and whose mother was Mary Ann, only daughter of Thomas Berney Bramston, of Skreens (M.P. for Essex in six successive parliaments), was the eldest surviving son of eleven children. He was born at Hallingbury Place, September 29, 1803. His father dying in June 1831, he succeeded to the large estates in Essex, Herts and Lincolnshire at the comparatively early age of twenty-eight. For a time he took up his residence at Thremhall Priory, which is on the borders of the noble forest of Hatfield, of which he was the owner. (For the history of the forest see Trans. Essex Archæol. Soc., n. s., vol. ii, pp. 259-265.)

Mr. Archer-Houblon was educated at Harrow and Christ Church, Oxford. His first wife, to whom he was married in 1829, and who died in August, 1847, was Ann, daughter of Admiral Sir J. W. Deans-Dundas, G.C.B. In November of the following year he married Georgina Anne, the gifted daughter of General Sir John Oswald, G.C.B., of Dunikier, Fifeshire, who survives him. There is no issue by either wife, and the heir to the estate is his nephew. Lieut.-Col. G. B. Eyre, of Welford Park, Berks, who now re assumes the name of Archer-Houblon, which his father had renounced.

Mr. Archer-Houblon was J.P. and D.L. for the counties of Essex and Herts, and attended both the Harlow and the Bishop's Stortford benches. Of the latter he was chairman for a great number of years, but his advancing age led him to resign this honourable post a few years since. He was the senior Justice of the Peace for the county of Essex, also a member of the Licensing Committee for the Hertford Division, and President of the Bishop's Stortford Grammar School, and did his utmost to promote the welfare of the latter, presiding at the last annual prize-giving. He was formerly captain of the Bishop's Stortford Volunteers, and was late Colonel of the Essex Militia. He was High Sheriff of Essex in 1840-1, and held many other local offices. He took great interest in all out-door sports, and at one time was part owner of the Puckeridge hounds. At the large meeting of the Essex Field Club at Hatfield Forest and Hyde Hall on July 31st, 1889, Mr. and Mrs. Archer-Houblon were present, and were elected members at the next meeting. It was by his kind permission that the twelfth annual fungus foray of the Club was to have been again held in Hatfield Forest on October 10th last, but this proved to be the day of his funeral, and the fixture was, of course, cancelled. He had been a member of the Essex Archaeological Society since 1871.

During the last sixty years "the squire" has taken part in many public and philanthropic movements, especially in those connected with church work. He took a leading part in the founding and maintaining of the Hockerill Diocesan Training College, opened in November, 1852. He was a trustee of the Friendly Society in Bishop's Stortford, and of late years was specially interested in the Diocesan House of Mercy at Great Maplestead. Together with his wife, he was a most liberal supporter of the Bishop's Stortford Nursing Institute. In Fact, in all works of kindness, mercy or philanthropy, of a diocesan or local character, his help was always most anxiously sought and as readily accorded.

Hallingbury Place is an historic house; it is now a stately quadrangular mansion of brick, occupying a commanding eminence in an extensive and beautiful park, well stocked with deer, well wooded, and with fine sheets of water. The old house was completely modernised by Jacob Houblon, whose family became possessed of it early in the eighteenth century. From the beginning of the fourteenth century it was the residence of the Morley family. After leaving Lees Priory we know that Queen Elizabeth, during her "progress" into Essex, Suffolk, and Herts, stayed at "Allingbury Morley" on Monday and Tuesday, the 25th and 26th of August, 1561. She was here amongst her relatives, as George Boleyn (Viscount Rochford) had married Jane, daughter of Lord Morley. It was to William, Lord Morley and Mounteagle, who had married a daughter of Sir Thomas Tresham, that the famous anonymous letter, which led to the discovery of the gunpowder plot on November 4th, 1605, was sent.

In 1873 Mr. Archer-Houblon's parish church was restored at considerable cost, mainly at his expense^*; he also built, and very largely supported his parish schools. It was on Michaelmas Day last, being his eighty-eighth birthday, that he went, according to his custom, to attend the service at church. He had tarried rather late in order to write some words of acknowledgement to a bedridden tenant who had sent him her birthday greeting. His "eighty-eighth birthday," he wrote, and he thought his last. So, indeed,it was to be. He hurried along his stone path between Hallingbury Place and the parish church - the laying down of which it often delighted him to recall, and which had been so often traversed - this overtaxed his strength, so that he was taken ill in church and had to leave it. He would insist, however, on walking home; but on reaching it he had to go at once to bed, from which he never rose again, but passed away very peacefully a week afterwards, in the early morning of October 6th.

Patriarchal in years, and rich in well-doing, we have indeed to deplore the loss of so conspicuous an example of a venerable and fine old English gentleman. His mortal remains were deposited in the family vault in Great Hallingbury Churchyard on October 10th, being carried thither, by his own request, along the footpath by which he had walked so often for so many years to church, in relays on the shoulders of twenty-four labourers employed on his estate. The funeral, which took place in most miserable weather, was attended by many hundreds of persons, rich and poor, from far and near, flocking to the churchyard to pay a last tribute of respect to the memory of the dead squire.

The parish church of St. Giles, Great Hallingbury, was again filled on the Sunday morning, when the funeral sermon was preached by the Rev. John Menet (vicar of All Saints, Hockerill, and Rural Dean): "The shock of corn in its Season." In the afternoon the Rev. H. M. Oswald (rector of Great Hallingbury) also preached a memorial sermon to a large congregation: "The Aged Christian's Departure in Peace." These two sermons have since been published. On the same day many special allusions were made in various churches and chapels; we must especially notice those at Bush End,Takeley. There were subsequently received many votes of condolence passed by the various public bodies with which Mr. Archer-Houblon had so long been associated.

His will has since been sworn at £23,817 5s. 3d.