Lords of the Manor of Holdingham

During Saxon times the area was owned by an Anglo-Saxon Lord called Bardi, a local landowner who is mentioned in the Domesday Book in 1086. The Normans dispossessed him and the original grant of the manor of New Sleaford and Holdingham known as the Manor of Holdingham was given to Bishop Remigius the first Bishop of Lincoln by William the Conquerer in 1072. Remigius had earlier provided Duke William with a ship and knights for the Battle of Hastings in 1066 and he was also a Domesday Commissioner. He had holdings in Bedfordshire, Buckinghamshire and Berkshire and church holdings in five other counties. The charter of William I which made the Norman Remigius the first Bishop of Lincoln can be seen in the Lincoln Cathedral treasury along with the Magna Carta. This Remigius (or Remi) had been almoner of the Benedictine Abbey of Fecamp in Normandy and had supplied Duke William with a ship and Knights for his work of conquest. He was the first Norman to be given an English Bishopric after 1066. 1072 was also the same year that the Bishop transferred his See from Dorchester in Oxfordshire to Lincoln. Circa 1135-1148 Bishop Alexander built Sleaford Castle, which stood in a field north west of the station. For most of the Middle Ages the Bishops of Lincoln held it as part of their episcopal estates including Hugh of Avalon the 7th Bishop of Lincoln who later was formally canonized by the Pope also becoming the first canonized Carthusian.
Bishop Henry Holbeach, a Lincolnshire man and one of the compilers of the Prayer Book sold it to Edward Seymour, Duke of Somerset in 1547. He was the brother of Jane Seymour, Henry VIII's third and favourite wife and when his nephew, Edward VI became King on 28th January, 1547 aged nine (9) years old, he acted as the young King's Regent (Protector Somerset). In June, 1550, he exchanged the Manor of Holdingham for Glastonbury and Hull with the King.

The Manor remained in the hands of the Crown until Queen Mary, grandly styled Queen of England, France, Naples, Jerusalem and Ireland who had married Philip of Spain, son of Emperor Charles V in 1554, who had nominated Philip, King of Naples for his wedding and abdicated two years later making him King of Spain and the Spanish possessions, conveyed it to Admiral Lord Edward Clinton in July, 1556. Clinton in turn sold the Manor to Robert Carre a member of the great landowning family of Carres and a client of his in 1559. A servant of Lord Hussey he died Lord of the Manor in 1590.

The Lordship passed to his son Robert Carre of Aswarby who founded the Carre Grammer School in 1604. Having no children the title passed to his brother Sir Edward Carre, 1st Baronet in 1606. His son Sir Robert Carre, 2nd Baronet succedded to the Lordship in 1618. He founded the Carre Hospital in 1636.

His son, Sir Robert Carre of Aswarby, 3rd Baronet, Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, Member of Parliament and Whig Leader in Lincolnshire during the execution crisis became the Lord of the Manor in 1667. His son, Sir Edward Carre 4th and last Baronet was the next Manorial Lord receiving the title in 1682. Having no children the title passed to his sister Isabella, the Carre heiress in 1684.

Isabella married the famous John Hervey (born 1665) at St. Martin in the Fields on 1st November, 1688 and they divided their time between a house in Bury, her house in Lincolnshire and a house in London which they shared with her mother, a sister of the politician Lord Arlington. John Hervey adored Isabella and they were idyllically happy; they had a daughter and a son, but she died in childbirth giving birth to a second daughter in 1693.

In 1694 he succeeded his father as hereditary High Steward of Bury St. Edmunds as well as the Member of Parliament. He married again on 25th July, 1695 and it was this wife, Elizabeth daughter and co-heir of Sir Thomas Felton, 4th Baronet, another wealthy heiress who became Lady of the Manor. She was appointed in 1718 a Lady of the Bedchamber to the Princess of Wales and remained at court until the Princess's death as Queen Caroline, in 1737. Elizabeth's child bearing was a good deal more successful than Isabella's had been. Indeed one could say that her efforts were almost spectacular. She bore John Hervey six (6) daughters and eleven sons.

John Hervey's friend the Duchess of Marlborough used her influence with those advising Queen Mary II in her last year of her reign to make him a peer and he was created Baron Hervey of Ickworth (peerage of England) 1703. Always a man with an eye to the main chance, he staunchly supported the Hanoverian succession. Consequently, he was able to gain favour with King George I who raised him to the dignity of Earl of Bristol (peerage of Great Britain) 1714 soon after the King's accession to the throne on the 1st August, 1714.

In spite of all of these achievements, fate had a sad turn of events still in store for the Lord of the Manor. He was once more widowed in 1741 when the Countess died of a fit in her sedan chair in St. James's Park. He died in 1751 aged 86 and three (3) of his grandsons succeeded to the Earldom of Bristol and to the Lordship of this Manor.

George William Hervey, 2nd Earl of Bristol who succeeded to this Lordship in 1751, was Ambassador to Spain 1758-61 and Lord Lieutenant of Ireland 1766-67. He subsequently became Lord Privy Seal in succession to Lord Chatham and First Lord of the Bedchamber. He died unmarried in 1775 of palsy from repelled gout.

The Lordship then passed to his brother, Augustus John Hervey, 3rd Earl of Bristol, who held the office of Lord of the Admiralty between 1771 and 1775 and was made Vice-Admiral of the Blue in January, 1778. In 1779, having no children, the Lordship passed to his brother the Rt. Rev. Frederick Augustus Hervey, 4th Earl of Bristol. Born in 1730 he became Bishop of Derry. He was succeeded by his eldest surving son, Frederick William Hervey, 5th Earl of Bristol in 1803. He was Under Secretary of State at the Foreign Office. In 1826 he was raised to the dignity of a Marquess and styled the 1st Marquess of Bristol and died of gout Lord of this Manor in 1859.

The title then passed to his son Frederick William Hervey, 2nd Marquess of Bristol who became the Member of Parliament for Bury St. Edmunds 1826-1859 and Treasurer of the Royal Household 1841-1846. His son, Frederick William John Hervey, 3rd Marquess of Bristol who was born in 1834 became Lord of the Manor in 1864. He was Member of Parliament for West Suffolk 1859-1864 and Lord Lieutenant of Suffolk 1886-1907.

His successor in 1907 was his nephew, Frederick William Fane, Hervey, M.V.O. 4th Marquess of Bristol, who was son of Lord Augustus Henry Charles Hervey, M.P., second son of the 2nd Marquess of Bristol. Born in 1863 he became a Rear Admiral and Member of Parliament for Bury St. Edmunds 1906-7.

His brother Herbert Arthur Robert Hervey, 5th Marquess of Bristol became the next Manorial Lord in 1951. Born in 1870 he became Minister and Consul-General to Colombia 1919-1923 and Minister to Peru and Equador 1923-1929. The title passed to his only son Victor Frederick Cochrane Hervey, 6th Marquess of Bristol in 1960. Born in 1915 he was Chancellor of the Monarchist Leaque for a number of years.

In 1985 his eldest son Frederick William John Augustus Hervey became the 7th Marquess of Bristol and Lord of the Manor.

On 1st February, 1991 Peter Norman Jones of Casterton, Victoria, Australia succeeded to the Lordship of the Manor of Holdingham.