General Sir George Higginson’s history of the origins of his Marlow family home

In poor condition, restored as best as possible, and containing a couple of unexplained gaps, plus some doubtful grammar, this is General Sir George Higginson’s history of the origins of his family home, Gyldernscroft, on the Henley Road, handwritten 100 years ago in 1919 when he was 93 years old.

“The traveller leaving Marlow by the Henley Road, will pass two interesting buildings halfway down West Street, one the old Military Academy, transferred about 100 years ago to Sandhurst and another, less pretentious, and nearly opposite, one in which the poet Shelley retired for upwards of five years during which he composed.

A few yards further on, the grey thatched roofs and timber frames, bearing evidence in their construction that the road must have been at a very early date, terminates the western boundary of the town.

And yet but at a very short distance a confused mass of roofs, gables and chimneys separated by the highway by an ancient flint and brick wall capped with ivy attract the notice of the traveller and it is to this building clings so much historical interest that I venture to place on record a few details of its ancient origin noted in a manuscript volume the work of the Rev.

Thomas Langley, from whom my grandfather inherited the property. The Rev. Thomas Langley was the last descendant of an ancient family, originally settled in Warwickshire but who also appear to have migrated to Marlow about the middle of the sixteenth Century. After holding, as Lord Paget by Court Roll, several farms, he bought the homestead twice since known as Gyldernscroft on September 21st 1592, from Michael Turner Esq., transferring it as a gift to his second son Thomas”.

The General’s account is interesting, although he does not mention that the original name of his family home before added extensions was Townsend Cottage.

The “twice since known” seems to relate to the fact that Townsend Cottage was renamed The Croft by his father and then later, avoiding confusion with another local house, Gyldernscroft. I would take issue with Sir George in that the Shelleys (as mentioned in this column last week) were based in Marlow only just over a year, and not five years.

The ‘Military Academy’ is of course Remnantz. The signature reads “George Wentworth A. Higginson.” A partly obscured memorial to both Thomas Langley Senior and Junior can be seen in All Saints Church.

Possibly after “composed”, a rather abrupt ending, Sir George intended to insert names of a work written by Shelley when in Marlow, but perhaps he could not remember it!

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