High Street Marlow. Previously known as Alfred House. One of its late Victorian owners said that part of the back of it, revealed during renovations, had been dated to the 1500s but obviously the frontage is later. A memoir of a former cadet of the Junior Branch of the Royal Military College states that Alfred House was formerly owned by the mistress of Charles II Louise De Kerouaille Duchess of Portsmouth. However they describe the position of the "mansion" as on the right before you turn into the High Street whereas Alfred House is actually located in the High Street and appears to have always fronted that way. It seems perhaps the grown up cadet was confusing a rumour about Marlow Place, which is on the right before turning into the High Street and was also used by the Royal Military College.
[In 1804-05 the College based in West Street Marlow and High Wycombe had taken on Alfred House for extra space. (Journals of the House of Commons, Volume 61) For more about the sometimes rebellious young "gentleman cadets" see here]
George and Mary Ellison lived at the house by 1816/17. George was a lawyer and solicitor in partnership with John Bloxam of Lincolns Inn. George and Mary's daughter Frances Sarah, by marriage Smedley, gave birth to the author Frank E Smedley in the house the next year.
A love of reading seems to have been genetic. When George wrote his will in 1830 he was particularly keen to share out his books amongst his family.
His wife Mary received her pick of the books and pictures plus her choice of the household furniture, plate, linens, china etc and all of his wines and liquors. £100 came to her after his death and another £500 annually as long as she lived and was his widow. If she married again the annuity was reduced to £100. Any future husband of hers could not touch this annuity.
Their son George received his share of the law business he ran with Bloxam.
Note: Mary Ellison was the god daughter of Martilla Mayhew of Marlow.
Sir John and Lady Mortlock lived in the house in 1833. The property consisted then of a house, lawn, greenhouse, 2 large gardens, yards, stables, a barn, and coach houses.
Lady Mortlock died that year. Her husband had moved away from area by the time of his death in 1845 but he was buried at Little Marlow with her.
In 1843 Miss Hampden, probably a relative of Renn Hampden the MP, was resident. She also subscribed towards the publication of various books, especially on historical subjects.
In 1846 widow Elizabeth Glanville who had moved to Marlow from Cornwall was the resident. Her will was proved that year. Her servant Ellen Stansfield was amongst those asked to verify an alleged list of Elizabeth's possessions which she wanted her daughters to have and which was mentioned in her will as having been written and given to them for safe keeping. The list contents should have been included within the body of the will rather than in a loose, unsigned separate supplement so the probate court needed verification the list as presented to them by the daughters was the indeed the one which Elizabeth had written. Her list contained all the paintings done by "dear Cordelia" her daughter, a rosewood flower stand, and in keeping with the bookish history of the house a book stand and collection of books.
The house was then let unfurnished by its owners, which may or may not have been the Glanvilles. All the household furniture then had to be sold. It included an 8 day clock, three cane settees AND a mahogany sofa (They must have liked lounging!) and a four poster bed with blue damask curtains around it.
William Perkins Esquire died age 84 as a resident of the house in 1867.
Later in the 1800s engineer Edwin Clark [1814 to 1894] made it his home. He bought and "modernised" the building in 1875, shortly before his retirement, but had been a tenant there from at least 1869. Edwin was chiefly a hydraulics engineer and inventor. He designed the Anderton boat lift, a hydraulic lift at the Victoria Docks in London and invented the block system of railway signalling. He was also described as a scientist and had a keen interest in astronomy - he built an observatory behind the house and was a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical and Metrological Societies. One of his telescopes was described in 1892 as amongst the most powerful in the kingdom. It was auctioned off by local auctioneers Rolls and Lawrence some time after Edwins death.
By the time of his residence the house was already called Cromwell House. I am uncertain why the name was changed from Alfred House. Edwin spent two years travelling in South America shortly after he purchased the house, but thereafter it remained his home.
Edwin would often have been away from home too during his earlier working life as a busy engineer. I see reports of him working in Wales, India, Malta and France as well as across England. His largest foreign project was probably Callao harbour in Peru. Closer to home he had designed and/or constructed numerous bridges, Scarborough Viaduct and as engineer to the Crystal Palace Company, he had completed the re-build of the Palace after the fire there. He was also behind the laying of many telegraph lines and cables, including between Dungeness and Holland and for many of the English railways.
He was also a J.P for Bucks, one of the leaders of Marlow Orchestral Society and a founder and life member of the Marlow Institute. In giving the Institute's very first lecture in the Town Hall (they had not yet their own premises), Edwin would say that his own thirst for learning and discovery began after going to a public lecture on the wonder of electricity in the very same Town Hall as a boy. He had then gone home and made his own electricity machine, as you do, to show his friends. While Edwin may seem to us to have been an intelligent and industrious young man, it was said his parents despaired of him. He was thought of as ne'er do well who would not settle down to his (parents) intended career for him as a solicitor. He also tried his hand at teaching and as an artist. What Edwin was desperate to do was travel. He had spent three years at a French school in his early teens and was a gifted linguist. He had little money but scraped together £10, slung a bag over his shoulder and departed for the continent, much to his parents dismay. A protracted tour there allowed Edwin to view the scientific collections of Europe and to make numerous studies in meteorology, astronomy, and natural history. Not exactly the hedonistic pursuits his parents were probably fearing!
His father was the grocer & former lace dealer Josiah Clark whose premises were a little further along the High Street from Cromwell House. Josiah had suffered some financial hardship and this had been the reason Edwin never completed his studies at Cambridge University. Lace dealing was not an industry that at the time was flourishing locally.
On the 1841 census young Edwin appears as a 25 year old "mathematician" living at home. He had returned from Europe two years before and taken work as a mathematic master at two London schools. He would soon decide to turn his hand at surveying for the railways, another change of career that must have made his poor parents sigh. However he established himself as a reliable engineer very quickly. A few years later patent iron girders invented by him were used on Marlow Bridge to replace worn out wooden ones. Edwin's working life was not always smooth. A firm he was a partner in, Clark, Punchard & Co, civil engineers, went into liquidation in 1879 with substantial debts. Edwin however soon recovered financially.
In 1893 Edwin's 66 year old wife Eliza died. Cromwell House was used as the venue for the resulting coroner's inquest. Though Eliza had suffered from occasional pains and shortness of breath for a while her death was unexpected and sudden - just over five minutes after she collapsed the doctor arrived and found she had already expired. Thus an inquest had to take place. The couple's cook Agnes Wheeler, the doctor William Shone and Edwin himself gave evidence. Edwin had previously rubbed some oil into Eliza's side to help her pains he said. The coroner does not seem to have asked him why Eliza does not appear to have consulted a doctor about her discomfort, nor why he himself did not do so. Money would not be an issue for this couple. Perhaps Eliza didn't like fuss. Shone felt that the symptoms reported by her cook and husband suggested undiagnosed heart disease rather than anything sinister. A death by natural causes, the jury ruled. They donated their attendance fees to the Cottage Hospital at the suggestion of the foreman Walter Lovegrove. He had a shop further up the High Street. Read more about Walter here.
Edwin Clark died of cancer in 1894 after three years of painful bad health and was buried next to his wife in the churchyard. Edwin had been described as a man with a warm and genial nature, and happy disposition. He did not forget the times of poverty he had experienced in his youth and so was kind to the less fortunate in Marlow. He was no doubt much missed. The house was put up for sale but did not reach the reserve price.
Mr Cripps had the house in 1897 and offered to lease it to the council to use as their offices for £20 a year, including lights, fire and attendance. Quite a bargain. The Post Office relocated there from their cramped West Street premises in the same year.
Cromwell House and it's grounds were sold separately in the Autumn of 1900. The council continued to occupy the premises, as did the Post Office with postmaster John Langdon, his wife Mary and their children living in 3 rooms of the building in 1901. Nashe's Architects also occupied some rooms as offices from 1908.
Photographed November 2020.
More information:
Edwin Clark's family was of humble origins. See the family of his troublesome uncle Richard Clark here and his inventor/engineer brother Latimer here
To find more posts about the history of specific buildings see the index here
Every mention of a family or individual here can be found in the A-Z person index in the top drop down menu, with over 6,000 individuals listed and counting...
Researched and written by Charlotte Day, with additional research and writing by Kathryn Day.
Sources:
Will of Elizabeth Glanvillle. PCC. Transcribed by me from a copy obtained from the National Archives.
Will of George Ellison Esquire. As above.
Reading Mercury 17th July 1848. Copy held at the British Library Archives and accessed by me March 2021 via the BNA.
Maidenhead Advertiser 4th October 1893. As above.
South Bucks Standard 22 July 1892, 16 Apr 1897, as above
Slough, Eton and Windsor Observer July 22 1892 & October 27th 1894 - Slough reference library.
The Standard, clipping,
Wikipedia articles on Frank E Smedley and Edwin Clark. Accessed March 2021.
Journals of the House of Commons, Volume 61.
Property records held by my family [parochial assessments, transcribed by me from original records we have].
The Athenaeum, September 1896, Digitised by Google, and accessed April 2020.
Report to the Council, Royal Astronomical Society 1894 & 1895.
©Marlow Ancestors.
