Hope End

File:Hope End House & footpath above Wellington Heath, Herefordshire.jpg

Hope End is an area and former estate of Herefordshire, England near the Malvern Hills, noted for its literary associations. As described by a 19th-century railway guide, Hope End Park and a country house lay near the West Midland Railway, between the stations at Colwall and Ledbury.{{cite book|title=Official Guide to the Midland Railway|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NacbAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA307|access-date=6 September 2018|year=1887|publisher=Cassell & Co.|page=307}} Hope End House may refer to any one of three houses on the estate, all reduced and much altered from their original states. Hope End ward is a local government area that is more extensive than the old estate.

In 1831 an earlier guide, to Ledbury, noted Hope End among "gentlemen's seats and residences", by the Colwall road. It belonged then to E. M. Barrett.{{cite book|last=Gibbs|first=J W.|title=Hints of Ledbury, a brief description, by a native inhabitant [J.W. Gibbs?].|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZscHAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA27|access-date=6 September 2018|year=1831|page=27}} This was Edward Moulton-Barrett, father of Elizabeth Barrett Browning who was brought up there; financial problems caused him to sell it the following year.{{cite web|url=https://www.browningscorrespondence.com/biographical-sketches/?id=970|title=Edward Moulton-Barrett (father), Biographical Sketches, Brownings' Correspondence|access-date=5 September 2018}}{{cite book|last=Forster|first=Margaret|authorlink=Margaret Forster|title=Elizabeth Barrett Browning, A Biography|year=1998|publisher=Vintage|isbn=0099768615|page=66}} The same guide gives fulsome praise to the Park: "Nothing can surpass the romantic beauty of Hope-end park. The most lovely graces of nature are here combined."{{cite book|last=Gibbs|first=J W.|title=Hints of Ledbury, a brief description, by a native inhabitant [J.W. Gibbs?].|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZscHAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA69|access-date=6 September 2018|year=1831|pages=69–70}} According to Elizabeth, the setting for her poem The Lost Bower was the wood above Hope End House's garden.{{cite book|last=Browning|first=Elizabeth Barrett|title=Elizabeth Barrett Browning: 21st-Century Oxford Authors|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kZGtAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA489|access-date=6 September 2018|date=2014|publisher=OUP Oxford|isbn=9780199602889|page=489}}

Land at Hope End, around {{convert|100|ha|acre}}, is on the Register of Historic Parks and Gardens of English Heritage.{{cite web|url=https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1000276|title=Hope End, Coddington - 1000276, Historic England|access-date=6 September 2018}}

Owners

File:Hope End Bluck.jpg

George Pritchard of Hope End, in the 18th century, had sole heiress Susannah Pritchard Lambert, his granddaughter and the daughter of Henry Lambert, who married Sir Henry Tempest, 4th Baronet (1753–1819)in 1791.{{cite book|last=Howard|first=Joseph Jackson|title=Visitation of England and Wales|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jNzwTVeVxekC&pg=PA20|access-date=6 September 2018|volume=7|year=1897|publisher=Heritage Books|isbn=9780788406232|page=20}}
Sir Henry Tempest, 4th Baronet, who acquired the Hope End estate by his marriage.{{cite book|last=Burke|first=John|title=A genealogical and heraldic history of the commoners of Great Britain and Ireland|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-P4UAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA291|access-date=6 September 2018|year=1833|page=291}} The Beauties of England and Wales wrote (1805) "On the well-wooded eminence called the Dog-hill, north of Ledbury, is Hope End, a small but very pleasant seat, belonging to Sir Harry Vane Tempest, Bart."{{cite book|last1=Brayley|first1=Edward Wedlake|last2=Britton|first2=John|title=The Beauties of England and Wales, Or, Delineations, Topographical, Historical, and Descriptive, of Each County: Hampshire; Isle of Wight; Herefordshire|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=RIpCAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA596|access-date=6 September 2018|year=1805|publisher=T. Maiden|page=596}}
Edward Moulton-Barrett, who bought the house and land in 1809, with {{convert|475|acre|ha}} of land.{{cite book|last=Forster|first=Margaret|authorlink=Margaret Forster|title=Elizabeth Barrett Browning, A Biography|year=1998|publisher=Vintage|isbn=0099768615|page=10}} The existing house was modified, becoming stables. A new house was completed, to a design and with a garden by John Claudius Loudon.{{cite web|url=http://www.parksandgardens.org/places-and-people/site/1789?preview=1|title=parksandgardens.org, Hope End|access-date=6 September 2018}} In the "Moorish style", with minarets, it was completed by 1812.{{cite web|url=https://htt.herefordshire.gov.uk/her-search/monuments-search/search/Monument?ID=4825|title=Herefordshire Through Time, Gardens, Hope End, Colwall|date=2 March 2015 |access-date=6 September 2018}}
Thomas Heywood purchased the house in 1832. He died in 1866.{{cite ODNB|id=13191|first=Alan G.|last=Crosby|title=Heywood, Thomas}}
(James) Charles Archibald Hewitt (1837–1910), of the 24th Foot.{{cite book|last=Fox-Davies|first=Arthur Charles|title=Armorial Families|edition=7th|year=1929–30|publisher=Hurst & Blackett|location=London|page=932|volume=1}}{{cite book|title=Walford's County Families of the United Kingdom|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zZYYO5ird4AC&pg=PA522|year=1908|page=522}}

The house was burnt in 1910, but the stables remained.{{cite book|last=Pevsner|first=Nikolaus|title=Herefordshire|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=B5ANBpiLHl0C&pg=PA105|access-date=6 September 2018|year=1963|publisher=Penguin Books|isbn=9780140710250|page=105}}

File:Hope End Mansion 1873.jpg

File:The walled garden at Hope End - geograph.org.uk - 636647.jpg

Hope End

Owners

Notes

Further reading