Here is the informaton I have on Causeway Meadows. I hope it makes some sense:
This is what I know of Causeway Meadows Farm, the ancestral home of my Nash Family. Some of the information was handed down to me from my Aunt Betsie. She obtained the information from a cousin, Humphrey Nash, who has done a lot of the Nash family history. Then I happened to meet online a woman who was part of a historical group putting together a history of Dodderhill which is where Causeway Meadows is located and she did some digging around for me also.
Of interest to me was clarification of the 3000 year leasehold that the Nash family had for Causeway Meadows. Here is what I found out- ‘At the Record Office she (note: ‘she’ is Cheryl, the historian for Dodderhill) found it was an indenture of lease dated 10th December 1563 between Thomas Carewe and William Hill and there was a yearly rent payable of one penny on the feast of St. Michael (if demanded). Thomas Carewe and Richard Sparry (the local land agent) ‘demised granted and farm let to William Hill the messuage or tenement outbuildings farm lands and hereditaments referred to or known as Corsey Meadow.’
Cheryl: what this really means is: Thomas Carewe was the Lord of the Manor and in the 1560’s he ‘sold off’ all his lands and also the Lordship of the Manor of Wychbold. Because of the way land was then ‘held’ Thomas Carewe would have held it of a larger magnate than himself, either a much larger land holder, Duke or Earl, etc. who would in turn have held the land from the King/Queen. In order to pass on ‘ownership’ of the land it was done via a very long lease i.e. 1500 years or even 3000 years and then each subsequent ‘owner’ held the land for the residue of years left on that lease. However, the Property Acts of 1881 and 1882 did away with the necessity for these long leases and as the ‘one penny’ yearly rent had never been demanded, the land could be held ‘freehold’or in legal terms in ‘fee simple’. Samuel Nash would have held Causeway Meadows under the term of the original 1563 lease, but in effect it was his to do with what he wished.
Now, the William Hill mentioned in the above information I believe was the father of Elinor Hill who married my 7g grandfather, John Nash, in Hanbury in 1674. So that is how it came into the Nash family I believe. Not proven though.
From Cheryl: Apparently during the 1770’s the house was owned by the Wilson family. Cheryl says that Causeway Meadows was like a hamlet, made up of various properties which the farm and the terraced cottages formed only a part, the rest of the area being made up of several pairs of cottages as well cottages. The only buildings left now are the farmhouse, in a reduced size, an old barn which has been converted into a dwelling, a pub called “The Bowling Green’ and about 8 semi-detached houses built in the 1950’s. The Causeway Meadows farm house is set quite a long way back from the road. In front of it and to one side of it were some cottages. Apparently there were 20 or so cottages built for the salt-workers at Stoke Prior. They were in two terraces of 10 or 12 facing each other onto a courtyard which had at its centre a well where the washing and ablutions were done for all residents. From what I (Cheryl) can gather these cottages could only be described as slums. Because the houses were a severe health hazzard they were demolished in the early 1950’s and the residents moved to the newly built houses in the main body of the village of Wychbold.
So when Samuel Nash lost a bunch of money from a failed salt brine business, he and his wife, Ann Preston Nash, moved out of Causeway Meadows to Haselor House where Samuel died in 1850. He sold Causeway Meadows to his brother Thomas who died in 1876. I don’t know if another Nash ancestor got the house or not as I don’t have a wife for Thomas.
I am pretty sure I have some more pictures of Causeway Meadows but can’t put my finger on them just yet….. Hope this is of some interest to whomever happens upon this forum! Any questions, contact me and I will try to answer them. Judy
