The Accession Register — The Hale Dynasty

The register reproduced below is the Bodleian's formal accession record for the Hale-Marsh papers, as submitted on deposit in March 1924 by the trustees of Miss Ruth Hale-Marsh. The record is in three hands: a principal cataloguing hand, a secondary hand adding condition notes, and a third hand in pencil — Eleanor Voss, 2024. The pencil annotations are reproduced here in full.

— E.V., Oxford, January 2024

Bodleian Libraries · University of Oxford
Department of Special Collections and Western Manuscripts
Broad Street · Oxford · OX1 3BG

Accession No: 1924/0183
Date of receipt: 14 March 1924
Depositor: Hale-Marsh family trustees
Processed by: R.H. Fellowes, Sub-Librarian

MSS. Hale-Marsh Collection

Papers of the Hale Family of Halecroft, Worcestershire, and the Marsh-Hale Family of Harlow, Essex · circa 1072–1924 · Donated in perpetuity

MS. Hale-Marsh I
Boxes 1–2
c. 1072–1400

The Norman and Medieval Papers

Manorial rolls · parish register fragments · inquest records · Latin writs · 2 boxes · approximately 340 items

Includes the earliest surviving document in the family archive: a land grant notation, in Latin, dated approximately 1072, recording the tenure of one Aldric at Halecroft under the new Norman administration. Also includes the Thomas Hale inquisition material (1351), the Worcester Assizes depositions (1351), and Thomas Hale's Remembrance (1382). The Remembrance is the only document in this volume in English.

Condition: Fair

The 1072 land notation is not, as the 1924 cataloguer believed, a grant. It is a confiscation notice. The notation records that Aldric dedit the land — gave it — which in this administrative context means it was taken. The family kept this document for 852 years without apparently recognising what it said about how the family began. Or perhaps they did recognise it and kept it anyway. I find I cannot decide which interpretation I prefer.— E.V., January 2024

Received 1924

MS. Hale-Marsh II
Box 3
c. 1400–1570

The Tudor Papers

Estate accounts · correspondence · household inventories · 1 box · approximately 180 items

Principally account books and household inventories from the period of the Hale family's greatest expansion, including the acquisition of outlying farmland in 1487 and the rebuilding of the hall in 1521. Two items are flagged by the depositors as sensitive: a letter of 1535 that appears to concern an approach made to the family during the dissolution of the monasteries, and a second letter that is a response. The response is in a different hand and is unsigned.

Condition: Good

The dissolution letter was, I think, a near thing for the family. They were approached, they equivocated, and they apparently did nothing either way — which is to say, they held what they had and kept their heads down and survived, which is what this family has always done.— E.V., January 2024

Received 1924

MS. Hale-Marsh III
Boxes 4–5
c. 1620–1680

The Civil War and Interregnum Papers

Military correspondence · estate sequestration records · legal documents · 2 boxes · approximately 290 items

Includes the letter informing Eleanor Hale of her husband Thomas's death at Edgehill (1642); the sequestration order of 1646 and the fine payment receipt of 1648; Eleanor Hale's correspondence with the estate trustees during the Interregnum; and the restoration of tenure documents (1660).

Condition: Fair — moisture damage to box 5

Eleanor Hale's letters to the trustees are extraordinary. She is managing a sequestered estate, negotiating with a Parliamentary committee, raising a son alone, and she writes with a precision and a steadiness that I find remarkable for any period.— E.V., January 2024

Received 1924

MS. Hale-Marsh IV
Box 6
c. 1710–1745

The Georgian Papers

Estate accounts · correspondence · personal letters · 1 box · approximately 140 items

A comparatively thin volume by the standards of the collection, reflecting a period of relative stability. The principal figure is Richard Hale, who managed the estate from his elder brother Charles's accession in 1741 without any formal title to the property.

Condition: Good

Richard Hale's letter of June 1749 — in which he explains, in five patient paragraphs, that the estate cannot support the expenditure Charles has proposed — is, I think, a masterpiece of restrained fury.— E.V., February 2024

Received 1924

MS. Hale-Marsh V
Boxes 7–8
c. 1795–1860

The Regency and Early Victorian Papers

Estate accounts · personal correspondence · diaries · 2 boxes · approximately 420 items

The richest single volume of the collection, principally on account of the papers of Augusta Hale. Includes her correspondence, household accounts, and diary fragments. The diary volumes are flagged as restricted; see restriction notice below.

Condition: Fair — diary vol. II water-stained

Augusta's accounts are kept in double-entry, which she apparently taught herself from a book. The handwriting in the accounts is noticeably different from the handwriting in her letters, as if she understood that the accounts were a different kind of document and required a different kind of self.— E.V., February 2024

Received 1924

MS. Hale-Marsh VI
Box 9
c. 1860–1884

The Late Victorian Papers — The Edmund Hale Material

Correspondence · legal documents · deed-box contents · 1 box + 1 deed-box · approximately 95 items

Contains the papers of Edmund Hale, the last of the Hale line in the main branch. Includes personal correspondence, estate documents, and the deed-box, which was deposited sealed. Two items within the deed-box were catalogued as sealed in 1924 and were not opened until January 2024.

Condition: Deed-box fragile — do not stack

Items 38 and 39 had been sealed for one hundred years. When I cut the wax, the paper unfolded with a small sound that I thought was worth noting. I knew — before I read a word — that I was about to find out something the person who sealed it had decided no one should know.— E.V., January 2024

Received 1924

Supp. A–C
Boxes 10–12
c. 1884–1924

The Hale-Marsh Supplementary Papers — The Transition Period

Legal correspondence · estate transfer documents · Marsh family papers · 3 boxes · approximately 310 items

Material relating to the transfer of the Hale estate to the Hale-Marsh trustees following Edmund Hale's death, and subsequently to the Marsh-Hale family. Includes correspondence between the solicitors and Miss Ruth Hale-Marsh, who directed that the papers be deposited at the Bodleian and restricted for one hundred years.

Condition: Good

Ruth Hale-Marsh knew what was in the deed-box. She must have. She chose one hundred years, which would have put her well beyond any living memory of the people involved. She wanted it found, eventually. She just wanted everyone who had been hurt by it to be safely dead first.— E.V., March 2024

Received 1924

Restriction Notice · Hale-Marsh Family Trust Instruction · November 1923
The following items were restricted from public access for one hundred years from the date of accession: MS. Hale-Marsh VII items 38 and 39; MS. Hale-Marsh V items 201–204. Both restrictions lapsed on 1 January 2024 and the materials are now available to all readers of the archive.