HURST FARM, Holt

‘Hurst’ is derived from the Old English word ‘hyrst’, (place at) the wooded hill. Apparently a reference to the once wooded ridge of ground between Rowley and Shrawley Brooks.

The terrier to the estate map of the 1750s shows Thomas Marshall as the tenant farmer at that time. He was probably at the farm when he served as churchwarden in 1740 to 1741. From perhaps the 1780's until 1816 Samuel Ockey/Oakley, son of Edward Okey of Little Witley Farm and probable brother of John Ockey of Upper House Farm, held Hurst Farm. Hurst Farm at that time consisted of about 33 acres of pasture, meadow and rough grazing, 72 acres of arable crops and 5 acres of hops. Ockey served in the parish post of overseer of the poor on three occasions between 1797 and 1814. His son, Thomas Ockey, succeeded Samuel for a brief period in 1817. By the following year Jeffrey Pardoe had taken on the farm. He stayed for at least six years.

Thomas Cadwalader took Hurst Farm in 1827, holding it for less than two years when Samuel Ockey took over for an even briefer tenure. Patrick Thomas held the farm for three years from 1830 at which time Michael Ashmore of Stoke Prior took the farm.

Ashmore farmed similar crops to the Ockeys, but the area of hops had dropped to less than 3 acres by 1839. Although his young family were all born in Stoke Prior Michael Ashmore he had married Ombersley born Maria Tombs in Holt in 1819. Maria’s brother was Thomas Tombs who farmed Hollingshead Farm. Ashmore’s original 132 acres had increased by only one acre before 1847, then to 170 acres with the acquisition of part of Rowley Farm in the spring of that year. He employed one labourer and was assisted by his two sons and a daughter. Ashmore served as churchwarden from 1842 to 1844 and overseer of the poor in 1840 and 1851. In 1849 he acted in this capacity on behalf of his brother-in-law Thomas Tombs. In his Will written on 31 January 1853 Ashmore left cash legacies to his children and the rest of his estate, which was valued at less than £800, to his wife. He died two days later. Control of the farm passed to his widow until her death in 1858. Their son William and his wife Sarah Jane then took over. William was a churchwarden from 1855 to 1859. In 1871 William was farming 200 acres with the assistance of three labourers and his two young sons.

William apparently did not want, or was unable, to farm such a large holding, for by 1881 he had moved to the Ombersley side of the river at Holt Fleetwhere he farmed 36 acres with his wife and son, Morris William. At that time William Roberts, a labourer, and his family occupied the house at Hurst Farm. Three years later Kentman, James Taylor was at the farm.

James Taylor married Mary Rose. Mary’s nephew, George Albert Rose was a farm bailiff, living-in with his aunt and uncle and three of his female cousins in 1891. Railway clerk Arthur Neems was also living-in. In 1896 Little Witley church was venue for the marriage of Taylor’s daughter Charlotte Blanche to her cousin, George Albert Rose, who was by then a publican living back in his home area of Bradford-on-Avon in Wiltshire.

Ambrose Hearn appears to have held Hurst Farm in 1913, but by 1915 David A Neems (possibly on in the same as the 1891 lodger) had taken it on. Arthur apparently married another of Taylor’s daughters, Rose, who died at Hurst Farm in January 1920. David Neems was still in occupation at the time of the 1920 sale.

The farm was reduced to 136 acres to make a convenient sale lot. The proportion of grass to arable crops had reversed in the proceeding one hundred years, for in 1920 there were 878 acres of grass and only ten acres of arable. 32 acres of woodland were included in the 1920 sale lot. The Millichips purchased the farm. Following further sales Hurst Farm is now part of a very large farming enterprise based in Ombersley.