Kingsbury: Manors

MANORS.

The early English kings had parted with their manor of Kingsbury long before the Conquest. (fn. 1) An estate called Tunworth, (fn. 2) in the northern part of Kingsbury parish, was granted by Edwy to his thegn Lyfing in 957. (fn. 3) By 1066 it probably formed part of the manor of Kingsbury (7½ hides), which was then held by Wlward White, a thegn of the Confessor, and passed from him to Ernulf of Hesdin. (fn. 4) Ernulf died in 1097 and his lands passed to the ancestors of the earls of Salisbury, probably through the marriage of his granddaughter Sibyl with Walter of Salisbury. Thereafter the overlordship of Kingsbury descended with Edgware manor. (fn. 5)

By 1086 Ernulf's manor in Kingsbury had been subinfeudated to Albold. (fn. 6) It was not mentioned again until 1317, when, under the name of the manor of KINGSBURY, it belonged to Baldwin Poleyn of Tebworth (Beds.) (fn. 7) into whose hands it seems to have come from John Poleyn (c 1300) (fn. 8) and to him from Gilbert of Tebworth (fl. c. 1202-27). (fn. 9) Between 1329 and 1331 Baldwin Poleyn sold the manor (fn. 10) to Walter Saling who died not later than 1340, when the manor was divided between three daughters, Alice, Maud, and Isabel, (fn. 11) one of whom may have married Thomas Page of Little Stanmore or sold the manor to him. (fn. 12) Thomas's son William married Christine Raven, his guardian's daughter, and from 1358, when he came of age, William held the manor jointly with his wife. (fn. 13) The Pages had two daughters, Elizabeth, who died unmarried, and Margaret, who married William Bury but died before her husband and father. (fn. 14) A trust was formed for the benefit of William and Margaret Bury with remainder, in default of heirs to Margaret, to William Page's heirs general. In 1410 the trustees granted the manor to William Bury and his second wife Joan. (fn. 15)

In 1425 John Penne, a London grocer, William Page's heir, recovered the manor from William Bury. (fn. 16) Penne mortgaged it in 1434 to Richard Clopton, a London draper (fn. 17) who foreclosed the mortgage in 1436. Clopton at once conveyed the property to Richard Barnett alias Somry and Robert Wight, clerks, possibly as trustees or mortgagees. (fn. 18) After various changes, presumably in trusteeship, (fn. 19) Thomas Chichele, archdeacon of Canterbury, and another granted the manor in 1441 to Henry VI, (fn. 20) who granted it in 1442 to All Souls College, Oxford, (fn. 21) still the owners of some property in Kingsbury in 1970. (fn. 22) In 1597 All Souls College owned 418 a. scattered through Kingsbury. (fn. 23) The two ploughs in demesne held by Albold in 1086 (fn. 24) and the demesne land attached to Kingsbury manor, first mentioned in 1325, (fn. 25) were probably located in south-western Kingsbury near the later Hill Farm. Other lands acquired by the owners of the manor became merged in the demesne lands. Of these the Page lands and Hamonds and Collins were the largest.

The Page family began to build up an estate in Kingsbury before acquiring the manor in the mid 14th century. In 1295 William Page, then described as of Little Stanmore, exchanged property with William Pypard, also of Little Stanmore, son of one of the heiresses of William Paris. (fn. 26) In exchange for land in Stanmore, Page received land in Edgware and Kingsbury, which was held by charter from the earl of Lincoln. (fn. 27) The portion in Kingsbury consisted of strips in Tunworth and Colmans Dean and Mays Field, an 11-acre field to the west of Bacon Lane. (fn. 28)

Faytisland was acquired in 1300. Among property held by free tenants of Edgware manor in 1276-7 was one carucate held by Hamon Constantine and two virgates held by John of Westmelne. (fn. 29) These can probably be identified with the lands and tenements in Kingsbury which Michael Constantine and John of Westmelne granted to Roger de Fleg, who conveyed them to Henry de Affeyte (La Feyte) and Alice, daughter of Millicent of Pelyndon and their daughters, Joan and Cecily. (fn. 30) Cecily sold the estate to William Page, then described as of Edgware, in 1300. (fn. 31) In 1316 Page settled on himself and his wife, Margaret Roos (La Rous), property in Stanmore, Edgware, and Kingsbury, of which the Kingsbury portion was described as a messuage, 140 a. of arable, 2 a. of meadow, and 5s. 1d. rent which he had acquired from William Aunsel and Cecily, daughter of Henry La Feyte. (fn. 32) Faytes, a 7-acre meadow lying west of Slough Lane, was presumably part of this estate. (fn. 33)

At the beginning of the 14th century Richard, son of Simon the elder of Kingsbury, who had held 3 quartrons of customary land in 1276-7, (fn. 34) sold 6½ a. of land and meadow in strips in Apsfurlong, Sneteleshale, and Old Haw, all in the region of Hay Lane, to William Page. (fn. 35) In 1306 Page exchanged 3 a. in Sneteleshale for 3¾ a. in Street Furlong, Old Haw, and Arneyshaw with the daughters of Michael atte Hyde, Alice, who was unmarried, Isabel, Mariot, and Helen, and their husbands, Simon Taylor of Hendon, William Shepherd, and Richard, son of Reynold Smith. (fn. 36) These transactions were presumably the origin of the two demesne fields (32 a.) of Stratford Long. (fn. 37)

In 1316 Alice, Helen, and Isabel granted Page 6 a. in the Hay Dean (Thaydene). (fn. 38) Like other land in northern Kingsbury - Hay Lane, Haydon Mead, Haydon Shots, and Hay Hills - it was probably originally part of Hayland, the estate owned by the de la Haye family. Possibly identifiable with the Lincolnshire family which was connected by marriage with William Longespee and which also had property in Bedfordshire, (fn. 39) the de la Hayes held land in Kingsbury during the 13th century. (fn. 40) Agnes, widow of Roger de la Haye (atte Haye) leased her dower-land to William Page in 1305-6 (fn. 41) and Roger's daughter and heir, Christine, and her husband, William Aunsel of Kenton, sold 17 a. of Hayland to Page in 1310. (fn. 42)

William Page died between 1325 and 1329 (fn. 43) and his property passed to his son, Thomas, of Edgware, (fn. 44) and, between 1346 and 1350, to his grandson, William. (fn. 45) Other land which became merged in the demesne lands of Kingsbury manor included the rest of Haydon Mead, formerly part of a 180-acre estate in north Kingsbury, Hendon, and Edgware, which had been conveyed by Walter and Isabel of Watford to William Bereford in 1285-6. (fn. 46) John Bereford of Hendon conveyed the Haydon Mead portion in 1381 to William de Stanton, chaplain of Little Stanmore, (fn. 47) who in 1387 conveyed it to John Raven and others. (fn. 48)

Although all William Page's lands were included in a survey made of the manorial demesne in 1438-9, (fn. 49) a distinction between the original demesne and other lands was still sufficiently recognized in 1485 for it to be necessary for All Souls College to make a grant of £1 13s. 4d. for 36 years to Richard Bury to relinquish all title to William Bury's lands, identifiable as all the Page lands in northern Kingsbury. (fn. 50)

The lands of Kingsbury manor acquired two copyhold estates in the 1450s. These were the lands held from Kingsbury manor by Lucy Dorman (Derman) and John Head, identifiable with Dormans Mead and other land mingled with the demesne lands west of Salmon Street. (fn. 51)

Hyde Farm, or Hamonds and Collins, which in the earliest extant terrier (1574) (fn. 52) consisted of 87 a. in eastern Kingsbury and Hendon, originated in an estate built up by Edmund Stevens and conveyed by him to All Souls College in 1503. (fn. 53) The farm-house itself, situated north of Kingsbury Road in the centre of land stretching from Edgware Road almost to Kingsbury Green (27 a. in 1597), (fn. 54) can be identified with Lorchons, described in 1426 as a tenement and ½ virgate. (fn. 55) It had been held by Richard Page alias Lorchon (fl, 1359), whose widow died seised of it in 1393. (fn. 56) The property passed to Page's daughter and heir, Sarah, wife of John Smith, and to their daughters and coheirs, Joan, wife of Edward Collins, and Margaret, married successively to John Cox, John Gardiner, and John Hamond, (fn. 57) although only Hamond appears as the holder on the rental of 1426. (fn. 58) In 1471 Hamond's son, Richard, conveyed the property to John Canon, who surrendered it in 1486 to John Pinner, tallow-chandler of London, from whom it passed in 1488 to Sir Thomas Brian, chief justice of the King's Bench. Brian must have surrendered the property to Edmund Stevens before 1495, when John Canon quitclaimed his interest, and in 1499 Stevens bought out the interest of George Collins, son of Joan, the other coheir. Stevens's purchase from Brian included Mill Hill, 12 a. south of Kingsbury Road, which John Pinner had acquired from Henry Mosshatch in 1488. (fn. 59) Part of the property held by the Grove family in the early 15th century, (fn. 60) it had passed to John Lyon by 1441, (fn. 61) and to Robert Mosshatch in 1466. (fn. 62) Other near-by property acquired by Edmund Stevens included Wadlifs, Spencers, and Longcrofts (19 a. in 1597), land held in 1426 by Alice Clerk, whence it passed to the Mosshatch family and to Hugh Morland, who conveyed it to Stevens in 1492. (fn. 63) Simonds (9 a. in 1597), in 1426 a tenement and three quartrons, was sold by Richard Simond's executors to Stevens in 1493. (fn. 64) The name 'Hamonds' was extended from its original description of Lorchons to the whole of Edmund Stevens's estate in eastern Kingsbury.

The 'Collins' portion of the estate consisted of freehold lands in western Hendon which were conveyed in 1312 by Simon King and his wife Mariot to their daughter, Mabel, and her husband, John Collins. Their daughter, the wife of William atte Hegge, inherited the property, which was divided between her daughters and coheirs, the wives of Thomas Freville of Laleham and Roger Smith of Hendon. Freville's portion had passed to Thomas Forster of Laleham before 1395 when Forster conveyed it to John Fremley, also of Laleham. (fn. 65) In 1495 Henry Fremley, husbandman of Laleham, conveyed it to Edmund Stevens. (fn. 66) Roger Smith's portion remained in the hands of the Smiths of Hendon until 1496, when John Smith and others conveyed it to Edmund Stevens and others. (fn. 67) Stevens received £80 from All Souls College in 1498 for all his copyhold lands in Kingsbury and for Collins in Hendon, (fn. 68) although the conveyance was not entered in the court rolls until 1503, (fn. 69) and with others he granted Collins in 1504 to Thomas Judde and others who in 1515 granted it to William Broke and others. (fn. 70) The college was certainly in possession of both Hamonds and Collins by 1533-6. (fn. 71) Wheat Croft, 4 a. lying east of Salmon Street, which was acquired from Thomas Wilkins by Edmund Stevens in 1489 and conveyed by him to All Souls with his other property, became absorbed into Kingsbury manor farm. (fn. 72)

William Mowbray (fl. 1521) (fn. 73) surrendered a customary close held from the manor of Kingsbury, then 6 a. and later 9 a., lying to the west of Stag Lane in north Kingsbury to All Souls College to be held for life by William Cogdale (Cockdale) and after his death to be sold for charitable purposes. Cogdale, who was the holder by 1528-9, (fn. 74) held the close, which took his name, for 30 years, after which it was seized by the college and absorbed into its estate. In spite of a protest made in 1610, profits from the close were never used for charity. (fn. 75) In 1591 Thomas Shepherd conveyed a cottage, Vassetts, which lay east of Salmon Street, almost opposite Hill Farm, and other copyhold land of the manor of Kingsbury to All Souls College. (fn. 76)

Purchases and exchanges during the 19th century extended and consolidated the All Souls College estate. Threshbeings Acre (4 a.) in north Kingsbury was bought in 1842 from Nicholl's estate. (fn. 77) In 1843 the college acquired Little Bush farm (44 a.), which joined and intermingled with the farm-land of Kingsbury manor, and in 1845 it bought Old Haws (5½ a.) adjoining Old Field, all from Francis Stubbs's estate. (fn. 78) In an exchange with William Field in 1858 it relinquished 7 a. to the west of Townsend Lane for 14 a. on the east, giving it the whole of the area between Kingsbury Road and Wood Lane. (fn. 79) Between 1868 and 1879, 20 a. on the border with Wembley south of Kingsbury manor farm-lands were bought from John W. Prout. (fn. 80) By an exchange with the Ecclesiastical Commissioners in 1890, All Souls acquired 34 a., of which 18½ a. joined the lands recently bought from Prout, and the rest lay near Hyde farm-house and in the north. In return, the college surrendered 35 a., mostly the original Collins land in Hendon. (fn. 81)

Before the First World War All Souls College (fn. 82) sold some land, including the site of the maternity hospital at Honeypot Lane and part of Stratford Long or Shoelands adjoining Edgware Road, which was developed for industry. The rest of Shoelands and Hungry Down in north-west Kingsbury was sold for building in 1931. The site for Wembley town hall in Forty Lane was sold to Wembley U.D.C. and the southern part of Hyde farm at Kinloch Avenue for building in 1933. The land north of it, Jubilee park (36 a.), was bought by Wembley U.D.C. in 1936. Most of Kingsbury manor or Hill farm-lands and Little Bush farm (160 a.) was sold in 1938 to Middlesex C.C. and Wembley B.C. for use as open space. In 1967, as Fryent regional open space, it was grassland leased by the Greater London Council to the London Borough of Brent. (fn. 83) In 1948 19 a. of Hill farm-land east of Salmon Street was sold to Wembley. The rest of the estate, comprising Crokers, land on the border with Wembley, some land east of Salmon Street, and Hyde farm-lands north of Kingsbury Road, was retained by the college, let on building leases for houses and shops. The home farm of the Kingsbury manor estate was situated to the west of Salmon Street. Buildings (domibus) were attached to the estate in 1325 and a 'messuage' was first specified in 1331. (fn. 84) It was called a manor c. 1438-9 (fn. 85) and from 1445-6 repairs to Kingsbury Manor appear as a regular item in the accounts of the bursar of All Souls College. (fn. 86) In 1951 15th-century hammers were found when a barn collapsed at Hill Farm. (fn. 87) From 1574 the house and its lands were called the Hill farm. (fn. 88) The farm-house was depicted in 1597 as a house facing Salmon Street with a complex of buildings around a courtyard behind it, a kitchen-garden, orchard, and two ponds. (fn. 89) The house was assessed for 6 hearths in 1664. (fn. 90) From 1700 the house became the centre of one of the four farms into which the estate was divided by leasing. (fn. 91)

The southern part of Kingsbury was freehold land which may have originated in the woodland held in common by freeholders, which was mentioned in early documents. (fn. 92) In 1276-7 Hamon Constantine held a carucate and John of Westmelne held two virgates of freehold land. (fn. 93) Most of this property seems to have passed by the 1290s to Thomas of Brancaster, who was building up an estate in Kingsbury and Hendon at the end of the 13th century. (fn. 94) It was held in 1325 by Geoffrey le Scrope, possibly as a lessee from the Brancasters or as a reward for his support of Edward II. (fn. 95) The estate reverted to the Brancasters, probably after Edward II's fall. In 1333 it was held by Gilbert, son of Alan Brancaster, a former citizen of London, who, in association with Gillian le Joigneur, jeweller of London, leased an estate in southeast Kingsbury to Henry and Christine Page. (fn. 96)

The Brancaster estate, which may confusingly have been called Kingsbury manor, consisted of a moated manor-house and an estate in Kingsbury of about 300 a. stretching from Salmon Street to Townsend Lane and southward to the Brent. (fn. 97) It probably extended southward over the Brent into Willesden and eastward into Hendon as far as Edgware Road. (fn. 98) It was held by knight service from Edgware manor, a tenure commuted to a pair of gold spurs or 6d. a year. (fn. 99)

The largest portion of Gilbert Brancaster's estate passed to his daughter Katharine, wife of John Farnborough (fl. c. 1362-c. 1384), (fn. 100) a basketmaker or cofferer, from whom the manor of COFFERS, COFFERERS or COFFERHOUSE took its name. (fn. 101) In 1400 Joan, widow of John Farnborough the elder, and her second husband John Mosshatch lost an action for dower against her stepson, John Farnborough the younger, stockfishmonger of London, for one third of a messuage, 132 a. of arable, 3 a. of meadow, 18 a. of wood and appurtenances in Kingsbury, Hendon, and Willesden. (fn. 102) The younger John Farnborough and his wife Gillian conveyed the estate, presumably as a settlement or mortgage, to Thomas Haseley, Clerk of the Crown of Chancery, and to John Frank, Keeper of the Rolls of Chancery, in 1424-5, (fn. 103) and Thomas Haseley was listed as the owner in 1426. (fn. 104)

Haseley (d. c. 1450) conveyed the premises, described as the manor of Kingsbury in Kingsbury, Hendon, and Willesden, to the use of himself and his wife for life, and in 1451 his widow, Agnes, leased them to Henry Waver and his wife, Christine, probably Agnes's daughter. (fn. 105) Henry and Christine enjoyed full possession of the manor after Agnes's death, and in 1476 Christine, whose second husband was Thomas Cook, won her action against her son, Henry Waver, for possession of the manor. (fn. 106) Henry predeceased Christine, who died in 1479, whereupon the estate, described as a messuage and 240 a. called Coffers, worth £7 3s. 4d. a year, passed to her granddaughter, Christine Waver. All Souls College, as the lord of Kingsbury (recte Edgware) manor, was granted the wardship of the younger Christine, then a minor. The college was neglectful, however, and in August 1479 William Edward, yeoman of Kingsbury, forcibly entered the premises. When he died the following February, his wife, Margaret, continued to take the profits from the estate. In 1481 the escheator declared that the manor was held in chief and Margaret Edward gave her husband's goods and chattels to the king in compensation, although she apparently remained in possession. (fn. 107)

Christine Waver seems to have recovered the manor at her majority and she and her two husbands, William Brown and Sir Humphrey Dymock, held it during the early 16th century. A dispute between John Brown, Christine's son by her first husband, and Humphrey and Christine Dymock was decided in 1540 in favour of the latter. (fn. 108) Christine was dead by 1550 when Dymock sold Coffers to Humphrey White, (fn. 109) who sold it to Henry Page of Wembley in 1555. (fn. 110) In 1556 the estate was described as a messuage, the site of a water-mill, 390 a., free fishing in the Brent at Brent bridge, and 10s. rent in Kingsbury, Hendon, and Willesden. (fn. 111) Much of the land in Hendon and Willesden had been acquired during the 15th century, but all the land in Kingsbury seems to have belonged to the original Brancaster holding.

In 1597 John Page had about 167 a. in Kingsbury, mostly in the south-east. (fn. 112) His family, while retaining possession of the bulk of Coffers until the 18th century, began to break up the estate in the 17th century. Richard Page of Uxendon sold Wakemans Hill (20 a.) and 20 a. in Hendon to Thomas Marsh of the Hyde in 1632, and another 14 a. in Hendon to Edward Franklin of Willesden in 1633. (fn. 113) North Dean was already being treated separately in 1636, (fn. 114) and it was not included in the conveyance of Coffers by Richard Page of St. Gilesin-the-Fields (Holborn) to Henry Cope of Dublin in 1716. (fn. 115) Cope and his wife, Mary, sold Coffers to James Brydges in 1720. (fn. 116) Henry Brydges, duke of Chandos, sold the manor in 1757 to Benjamin Hays of Wimbledon (fn. 117) and in 1836 it was apparently held by Trebe Hele Hays of Delamere (Devon), who sold 9 a. next to the Brent to the Grand Junction Canal Co. (fn. 118) William Praed, who was the owner in 1839 of an estate there totalling 107 a., (fn. 119) was still in possession in 1870. (fn. 120) By 1927 the estate was in the hands of Kingsbury Estates Ltd. (fn. 121) Building had begun at Langford Long as early as 1924, (fn. 122) but a large area in the south-east was still open space, as a cemetery and recreation ground, in 1970.

Thomas Marsh of Roe Green devised Wakemans Hill, by will proved 1695, (fn. 123) to Thomas Nicholl, who sold two of the three fields there to John Cranmer of Eccleshall (Staffs.) in 1710. (fn. 124) Cranmer's son John conveyed them to Francis Newman in 1735, (fn. 125) and Newman mortgaged and in 1749 sold them to William Harrison of Hendon. (fn. 126) In 1782, after Harrison's death, the two fields were sold by devisees under his will to George Marsh of Blackheath (Kent). (fn. 127) In 1819 one field at Wakemans Hill was held by John Nicholl and the other two by Arthur Cuthbert Marsh. (fn. 128) Elizabeth Vidler and George Wheeler were the holders in 1839 (fn. 129) and 1870. (fn. 130) The area was developed for building in 1927. (fn. 131)

North Dean (45 a.) was in the hands of Samuel Nicholl c. 1729-38. (fn. 132) John Nicholl of York sold it in 1769 to Frederick Reynolds of Pall Mall (Westminster), upon whose death in 1799 it passed to Anne Marie Reynolds, his sister, who devised it by will dated 1801 to James Royer of Eastbourne. It was sold in 1810, under the terms of Royer's will, to Charles Pieschall of Sise Lane (London). (fn. 133) Between 1822 and 1839 North Dean passed from Pieschall to Henry Hoffman, (fn. 134) who was still in possession in 1870. (fn. 135)

A manor-house was attached to Geoffrey le Scrope's estate in 1325, although its site is not known. Accounts mention the lord's chamber, a kitchen, larder and malt-kiln, and a surrounding moat with its bridges. (fn. 136) A tenement with curtilage was included in the lease of 1333. (fn. 137) The 'Cofferhouse' was mentioned in the 1550s. (fn. 138) If that house still existed in 1597 it must have been situated in one of the areas not marked on the map. The centre of the Coffers estate in Kingsbury was, probably from the 17th or 18th century, Blackbird farm-house, which was built south of the junction of Blackbird Hill with Old Church Lane. (fn. 139) At the beginning of the 20th century it was a two-storeyed brick building with a tiled roof, possibly dating from the 18th century. (fn. 140) The farm-house was demolished in 1936 to make way for shops. (fn. 141)

Part of Gilbert of Brancaster's estate was conveyed by him to Gillian le Joigneur, who may have been his daughter, and who can be identified with Gillian, wife of Guy of Hoddesdon, fishmonger of London. Before 1351 Guy and Gillian conveyed to the knights of St. John of Jerusalem 40 a. of land and 4 a. of meadow in Kingsbury worth 10s. 4d., which was held from Edgware manor for 1½ d. rent, 6 a. of wood in Hendon worth 3s., which was held from Westminster abbey for a clove of garlic, and 6s. 8d. rent from free tenants in Kingsbury and Hendon. The estate is identifiable with Church field, 32 a., lying west of Church Lane, and Kingsbury Hill, 6 a. in the corner between Townsend Lane and Wood Lane. (fn. 142)

The Hoddesdon grant was not the only source of FREREN or FRYENT manor, as the estate belonging to the Knights Hospitallers was called. Kingsbury church was appropriated to the Hospitallers by c. 1244-8 (fn. 143) and land in Tokyngton was owned by them in the late 13th century. (fn. 144) In the 1330s the prior of St. John of Jerusalem seems to have owned land in south-western Kingsbury. (fn. 145) Property in Kingsbury was included in an extent made of the knights' possessions in 1338. (fn. 146) When the Hospitallers' property in Tokyngton was surveyed in 1511-12, it consisted of 23 a. in strips and parcels of land interspersed with the estates of Tokyngton and Wembley manors. (fn. 147) It had disappeared by the middle of the 16th century, probably through exchange. (fn. 148) The Freren lands in Tokyngton were absorbed into Tokyngton and Wembley manors while their property in Kingsbury, as two blocks of land - High field or Nomansland (18½ a.) on the border with Harrow - became part of the Freren estate. (fn. 149)

By 1597 two fields in north Kingsbury belonged to Freren manor. (fn. 150) Bowes (Boys or Bouse), otherwise Hyde Hill field or Mayden croft, near Hyde Farm, was held from Kingsbury manor for 1s. rent (fn. 151) and may be identifiable with Nelesfield, originally part of the Brancaster estate, for which Geoffrey le Scrope paid 1s. rent to William Page in 1326. (fn. 152) Freren field, to the west of Stag Lane, was mentioned in 1426, although it was then apparently a common field. (fn. 153) By 1597 it belonged exclusively to the demesne of Freren manor. (fn. 154) Although only the outline of the Freren estate was marked on the map of 1597, (fn. 155) there is sufficient information to suggest that its area was essentially that of c. 1729-38 (fn. 156) and 1839, (fn. 157) consisting of 120 a., concentrated mostly in southern Kingsbury.

The estate remained in the hands of the Knights Hospitallers until the Order was suppressed in 1540. (fn. 158) The king received the rents (fn. 159) until 1544 when he granted the estate to the dean and chapter of St. Paul's cathedral. (fn. 160) With the exception of a brief period during the Interregnum when Freren manor, then described as 186 a. in Kingsbury and Hendon, was sold by Parliamentary trustees to Richard Gibbs, goldsmith of London, (fn. 161) St. Paul's retained the estate until it was vested in the Ecclesiastical Commissioners in 1872. (fn. 162)

Tithes, great and small, formed part of the Freren or rectory estate. By c. 1668, except for those paid by three or four parishioners, all tithes had been compounded for £60, although the parishioners estimated their worth as £110. (fn. 163) Composition for tithes was £420 in 1822 (fn. 164) and in 1839 they were commuted for an annual rent-charge of £500, when the joint owners were said to be the chapter of St. Paul's and their lessee, the duke of Buckingham. (fn. 165) All tithe rent-charges were redeemed between 1878 and 1936. (fn. 166)

Modifications were made to consolidate the estate in the 19th century. Between 1858 and 1866 Kingsbury Hill (9 a.) was exchanged with William Field of Townsends for Rolf crofts, 10 a. in the angle of Salmon Street. (fn. 167) In 1890 34 a., consisting of Freren field, Nomansland, and Hyde Hill field, were surrendered to All Souls College in exchange for 35 a. in western Hendon. (fn. 168)

The Ecclesiastical Commissioners sold most of the estate, 80 a. around Fryent Farm, between 1928 and 1931. The property was divided into building lots, of which the largest purchasers were Campbell & Heath and Salmon Estate (Kingsbury) Ltd., each of which purchased 26 a., and F. G. Parsons, who bought 21 a. (fn. 169)

Freren or Fryent farm-house was situated to the west of Church Lane near its junction with Wood Lane. In 1597 it was a modest house facing Church Lane, flanked on the north and south by barns. (fn. 170) In 1837 the farm-house had two storeys and attics. (fn. 171) By 1889 it was called the Old House and described as 'slightly built in the first place'. The walls were cracked and held together with iron ties and the house was damp and 'scarcely fit for habitation'. After a fire in 1914, the Ecclesiastical Commissioners granted £1,000 for building, mostly in connexion with a dairy business. The farm buildings, which were sold to Frederick Lavender in 1929, (fn. 172) were still used as a dairy farm in 1937 (fn. 173) but were demolished after the Second World War. (fn. 174)