23. The Lacon Family
The surname Lacon was first found in Shropshire where the family held a seat (a manor) from very ancient times, some say from before the Conquest. The Catholic family were one of the wealthiest in Shropshire and were very influential in the Parish of Wenlock. Swathes of the Harley Parish were part of the Wenlock Parish, as can be seen on the Tithe Map of 1842. These lands became part of Harley Parish in 1882.
The Lacons held the Manor of Harley from 1428 to 1618, it being passed from father to son, for a period of 190 years.
Details of the influence of the Lacons on the village are held on the Manorial Roles which contain records of all the disputes, crimes and other mainly agricultural matters, arising out of the manorial court held within the Manor house. From 1349 Harley did not have a resident Lord of the Manor so the court must have been held elsewhere.
The first Lacon to be Lord of the Manor was Sir Richard from 1428 to his death in 1446
Then came William 1446 to 1462
Sir Richard 1462 to 1503
Thomas 1503 to 1536
Richard 1536 to 1542
Rowland 1542 to 1608
Francis 1608 to 1618
Completing 190 years of Lacon rule.
Rowland Lacon (b. 1537 d. 1608) of Willey and Kinlet in Shropshire, was Sheriff of Shropshire in 1570/1
In 1581 his uncle Sir George Blount conveyed extensive estates to him at Kinlet and elsewhere making him one of the largest landowner in the country. He always lived in Shropshire. His religious views were obscure whereas his wife was an open recusant (a person who refused to attend Anglican services but remained loyal to the Pope and the Roman Catholic Church).
Rowland Lacon (b.c.1591 d. 1657) from Kinlet, was MP for Much Wenlock in 1614 and Freeman of the town in 1625. He was a Royalist in the Civil War. He was the first Lacon not to hold the Manor of Harley.
In 1633 he sold or gave consent to the sale of the Willey Manor, a core Lacon holding.
The Lacon family were in debt but he refused to accede to his father’s wish for him to marry for wealth. Instead on his own initiative he gave his fiancé a bond of £1600 as proof of his intentions. His father had the bond declared invalid by an ecclesiastical court and packed him off to Kinlet to marry a Shropshire bride.
Later, his father was not amused when Roland’s fourth marriage to his chambermaid produced seven children, a major problem for Rowland’s dwindling inheritance.
In 1633, Rowland married for the fifth time, his former sweetheart, now a widow. With her money he persuaded his father to give him possession of the manor of Earnwood along with interests in other estates.
In 1640 he managed to wrest control of the family’s remaining estates from his father, by marrying his daughter to William Child. Child’s father gave Rowland a dowry of £3000 in order to obtain control of the estates for his son. This large sum of money is said to have cleared the Lacon family debt.
The last of the Lacons to the Raby Estate
However, Fuller, writing in his Worthies of Shropshire in 1662, speaking of the Lacons says, ‘this ancient family is still extant in this County (Shropshire) though I suspect shattered in estate’.
It appears that the Lacon family was indeed shattered. Mary Lacon emigrated to Virginia in 1622, Charles Lacon settled in the Leeward Islands in 1635, Lancelot Lacon aged 32 emigrated to Barbados in 1635 and Richard Lacon settled in Barbados with his wife, daughter and servants in 1680.
In 1618 Francis Lacon sold the Harley Manor to Sir Francis Newport. It then followed the descent of Cressage Manor until 1785.
From then on the Harley Manor was traded amongst various undeservings including an Earl’s mistress, a man who changed his name and was legally deemed to be a lunatic, ending with a certain General Harry Poultney.
Whether any of these, including the stream of Lacons, had the best interests of their Harley tenants at heart is anybody’s guess. The time when the close attention, fair or otherwise, which a resident Lord would have afforded, had long gone.
From way back Manor land ownership had multiplied accidentally into tracts of land widely dispersed across the country making any form of good estate management at that time very difficult.
The overwhelming impression is of wealthy, privileged individuals acquiring large areas of land by nothing more than birth right, gift or marriage, with their main attention diverted elsewhere, managing their estates with little or no regard for their tenants. No doubt there were exceptions.
In modern times, Lord Barnard, died aged 92 in 2016, his son William Vane inheriting the Raby Estate which is held in trust.
Raby Castle the medieval family seat, is the ancestral home of Lord Barnard, the estate spreading across Teesside and County Durham.
Raby Estates (Shropshire) owns 6500 acres of land between Shrewsbury and Telford along with 800 acres of woodland predominately on or around the Wrekin. There are extensive Raby owned woodlands within two miles to the north west of Harley.
This is a modern, outward looking estate providing access and services to the public as described on their website.
The Harley Village Hall is held on lease by the Village Hall committee from the lessor, the Raby Estate.