10 Jul Lordship Title of Beenham ID1373
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BEENHAM is not mentioned in the Domesday Survey, but it seems probable that in 1086 it was attached to the extensive royal manor of Reading and that the greater part of the parish was included in the grant of that place to Reading Abbey by Henry I. In the 13th century Beenham belonged to the monastery, and in 1276 the abbot had free warren in Beenham, 'in the manor of Reading.' In 1291 it was described as a hamlet attached to Reading. This property remained in the possession of the abbey until the Dissolution, when its annual value amounted to £25 7s. 8d., but no manor of Beenham is mentioned until after the Dissolution. The tenants had probably always hitherto owed suit at the manor court of Reading, but in the 17th century a court was undoubtedly held at Beenham. In 1544 Henry VIII granted the manor of Beenham, together with 37 acres of wood lying to the east of Beenham Manor and the woods called Cowhill Grove, Shrub Wood and High Grove, to Henry Norreys, afterwards Lord Norreys of Rycote and his wife Margery in tailmale. On the death of Lord Norreys in 1601 the manor descended to his grandson and heir Francis, who was created Earl of Berkshire in 1620–1, and sold the manor and woods in 1622, shortly before his death, to Sir Peter Vanlore, a Dutch merchant. The history of Vanlore's property is difficult to trace, since after his death in 1627 it was divided between his son Sir Peter Vanlore the younger and his four daughters or their heirs. In the list of his property only a capital messuage and farm of Beenham are mentioned, but in 1638 an estate described as the manor of Beenham was assigned to the younger Sir Peter as his son and heir. Beenham Farm, where the courts were held, with part of the demesne lands and the woods mentioned in the grant of Henry VIII, passed on the death of the second Sir Peter in 1644–5 to Mary the wife of the Earl of Stirling, one of his daughters and co-heirs. This property belonged in the early 19th century to the Marquess of Downshire and others, from whom it was bought by Sir Charles Rich. The remaining property of the Vanlores in Beenham was still called the manor of Beenham, but its possession was disputed by the descendants of Anne and Elizabeth, two of the daughters of the elder Sir Peter Vanlore. Elizabeth married John Vanden Bempde, but died before her father and her share in the property afterwards passed to her son John. Anne was the wife of Sir Charles Adelmar alias Caesar, and her share was inherited by her daughters, Jacobina the wife of Sir Henry Anderson and Anne the wife of Thomas Levingston. There are a large number of documents referring to the division of the Vanlore property and dealing with shares in the manor of Beenham. John Vanden Bempde died before 1635, having failed to get possession of the manor before his death, but in 1659 his brother Abraham obtained a release of half the manor from Sir Richard (son of Jacobina) Anderson. In 1661 Abraham Vanden Bempde petitioned the House of Lords for relief against Thomas Levingston and his wife respecting the possession of the manor of Beenham. Perhaps in consequence of this petition he obtained the whole estate, although his position cannot have been fully secured, since in some depositions of 1695–6 he was called 'the reputed lord of the manor' and the 'reputed owner' of various woods in the parish. The manor passed to John Vanden Bempde of Pall Mall, probably the son of Abraham. He and his wife Temperance owned the manor in 1710, and were succeeded by their only daughter and heir Charlotte Vanlore, who married first the first Marquess of Annandale and secondly Colonel Johnstone. On her death in 1762 Beenham passed to her son George, the third marquess, who died unmarried in 1792. His property in Beenham passed to his half-brother Richard and was sold in the following year to Sir Charles Rich, bart. The latter was the son of the Rev. John Bostock, D.D., who had married the daughter and heir of John Hopson of Beenham, but he took the name of Rich in 1790. Sir Charles Rich died in 1824, and Beenham Manor passed to his son and heir Sir Charles Henry Rich, who sold it in 1834 to Maj.-Gen. Dickson. It passed to his son Col. Samuel Dickson and to the latter's brother Capt. William Thomas Dickson. The latter, then lieutenant-general, was lord of the manor in 1883. It was bought from him in 1885 by Mr. Henry Waring, whose only son Lieut.-Colonel W.W. Waring is lord of the manor.
Other Information:
Listed in the Domesday Book:
No