People
Few families have left so deep an imprint on the story of Leigh as the Morleys, whose connection with the parish ran from the early years of the nineteenth century until the closing decades of the twentieth. Across three generations they shaped not only the appearance of the village but also its working life, its institutions and its open spaces, while at the same time playing a part on the national stage of commerce, politics and education.
The founder of the family's fortunes was Samuel Morley, born in 1809. Like many young men of his background, he began his working life at the bottom of the ladder, joining the counting house of the hosiery firm of I & R Morley as a clerk. He proved to be a businessman of exceptional ability, and from 1820 onwards it was he who steered the firm through half a century of growth, only handing over the direction of the business in 1871. In 1841 he married Rebekah, whose father, Samuel Hope, was a banker, and through this marriage the name Hope entered the family line, to be borne by his descendants ever afterwards.
Samuel Morley's arrival in Leigh transformed the village. He purchased Hall Place together with an estate of 380 acres, and, finding the existing Georgian house of 1780 not to his taste, he had it pulled down. In its place rose a new Hall Place, complete with a stable block, the whole undertaking costing somewhere in the region of £77,000 — a very considerable sum for the period. The new mansion became the heart of the estate for the better part of a century.
Public life claimed a good deal of Samuel Morley's attention. In July 1865 he entered Parliament as member for Nottingham, though his tenure was short, for he lost the seat the following year after an election petition. He returned to the Commons in 1878, this time representing Bristol, and continued to sit until 1885, when he retired from parliamentary life. Honours came his way, but he declined a peerage — a decision consistent with his principles. He had been active in religious and reforming circles for decades: in 1847 he helped launch a parliamentary body for the Dissenters, and he was a founder of Homerton College at Hackney, an institution that in later years removed to Cambridge. His interest in education extended to women, as shown by his establishment of Milton Mount College for Girls at Gravesend, while in Southwark he founded Morley College, which continues his name in adult education to this day.
The scale of the family firm by the turn of the century gives some idea of the wealth behind the Leigh estate. In 1900 the payroll of I & R Morley listed 3,950 workers. Of these, seven factories accounted for 3,173 factory hands, while a further 1,241 staff were employed in the warehouses at Wood Street and Nottingham. This was a business of national importance, and its senior partners moved in the highest circles.
Samuel's son, Samuel Hope-Morley, who lived from 1845 to 1929, carried the family's standing to its height. A senior partner of I & R Morley, he was appointed Governor of the Bank of England, serving from 1903 to 1905 — a mark of the esteem in which the family was held in the City. His town house was at 2 Grosvenor Square, one of London's most fashionable addresses, but Leigh remained the family seat. He enlarged the estate by adding Leigh Park and Prices Farms to its holdings. His death came in 1929, and his widow, Laura, Lady Hollenden, survived him by many years, dying in 1945. During the war she lived at 49 Grosvenor Square.
Samuel Hope-Morley had been created the first Baron Hollenden, and the title passed to his son Geoffrey Hope-Morley, born in 1885, who became the second baron. Geoffrey's long life, which ended in 1977, spanned the great days of the estate and its gradual winding down. In its heyday the grounds around Hall Place were kept to a high standard — in the balmy days before the war no fewer than 20 gardeners were employed there. Geoffrey added his own touches to the landscape, building three stone bridges around the lake, which remain a feature of the park.
The war brought disaster to the mansion itself, when a fire destroyed one third of Hall Place. The estate community rallied: a fund was opened that purchased two Spitfires for the war effort, a striking gesture of loyalty at a difficult time. After the war, Geoffrey showed himself a generous friend to the village. In 1948 he gave Leigh Green to the village, and in 1952 he established the Morley Trust, while the Village Hall was handed over to the Parish Council. On the Home Farm, the Guernsey herd proved a success, keeping agricultural life going on the estate. The family firm, however, could not remain independent for ever: in the mid 1960s Morleys were taken over by Courtaulds, ending more than a century and a half of family control.
The estate itself was steadily reduced. The Laundry had closed as a working business in 1933 and was converted into a dwelling; it was sold in 1971, Laundry Cottage followed in 1978, and Little Lucy's Farm was sold in 1991. Within the mansion, times had grown harder: during 1975-76 the kitchen area and the top floor were abandoned, a sign of the shrinking household that remained.
Geoffrey died in 1977, and the barony passed to his son Gordon Hope-Morley, the third Baron Hollenden. Gordon had served in Norway with the Black Watch during the war, and in later life married Sonja Sundt. He had in fact taken over the running of the estate some years earlier, succeeding to it in 1973, and so guided it through its final years of contraction.
The Morleys' century at Leigh, from Samuel Morley's purchase of Hall Place to the dispersals of the late twentieth century, left the village with legacies that endure: the green, the hall, the trust, and the memory of a family whose influence reached from the counting house of a hosiery firm to the Bank of England, Parliament and the colleges of Cambridge and Southwark.