The planting of the trees on Hutton Rudby Green

In 1878 three young men of Hutton Rudby – two of them were the brothers John and Joseph Hutchinson of Toft Hill – conceived the idea of beautifying the village by planting avenues of trees along the Green and North End.  They explained their idea at a public meeting where they were met with an enthusiastic response.  Donations were called for and a fund-raising concert was planned.

Hutton Rudby Green

They were possibly inspired by the lime trees planted on Stokesley West Green in 1874 to commemorate the marriage of Miss Caroline Marwood of Busby Hall and Mr Wynn Finch of Stokesley Manor.  The main Green at Hutton Rudby had always been a bare grassy expanse with a wide view across the rooftops towards the Cleveland Hills.  The trees planted in 1878-9 would grow to become one of the most recognisable and beautiful features of the village.

The east end of the Green 1879

The 1879 photograph of the east end of the Green shows the new saplings, protected from the horses and geese that grazed the Green by circular railings made by the blacksmith Mark Wood.  The cost of the 41 trees was £2-16s-3d (some trees were donated) and the iron guards cost £27 including erection. 

Hutton Rudby History Society has a plan and notes – drawn up, I think, by Val Martin – of the tree planting, including the names of those who ceremonially planted 31 of the trees.  I haven’t seen the originals from which this information was compiled, but I will post it anyway, as I think it must be of interest to descendants and also as a record of the original planting (trees were lost in the time of Dutch Elm Disease.) 

My copy of the plan may be too indistinct for easy reference, so I will list the trees below.

They were numbered as follows:

• Nos 1, 2 & 3 along the side of the road facing Barkers Row & Hutton House

• Nos 4 to 21 along the south side of the road that runs up the Green:
• Nos 4, 5 & 6 in the first section of the Green (between the road to Enterpen and the road that crosses the Green near the bus stop)
• Nos 7 & 8 on the next section (from near the bus stop to the Spar shop)
• Nos 9, 10 & 11 from the Spar shop to Ebenezer Place
• Nos 12 to 17 from Ebenezer Place to opposite the King’s Head
• Nos 18 to 21 opposite the top of North End

• Nos 22 to 32 along the north side of the road that runs up the Green:
• Nos 22 to 25 in the first section (between The Elms and the road to Stringers Row)
• Nos 26 to 28 in the next section (between Stringers Row and Crowbank)
• Nos 29 to 32 between Crowbank and the Methodist Church

• Nos 33 to 41 along North End:
•  Nos 33 & 34 along the top of North End (the War Memorial was later placed between the trees)
• Nos 35 & 36 between the top of North End and the old Wesleyan chapel (the buildings in the middle of the Green)
• Nos 37 to 41 along the western side of North End

Incidentally, the plan shows the turning circle that then existed outside The Elms, which was the home of Miss Ann Paver.  Traces of this may still be seen in the grass in some conditions.  The house was to take its name from the two elm trees planted outside the gate by Miss Paver and her great-niece Miss Annie Farndale.


Notes on the nature of the soil when the trees were planted:

All the holes below an imaginary line drawn from William Jackson’s [his shop was in the area of Stringers Row, North Side] to George Walton’s [in the area of Lincoln House, South Side] showed excellent soil.  No 22 was very stony and was treated with a good quantity of new soil.  Above this line to No 10 tree, the soil gradually decreases and thence to the top of the main avenue (opposite the New Wesley Chapel [Wesleyan Church]) there is practically only stiff clay. 

The holes on the north side of the section are slightly better than on the other side.  There was no soil in No 13.  From this tree to the west end of the avenue, the soil was a little better but about a load of new soil was added per hole.  No 21 was very stony.  Nos 33-36, inclusive, were mostly clay.  Nos 37-40 were good sandy soil.  No 41, all clay, had about two loads of soil added.  Nos 8-21 inclusive, 26, 28, 30, 33 & 34 were so wet that trenches were dug to the road channels and filled with rubble and ash.

Tree No 1 – Variegated Sycamore – planted by Master George Hutton Bowes Wilson.  
George was born on 26 Oct 1878, so he was only a baby when the tree was planted.
The son of Thomas Bowes Wilson and Maria Hutton, George was educated at Clifton College and New College, Oxford.  He became a solicitor, married and was killed in the First World War in 1915.  Middlesbrough Town Hall has a painting of George in uniform; it can be seen here

Tree No 2 – Lime – planted by the Misses Winifred, Margaret, Marian and Katharine Blair.
Their father, George Young Blair, was in the process of building his country house, Drumrauch Hall.  They were aged between 8 and 10.  See this post

Tree No 3 – Sycamore – planted by Mrs Hutchinson for Mr Pyman’s family.
Mrs Hutchinson is possibly a relation of Joseph and John Hutchinson.
Thomas English Pyman, shipowner (son of  George Pyman of Raithwaite Hall and West Hartlepool) lived with his family at Linden Grove. 

Tree No 4 – Lime – planted by Miss Mary Hannah Paver.
She was the niece of Miss Ann Paver of The Elms, North Side, and was 27 years old at the time of the planting.  She died unmarried aged 76 in 1928 and is buried in the churchyard.

Tree No 5 – Elm – planted by Miss Jennie Chapman.
I think this may be Miss Jane Chapman , whose family farmed at Sexhow Hall.  She would have been about 24 years old at this time.

Tree No 6 – Lime – planted by Miss Jenny Mease.

Miss Jenny Mease

Daughter of Joseph Mellanby Mease, she was about 24 years old.  She ran a school with her mother and at some time lived in Rose Cottage, Enterpen.  She died in 1949 aged 94, and is buried at Hutton Rudby.

Tree No 7 – Sycamore – planted by Miss Maria Carter

Tree No 8 – Elm – planted by Miss Hutchinson.
Possibly Anne, the sister of John and Joseph Hutchinson.

Tree No 9 – Lime – planted by Masters William and Edwin Harrison.
These boys, aged 5 and 6, were the children of Mrs Elizabeth Rebecca Harrison of Toft Hill by her second marriage to William Harrison.  Her first marriage was to Ralph Hutchinson, with whom she had John, Joseph and Anne.

Tree No 10 – Elm – planted by Masters Fred and Tom Garbutt
The sons of Thomas and Dorothy Garbutt of Hutton Grange Farm, they were aged 5 and 8.  Their father Thomas was born in Eston in about 1828 and it appears that his father Joseph (born in Marton in about 1816) came to Hutton Grange not long before 1851 with his family.  Fred and Tom lived and worked at the farm all their lives and died unmarried, Tom in 1946 and Fred in 1956.  They gave land to the Cricket Club at a peppercorn rent, and were such well-respected regulars at the King's Head that the landlord waited until they died before he modernised the pub.  

Tree No 11 – Horse Chestnut – planted by Mr Joseph Mellanby Mease and the Village Boys.
It must have seemed very appropriate for the boys to plant a tree that would supply future generations with conkers!

Tree No 12 – Sycamore – planted by Mrs Yorke.
This is probably the Mrs Mary York who lived near to Ebenezer Place at the time of the 1881 census.  She was a widow of 57 and lived with her 34 year old daughter Dinah.  The tree would be almost opposite their house.

Tree No 13 – Elm – planted by Miss Jessie Goldsborough. 
Bartholomew Goldsbrough (or Goldsborough) was a butcher.  The trees plan shows “Bartle Goldsbrough’s Cow House” on South Side in the area of Goldie Hill and “B Goldsbrough’s Shop” on North Side in the area of Crowbank and Crowell Cottage.  The 1881 census shows Bartholomew Goldsborough living on North Side, aged 37.  With him were his unmarried brother John (also a butcher), their two married sisters, an apprentice called George Bainbridge, and his niece Jessie, who was then 15, still at school, and was born in Hilton.

Tree No 17 – Sycamore – planted by Mr C R Garbutt’s family.
Christopher Garbutt was a joiner & publican of the King’s Head.  He was born in Potto, and his wife Jane in Elwick.  When the trees were planted, they had five daughters.  The youngest was a baby, born at the end of 1878, and the eldest was about 14 years old.

Tree No 18 – Lime – planted by Miss Rosetta Hall.
Daughter of Matthew Hall, tailor & draper, grocer & subpostmaster.  He was in business with his sons William, Graham, Thomas and John [according to the 1891 Bulmer’s Directory].  Rosetta was 7 years old at the time of planting.  She married Robby Hodgson, and lived in Garbutts Lane

Tree No 21 – Sycamore – planted by Mrs Robert Goldsborough.
The plan shows that Mrs Goldsborough lived at West End and planted a tree beside her house.  The 1881 census shows Mrs Sarah Goldsborough, widow aged 81, born in Carlton, living with her son Robert, aged 44, who was born in Thorpe, Co Durham.

Tree No 22 – Elm – planted by Miss Ann Paver.
She lived at the house now called The Elms, North Side, with her niece, who planted tree no 4.  She died in 1901 aged 84 and is buried in the churchyard.  In the 1891 census her household included her great-niece Annie Farndale (see below)

Tree No 23 – Elm – planted by Miss Annie Farndale.
She was born in Stockton and was about 6 years old at the time of the planting.  She later lived in the cottage next to The Elms, at the end of Stringers Row, with her sister

Tree No 24 – Lime – planted by Miss Jones

Tree No 25 – Horse Chestnut – planted by Mr Passman.
Henry Passman of Manor House Farm and then North Side, Hutton Rudby. See this post for more details on Henry and his half-brother Mark Barker Passman.

Tree No 26 – Sycamore – planted by Miss Carter.

Tree No 27 – Scarlet Horse Chestnut – planted by Mr John Hutchinson. 

Tree No 28 – Lime – planted by Master Borrie Blair.
The eldest child and only son of George Young Blair of Stockton and Drumrauch Hall, Peter Borrie Blair was 12 at the time of planting; he died at the age of 24

Tree No 29 – Scarlet Horse Chestnut – planted by Mr Joseph Hutchinson. 
John Hutchinson was an iron manufacturer’s clerk aged 24 at the 1881 census, his brother Joseph was then 23 and a bank cashier.  Ten years later Joseph is still at Toft Hill with his now widowed mother, his half-brother and two half-sisters, but his brother John is not with them.  Joseph was by then married to Mary, from West Hartlepool.  Mary died in 1936 and Joseph in 1937; they are buried at Hutton Rudby.

Tree No 30 – Elm – planted by Mr Southern’s family. 
The 1881 census finds Robert Southeran, flourdealer, living next door but one to Enterpen Farm.  He and his wife Isabella had moved to Enterpen from Stokesley in the first half of 1878, and at the time of the tree planting had six children under ten, the youngest, Millicent, being only a baby.  In 1891 he was farming at Hill House, Middleton, and four of the children were still at home

Tree No 31 – Sycamore – planted by Miss Charlton. 
There were several Charlton families:  in 1891 there were 3 in the village, and Charltons farmed at Butter Hill, Middleton (now Indian Farm) and at Rudby Farm

Tree No 32 – Variegated Sycamore – planted by Miss Hannah Chapman. 
Hannah was the daughter of Mrs Mary Ann Chapman who farmed at Sexhow Hall.  She was aged about 26.

Tree No 35 – Sycamore – planted by Mr James Coulson. 
The plan shows that he lived in West End, near Mrs Goldsborough.

Tree No 41 – Horse Chestnut – planted by Mr George Sherwood.