< Back 18. Bryan Hewitt on Myddelton House Gardens 18. Bryan Hewitt on Myddelton House Gardens Artist Name 00:00 / 01:33 Bryan Hewitt: I think Bowles’s importance to the modern gardener is because..that.. he’s packed with such good advice about how to grow plants well. Well, you only have to read his books. I mean the style of writing is extremely entertaining even after it’s nearly a century since they were published. … Read his books and you may get a level of the pleasure that Mr Bowles got from growing his plants well. … I get a measure of pride from being part of this and being associated with such an interesting and very kind old man. It is a really wonderful place to work and I think it’s quite intoxicating for me, even after all these years, from smells and from the light coming through and hitting a plant in a certain way at various times of the day. MUSIC: (Reprise) Hide & Seek Rag (McConnell - ATV 8B 43) FADE IN AND UNDER It’s a very peaceful, happy place. One feels that there is a presence here still; that there is a benign presence, that he really hasn’t quite left the site and I hope that he’s happy with what we’re doing. MUSIC: Fade up and under final SFX SFX – A SINGLE WHISTLER AND A RESPONDING WHISTLER

< Back 3. The Bowles Boys and the history of the house and the Bowles family 3. The Bowles Boys and the history of the house and the Bowles family Artist Name 00:00 / 06:12 The Bowles Boys Narrator: Peter Deering was seven when he first came to play here. Peter Deering: … as I lived just on the hill outside the gates here I used this garden and the fields around as the playground. MUSIC: Hide & Seek Rag (McConnell - ATV 8B 43) FADE IN AND UNDER Narrator: Bowles was happy for Peter and his local friends to come here and play games or fish. In winter, when the river and the lake froze over, they skated. Peter Deering: … All the equipment was kept in a cupboard under the stairs here, including the skates …And there was always a rush … to get the best bit of gear, especially if you could get Bowles’s own skates, which were permanently fixed to a pair of boots (otherwise you had to get a pair that you clamped onto your shoes). MUSIC: Up and end Narrator: But it was not all fun and games. The boys, usually about three of them, were put to use, helping out in the garden, as Peter remembers. Peter Deering: ... we would just come over anytime, morning or afternoon, and the drill was to come in, pull three weeds from the front drive here, which was a custom for everyone that came no matter who they were. SFX: A SINGLE WHISTLER Peter Deering: And we’d walk in the front door and whistle, and if Bowles was in the house he’d whistle back. and if he didn’t whistle back then we’d proceed into the garden, whistling until we heard a whistle back. And then we’d join in with whatever he was doing: weeding, replanting or just trying to find something. SFX: A SINGLE WHISTLER & A WHISTLED RESPONSE [……..] You’d walk though the garden with him and he’d say oh there’s such-and-such a thing here that should just be coming into bloom… and sure enough there would be… he always walked with his hands behind his back … And his coat, a raincoat generally, which had long torn strips hanging from it, tied up in a knot at the bottom and a slouchy, trilby hat. Generally he wore a pair of flannel trousers and a tweed jacket. He always wore… a bow tie. History of the House Narrator: Myddelton House was built in the early 19th century. By Victorian standards it is not large, although it does have some 25 rooms above ground level. The basement was big enough to fit a servants’ hall, a warren of domestic offices, the kitchen - with a huge double range, the butler’s pantry, scullery, day larder, poultry larder, boot room and wine cellar. Just imagine what it must have been like… SFX: Audio Montage of a busy household Each day, at dusk, it took two housemaids an hour to close the folding shutters. There was no gas or electricity – only oil lamps that had to be trimmed, polished and filled. Candlesticks were put out ready on the hall table. There were silver candlesticks for visitors, brass for family, and in the basement the servants’ used huge tin ones, called “dripping pans”. By the 1920’s, visitors to Myddelton House found themselves in a world where time seemed to have stood still for half a century. In fact, Bowles never had electricity put in here. And gas was only installed in the house after the Second World War, when the Austrian cook said she would not work here without it. After Bowles died in 1954, the contents of the house were sold at auction. The sale went on for three days! Although some paintings stayed within the family, many of Bowles’s finest water-colours are now housed at the Natural History Museum in Kensington and at the Royal Horticultural Society’s Lindley Library. The house and grounds were sold to The Royal Free Hospital and the London School of Pharmacy. Even though he is now long dead, visitors to Myddelton often note the warm atmosphere and say that it feels as if Bowles is still here. History of the Bowles Family Narrator: Bowles had Huguenot ancestors - the Garnaults – who lived in Bowling Green House, an Elizabethan building that stood near this site. The Garnaults settled in England in the late 17th century after they fled from religious persecution in France. They made their fortune as craftsmen jewellers and went on to use their wealth to buy controlling shares in the New River Company. At around the same time, the Bowles family were working as printers and publishers in St Paul’s Churchyard, in London. They produced maps, portraits and political cartoons - including William Hogarth’s famous series, The Rake’s Progress. The two families were united in February 1799, when Henry Carrington Bowles married Anne Garnault. Anne inherited the Bowling Green House Estate. She died in 1812, when she was only 41. After her death, and despite his success in business, Henry Carrington Bowles felt ashamed of being associated with “trade”,. And he wanted to escape his title: Mr Bowles of Bowling Green House! He demolished the Elizabethan house and replaced it with a smarter more imposing, fashionable, yellow brick residence. The new family home was named Myddelton House - after Sir Hugh Myddelton, the imaginative engineer who built the New River. A section of that river used to flow through the garden.

< Back 2. Front Lawn and The Great Storm by Bryan Hewitt 2. Front Lawn and The Great Storm by Bryan Hewitt Artist Name 00:00 / 02:14 Narrator : The stone garden was first created in the 1920s. Local lads - who were known as Bowles Boys - collected the round stones that decorate the bed. They loaded them on to wheelbarrows at nearby Maiden’s Brook, and trundled them back here. A limestone column was placed here to add height and a bit of sculptural variety to the bed. To compliment the column, Bowles had the fossilised Araucaria, or Monkey Puzzle tree positioned beside it. The tree is ancient. It dates from the Cretaceous Period – around 250 million years ago. It is believed it was discovered in the early nineteen hundreds, when they were excavating the King George V Reservoir. Whatever its origins, it is certainly the oldest tree in the garden. The carved stone water trough came from an old blacksmith’s forge in Forty Hill. For many years it served as the block riders used to dismount when they came to have their horses’ hooves shod. Bowles brought the trough here in the 1930s, after his brother, Sir Henry, closed the forge down. The stone garden suffered badly during the great storm of 1987. Bryan Hewitt: …the huge old cedar tree that was in the middle of the stone bed … was well over a hundred feet tall and when it came down the roots knocked over the petrified tree, and it also knocked over, sadly, the old well boring … that came from Whitewebbs Pumping Station, dating back to about 1897 when they created the pumping station there. That got knocked over and that simply smashed. Being limestone I suppose it didn’t really have a chance.... … there was a vast poplar tree; it was a black poplar in the wild garden… and …that came down in the storm …There was a yew tree near the pond … quite a large one that came down. Another tree that got sent flying was the kalopanax tree, which was also on the drive; that was a good specimen. Fortunately a nut must have been swept up and that germinated and you can see that in the wild garden to this day. …

< Back 16. Alpine Meadow 16. Alpine Meadow Artist Name 00:00 / 03:28 Bryan Hewitt: …the alpine meadow was inspired by Mr Bowles’s trips to the Pyrenees. He used to go when his hay fever would be at its worst in the summer and he’d go away for about a fortnight or when the air was purer. His staff had a bit of a holiday around about that time as well; it was a break for them. In the Alps he’d see these wonderful fields of bulbs of crocuses, of daffodils, of fritillarias and he brought these plants back with him. Narrator: Following a trip to the mountains in June 1909, Bowles wrote: Voice of Bowles: As I had never been among Alpine meadows at that time of year, I soon forgot the rain and cared nothing about how wet my feet were getting: for all the meadows are like the gayest gardens, with lovely wild flowers of all the colours imaginable. Narrator: It was after his father died, in 1918, that Bowles began to put into place long held plans for a meadow below the Rock Garden. He planted a sequence of flowers that seemed to grow as naturally in the grass here, as they did in the mountains. Leucojums, or snowflakes, and snowdrops were the first to appear, followed by Scilla bithynica, crocuses and early daffodils. As summer advanced, camassias, hyacinths and wild geraniums covered the meadow with a cloud of blue. After Bowles died the Alpine Meadow suffered from neglect. Spring bulbs still put on a brave show. Many of the crocuses he brought back escaped into the lawn and into some of the other beds. But bamboos took over much of the area. Soon after restoration work began the bamboos were cut down. They revealed an unexpected sight: a purple flowering plant with no leaves, called Lathraea clandestina , or Purple Toothwort. Bowles had encouraged it to grow here. You can see some Purple Toothwort if you take a look at the roots of the maple tree growing in the Rock Garden. Narrator: Bowles once wrote: Voice of Bowles: I would give anything possible in the shape of toil and thought, even putting up with such evils as dirty nails and worn-out garments to achieve even a quarter of an acre of such a meadow as those I rushed past in the autobus on the outskirts of Predazzo in the Italian Dolomites. Narrator: Bowles collected grasses that were suitable for his Alpine Meadow. This was at a time before grasses were popular in gardens, but Bowles appreciated them for their dramatic possibilities: their height and their movement. He referred to: Voice of Bowles: “tall flowering stems, delightfully light and elegant, which appear in July and last until spring… MUSIC: (Reprise) Ring-a-Ring-a-Roses Levasseur establish and run under the next paragraph and Voice. Narrator: In the house, during the winter months Bowles filled vases with displays of dried grasses. His housekeeper, Alice, was not so keen. And whenever she had a chance, she threw the dust-gathering stems away. This irritated Bowles, who complained: Voice of Bowles: “Alice has been at it again!”

< Back 8. New River Lawn 8. New River Lawn Artist Name 00:00 / 01:38 Narrator: This is the part of the garden that has changed the most since Bowles’s time. Then the main feature was the river, as it curved round, passing under the two bridges. As you looked towards the Tulip Terrace, the river was flanked on the left by a narrow grass verge. It was here that Bowles planted his main collection of irises. MUSIC: (Reprise) Hide & Seek Rag (McConnell - ATV 8B 43) FADE IN AND UNDER To the left of the Wisteria Bridge are three old yew trees. They would have looked more striking in Bowles’ day than they do now. One of the winter jobs he assigned to the Bowles Boys was to peel off any loose bark and scrub the trunks until they glowed a rich crimson. Peter Deering remembers it well. MUSIC: FADE UP FOR A MOMENT THEN UNDER THE FOLLOWING AND FADE OUT ON LAST PIECE OF SYNCH Peter Deering: ,… the drill was to get a bucket of water and scrubbing brushes and you would just scrub and scrub it away and it would just flake off and scrub it clean all shiny bright. It was really great fun. … Narrator: This would have added a dash of colour to the garden in wintertime. It was an idea Bowles got from a visit to Glasnevin Botanic Gardens in Ireland. A Poncirus , or hardy orange, grows opposite the Tulip Terrace. In Bowles’ time it was a rarity. He was given it as a seed from Canon Ellacombe, one of his first gardening mentors. It was Ellacombe who encouraged Bowles to join the Royal Horticultural Society, which played such an important part in his life in later years.

< Back 6. Lunatic Asylum and Hollow Lawn 6. Lunatic Asylum and Hollow Lawn Artist Name 00:00 / 02:14 Narrator: When Bowles was young a vast clump of evergreens occupied this area. It was the sort of planting you might see in a London square. Laurels grew here. In showery weather they gave off a smell that reminded Bowles of dirty dog. Spotted Aucubas and Privet also grew here. Bowles thought it was all quite dismal, so he had the mass of greenery cleared away and blocks of Kentish ragstone were put down to form two rocky mounds and irregularly shaped beds. The idea was that this would be his Japanese garden. – And some cherries and bamboos were planted. But before he developed the theme any further, Bowles decided Japanese-style gardens had become too fashionable. He was put off the idea when giant toads, pagodas and jingling glass bird-scarers were all the rage at the Royal Horticultural Society’s Great Spring Show. Despite his misgivings, the Wisterias and Magnolias that grow around here still give this area a Japanese feel at times. MUSIC: fade in and run under from ‘some strange and abnormal plans By the time Bowles gave up on the idea of a Japanese garden, he had acquired the corkscrew Hazel you can see growing here. It was given to him by Canon Ellacombe. Some strange and abnormal plants were discovered by Bowles himself. These included a pigmy form of Elder. Another, the Plymouth Strawberry, was a variety of woodland strawberry that was first described in the 17thcentury. You can also see Hedgehog Holly, or curly leaved holly, growing here. In his book My Garden in Spring , Bowles wrote: Voice of Bowles : The freaks have increased in number and are now under the protection of the cherries and bamboos. Narrator: As a result of growing these gnarled, twisted and unusual plants, this area of the garden became known as the Lunatic Asylum. MUSIC FADE UP ON MUSIC and OUT.

< Back 9. Tulip Terrace and Bowles Memories 9. Tulip Terrace and Bowles Memories Artist Name 00:00 / 02:49 Narrator: Bowles was very keen on tulips. Above all he preferred tulips that flowered in late April and May. In his book, My Garden in Spring, he wrote: Voice of Bowles: I have long ago lost every scrap of affection for the early-flowering garden varieties that are still the most conspicuous Tulips in most public parks and many gardens. Narrator: In Bowles’ day the beds in this tulip terrace were planted with single colours. Care was taken to make sure there was no clash of colours. As soon as flowering was over the developing seedpods were snapped off to encourage the bulbs to ripen quickly. This meant they could be lifted in time for the planting out of summer bedding. Bowles liked to fill individual beds with plants of the same type. In some he grew succulent plants, in others he grew Salvia splendens – or scarlet sage – which gave a brilliant red focal point to the terrace. The salvias Bowles grew were taller than the ones that are widely grown today. Another of his favourite plants was heliotrope , or cherry pie, as we will hear from Bryan Hewitt: Bryan Hewitt: he had a large collection of species tulips which he would put in those beds and … then after the tulips were finished they would have summer bedding in, ..which Cherry pie… was one of the plants he used to famously grow in there - that’s very sweet-smelling.. ; Narrator: Scent was an important feature in the garden. Bowles memories Narrator: When Bowles was a child he enjoyed rolling down the grassy slope here. – But only when his ever-protective governess was not looking! The patch below the terrace on the south bank of the New River was always one of his favourite areas. He remembered it as “the sunny plot”. When he took the garden over there were some crocuses growing here. Crocuses were to become his “first garden love”. Among gardeners he was known as the Crocus King, and with good reason. Maurice Mantle, a gardener at Myddelton in the 1930s, remembered six or seven hundred different bulbs growing in the kitchen garden’s cold frames. Many of these had been sent to Bowles by horticultural gardens, and some of them were extremely rare. Bowles was proud of the fact that his was possibly the most comprehensive crocus collection in the world. At the western end of the kitchen garden wall, next to the steps, you can see where, in 1887 Bowles, his brother, Henry Ferryman Bowles, and a Cambridge friend, TAH, carved their initials into the bricks.

< Back 5. Bowling Green Lawn 5. Bowling Green Lawn Artist Name 00:00 / 02:21 Narrator: In 1914, Bowles wrote: Voice of Bowles: I have never felt disgust for variegated foliage evinced by so many good gardeners and in many cases I warmly admire it. SFX: Sound of children playing games/laughter Narrator: At the far end of the lawn there are two large beds of variegated plants that Bowles referred to as “Tom Tiddlers Ground ”. – He named them after an old children’s game – Tom Tiddler . The aim of the game was for a child to defend a patch of ground, which was supposed to be where he kept a store of gold and silver. In these two beds Bowles applied a loose theme to his planting – with golden leaved plants to one side, silver leaves in the middle and purple leaved plants on the other side. The larch tree – or Larix Decidua - at the edge of the bed was planted in 1985 to replace an earlier one, which was thought to have grown here for around 280 years. History of the Bowling Green Lawn Narrator: This lawn is named after Bowling Green House -– a large Elizabethan building that stood here until the early 19th century. The path here is where the drive was located that ran up to the original house from the road. Bowling Green House was home to Bowles’s 18th century ancestors, the Garnaults. - It is possible that the house took its name from a bowling green that existed here in the days when the Royal Palace of Elsinge stood nearby - in the grounds of what is now Forty Hall. The palace was demolished in the mid-17th century. Recently, excavations and surveys were carried out to pinpoint the exact position of Bowling Green House on the lawn, but they only revealed bits of debris and bricks – nothing to give a real sense of the fine building that once stood here. In 1799, on the day Anne Garnault married the print seller and publisher Henry Carrington Bowles, she planted a swamp cypress at the eastern end of the lawn. It grew to be 80 feet tall, before it blew down in the great storm of 1987.

< Back 4. Pond area and Conservatory 4. Pond area and Conservatory Artist Name 00:00 / 03:14 Narrator: The pond is not a natural feature of the garden. It was created when Myddelton House was built in the early nineteenth century. The heart-shaped area formed when workmen were excavating for the soil and gravel that were used to create the raised ground on which the house stands. The pond was originally lined with clay to make it watertight. - This process is known as ‘puddling’. But there must have been a hole somewhere – because the pond always leaked. A spur of the New River used to run through the garden and the pond was topped up from it, through a pipe with a stopcock. But this water proved unsuitable for some aquatic plants, which failed to thrive. Bowles wrote: Voice of Bowles: The New River water comes chiefly from chalk wells of great depth, and therefore is hard enough to look blue, and cold enough in summer to make you look blue, if you were in it for long . Narrator: Because of this Bowles had to plant tougher British native species in the pond - many of which he collected on visits to the Norfolk Broads and the Cambridgeshire Fens. But some water lilies grew well here. A former gardener, Charlie Smith remembered how the lilies grew so thickly that ducks could run from one side of the pond to the other without getting their feet wet. After the New River was filled in in the 1960s the pond all but dried up. Since then it has been completely re-lined – this time with rubber lining. Now the water stays inside it! Victorian Conservatory Narrator: Bowles kept seawater tanks in the Victorian conservatory. He filled them with seaweed, sea urchins and fish. Each week the seawater was changed. It came from barrels that were brought by rail to the local station. Bowles also kept rocks and minerals inside the conservatory. – He collected many of these during his plant hunting expeditions. You can still see some of them in there, [OU1] along with other curiosities. - There is a carved stone, which came from the old St Paul’s Cathedral that burnt down in the Great Fire of London. And there is an 18th century lead cistern that Bowles used to hold rainwater for his fern collection.[OU2] These objects are just an example of the numerous items that Bowles brought to Myddelton, to add interest and variety to his garden. You will come across many more as you explore the grounds. Let’s hear from Wesley Kerr, the chairman of the Heritage Lottery Fund committee: Wesley Kerr : Myddleton house, very much, in its 4 acres embodies that idea of the genius of place. The water courses, the rocks, the hills in the distance, the mansion. But it’s also a cabinet of curiosities of architectural ornaments like the old market cross, the ancient walls, the Irishman’s shirt, the outbuildings and they all move to a forefront at different times of the year when the planting near them makes you look at them.

< Back 10. Wild Garden 10. Wild Garden Artist Name 00:00 / 01:45 Narrator: Bowles believed that ‘one might as reasonably expect figs from thistles as good fern fronds in this dry garden’. However, a visit to a winter meeting of the RHS and encouragement from a friend persuaded him to clear an area on the north side and plant the ‘promised cartload of treasures’ his friend had given him. The bed prospered for some years before it was eventually abandoned. Bryan Hewitt can tell us some more about this wild garden. Bryan Hewitt: Mr Bowles doesn’t give an explanation quite what the idea of the thing was in the wild garden, but we take it to mean it was an area of minimal maintenance. Narrator: When Bowles was in charge, shrubs, crocus, colchicum and snowdrops grew here. Some of the older planting was destroyed during the great storm in 1987. Here is Bryan Hewitt again: Bryan Hewitt: there was a vast … black poplar … and that had been planted by Sam Howard in 1911. In 1959 I know it was recorded as being a height of 111ft and it was such a magnificent tree that it was recorded in Alan Mitchell’s book about trees of note in the British Isles. But that came down in the storm and it fell squarely across a nice big, expensive Haddenstone pot which had just been put there as a centrepiece in the wild garden; it smashed it to pieces. And also in that area was some box trees that were at least a hundred years old. Narrator: On a positive note, the storm created an open area that let in more sunlight to give the current gardeners new planting opportunities.

< Back 14. Restoration Work 14. Restoration Work Artist Name 00:00 / 01:24 Narrator: Near the potting shed door you can see a brick inscribed with the date, 1859, and the initials of an early head gardener, George Hyde. In 2009, Heritage Lottery funding paid for restoration work on the potting shed, a Peach House and the cold frames that once stood here. It was while they were carrying out research for this project that members of the E A Bowles of Myddelton House Society discovered the original drawings for the trellis panels on the nearby wall. Bryan Hewitt explains: Bryan Hewitt: There was not much left of the trellis at all, but the brick columns were still there and they were covered in a canopy of an old rose and an Akebia quinata from Japan, a climber, which had sort of crushed it and covered it over. And all this area was cleared and for a time we had these five stark red brick pillars with nice capping stones on and that was all. And in Mr Bowles’ scrapbook was found the plan that he’d drawn up himself of the beautiful design of the trellis as he had it in his time. Narrator The Society funded their restoration to these original designs. The potting shed has been faithfully restored and now houses the gardening team’s rest room, a viewable potting area and an archive room.

< Back 7. Wisteria Bridge 7. Wisteria Bridge Artist Name 00:00 / 01:17 Narrator: This bridge gets its name from the fine old wisteria that grows here. Its trunk has become thicker and more characterful since Bowles’ time. But even then this plant was special. In 1941 Bowles wrote that the previous year it had been ‘the star turn of the garden’. It already covered about 25 yards of wall and had climbed to the top of the yew tree. When it flowers it is a beautiful sight from the road. One passer-by was overheard telling a friend, “It’s what they call a Blueburnum”. The wisteria is most striking in May, when it is covered in long, pendulous stems of lilac flowers. By late summer or autumn it bears a crop of what look like imitation runner beans. These are seed pods, which are covered in fine, short hairs that all point downwards. When they are seen from above the pods appear silver, but from below we see only the tips of the hairs and they look green. In Bowles’s time two lead ostriches stood here. Now you can see these on display in the Visitors’ Centre.