Records of the Milford Haven Estate

Milford Haven estate letter books, 1920-1944; accounts, 1893-1942, rentals, 1894-1924, land values, 1910-1915, and deeds and documents, 1708-1964.

Milford Haven, Pembrokeshire was a new town, built following an Act of Parliament of 1790 which granted to Sir William Hamilton the powers to make quays, establish markets, make docks, roads and avenues. Sir William made his nephew, Charles Greville, responsible for the enterprise, and, after Sir William's death, the estate passed to Charles, who died in 1809. He was succeeded by his brother, Robert Fulke Greville, who took little interest in the town. He died in 1824. His son, also named Robert Fulke Greville, inherited the estate, and in 1853 he came to live at Castle Hall, to which he made extensive additions, and spent large amounts of his own money building a wooden pier and hotel for the Irish traffic, two bridges across Milford's two pills and obtaining an Improvement Act for the town. He ran out of money, and the estate became so heavily mortgaged that when he died, in 1867, it passed to the National Provident Institution, which began in earnest the work of building docks at Milford. The Estate Company had a chequered career- it spent large sumes of money to keep its houses in good repair, and the Newton Noyes railway became something of a 'white elephant'. An agent was appointed to administer the estate, which had been bought by Sir Hugh James Protheroe Thomas in 1920. Sir Hugh sold off much of the estate between 1920 and 1924, when he died following an operation for appendicitis. The Newton Noyes railway and pier were purchased by Messrs Thomas W. Ward of Sheffield for a ship-breaking yard, and in 1934 the Admiralty acquired the pier and part of the railway for the Royal Navy Mines Depot. Castle Hall was surplus to the Admiralty's requirements and demolished.

Arranged chronologically and into two groups by deposit: Group One contains letter books, accounts, rentals, land values, and miscellaneous; and Group Two contains deeds and documents.

No restrictions

Deposited by Mrs J. Knowles of 24 Hamilton Terrace, Milford Haven, in October 1978, and by Mr M. J. Cornock, Curator of Milford Haven Museum, The Docks, Milford Haven in September 199[ ].

Compiled by Mair James for the HMC/NLW Family and Estates project. The following source was used in the compilation of this description: Pembrokeshire Record Office, Catalogue of the records of the Milford Haven Estate

Hard copies of the catalogue are available at Pembrokeshire Record Office and the National Register of Archives

Usual copyright regulations apply.

All records deposited at the Pembrokeshire Record Office have been retained.

Accruals are not expected