The Grays at the Grange

Gerald Gray came from a farming background. He was born on 12th April
1884, the 3rd son of Alfred Gray who farmed 166 acres in Uffington.
His mother died when he was just 4yrs old leaving his father a widower with
4 children aged 2yrs to 8yrs. Alfred did not remarry until 1896 and Rose
Constance Walker, his 2nd wife, was 12yrs younger than him. They had 2
more sons and by the time the youngest was born in 1900 they had moved
to Granby Lodge in Bisbrooke Parish not far along the road to Uppingham
from Glaston. In 1916, when the Duke of Rutland’s estate was sold, Alfred
bought Manor Farm, Bisbrooke.
Gerald left home in his teens to spend some time in Stamford as a draper’s
apprentice but he came back and spent a number of years assisting his
father at Granby Lodge. He married Edith Amy Jennings at Glaston on 27th
December 1913 and they moved to the Grange about 1917.

Farming

The first time Gerald Gray appears in Dolby’s Directory (published in Stamford) as a Farmer in Glaston was in 1917 and he is then listed until his death forty years later. In 1941, he stated that he had occupied 116 acres in Glaston since 1900 so presumably his father had always rented some land from the Evans Frekes of Bisbrooke Hall. Certainly, he continued to work in close co-operation with his father. It may well be that the land attached to the Grange differed to that for previous tenants.
Initially it would have been rented from Percy Evans Freke, who had added to the estate that his parents had started collecting in Glaston and Bisbrooke. (He purchased the Grange in 1905.) Percy was killed in 1915 on active service in WW1 and the property passed to his widow Mrs Eva Evans Freke. Around about 1928, another 13 acres were added to the farm making a total of 140 acres.
About 60% of the soil was light and sandy with the rest divided between medium and heavy soils and about 60% was arable and 40% pasture for cattle and sheep. It was a mixed farm typical of the time. We can get a more complete picture at one point in time from the National Farm Survey of 1941. At that time the land, house and buildings were all in fair condition and he was paying rent of £192.
Cash crops were barley and oats with small acreages of wheat, peas and flax, altogether covering 40% of the farm. Another 20% was used for fodder and of the other 40%, 36 acres were used for grazing and 20 acres grass for cutting. He had 30 breeding ewes and 24 cattle including 2 in milk and 4 in calf. The non-milk cattle may have been part of a trading herd or he have have been overwintering them for his brother as he had earlier done for his father. He also had a dozen chickens.
There were always horses which Gerald was fond of and waggons were housed in the two open sheds. In 1941 there were still 4 mares & 2 geldings for agricultural use and 1 young heavy horse but no tractor. There was one 5hp engine but no electricity supply. Water in the fields came from springs and for the house and buildings from the well near the back door.
Gerald still had 2 workers on the farm in 1941 but this may have been reduced further as the War progressed. It is also likely that he was under pressure to decrease the land used for pasture and increase that for grain and vegetables in line with wartime agricultural policy.

Life at the Grange and in the Village

The Grange was a large house for two people but in their early days the Grays may well have had a domestic servant and possibly a farm servant living in. There were 8 rooms, 4 downstairs and 4 upstairs. The largest room beside the main road was the sitting room and it sounds as if it had a strong, secure feel – a big bookshelf, a roll top desk and high-backed settle. Books were valued and kept behind glass.
The current utility room (the ‘Shed’ since the 1980s) was a wash house with a brick boiler. The back door (which changed places with a sink later), led out into the farmyard. The kitchen, no doubt as ever, was a hub of activity with bacon hanging from the hooks on the ceiling. Some water from the well was pumped into the house via the larder but there were no flushing toilets and no electricity.

What was unusual was that Mrs Gray was always a working wife. Edith Jennings was
28yrs old and a schoolteacher when she married Gerald. She was born in Lambeth
in 1885, the youngest of 9 children, but her father died when she was about 6yrs old
and she seems to have spent much of her life living with her older siblings. She came
to Glaston in her teens with George Jennings, her eldest brother, who opened a
Coffee Tavern and store. She became a pupil teacher at Barrowden and taught there
for some years. It is surprising that she was able to retain her job after her marriage
however rules on married teachers were waived during the War and Bisbrooke Hall
School had already had a married teacher, Martha Shelton. When Mrs Shelton
retired, Mrs Gray became Head Mistress and was there for the next 30 years.
The children always went home for lunch and undoubtedly Mrs Gray did too. Gerald was diabetic and she took great care of his diet however she must surely have had domestic help to ensure she could carry out her required domestic duties as well as teach!

She had the reputation of being a good teacher in the context of the time – plenty of the 3Rs and corporal punishment on occasion. There were only 3 annual scholarships to Stamford available to Rutland schools and Mrs Gray did extremely well at getting them for her pupils. She was highly spoken of by her former pupils. On her retirement in 1953 she was awarded an M.B.E.
Gerald played an active part in many village activities. He was President of the Cricket Club lending a field for matches and was involved in reviving the Football Club in the mid-1920s. In 1927 it was reported in a local paper that he had taken the main part in a play in the Church Rooms. He was roped in as MC for fundraising events and was Churchwarden for a number of years.

Gerald died on 11 Sept 1947, aged 63yrs. His grave is in Glaston churchyard and the font cover in the church is inscribed “Given by his wife in memory of Gerald Grey Churchwarden 1918 – 1928”. It was made by Bowman’s of Stamford.

After his death, Edith moved to live with her widowed sister, Eliza Warren, in her bungalow, Holmleigh, Glaston Road, Bisbrooke. Her brother, George, now retired with his 2nd wife and her sister Maria Louise lived around the corner at The Briars and another widowed sister, Mrs Salthouse, lived next door at Hillside House. Of her 8 siblings, 6 were buried in Glaston churchyard. She outlived them all to die aged 80 at Rutland Nursing Home, Langham in 1966.