Collection AR1057 - Records of the Byron Family of Coulsdon Court

The Bryons were Lords of the Manor and residents of Coulsdon from the purchase of the Manor in 1782 until the sale of the estate and its dispersal in 1921.

Thomas (1) had no children and the manor was inherited by his nephew, Thomas (2) (1772-1845) before passing to the eldest son, Thomas (3) (1809-1863). Thomas married his cousin, Julia Jeffreys (1813-1899), daughter of Thomas’s aunt, Charlotte, who married Revd. John Jeffreys. Thomas and Julia are the first members of the family to feature significantly in the Byron Collection AR1057.

Thomas and Julia’s only child, Edmund (1843-1921) inherited the estate in 1863. He married Charlotte Jeffreys (1845-1908) in 1867. This was also a first cousin marriage into the Jeffreys family, Charlotte being the daughter of her Edmund’s uncle, Gen. Edmund Jeffreys. Consequently, they, and their five children who survived into adulthood (one daughter died at the age of 5) and the grandchildren, features relatively prominently in the Byron Collection

The manor and all the estate were sold and dispersed upon Edmund’s death in 1921 with his children as the primary inheritors.

The children of Edmund and Charlotte were:
Lucy (1868-1967), who married Theodore Hall Hall. They had one child, Owen.

Thomas (1869-1940), who did not marry. Emigrated to Canada.

Cecil (1870-1911), who married Katharine McAfee. They emigrated to Canada. Two children died in infancy; one son survived into adulthood, Arthur (1906-1984). Arthur wrote a family history, which was privately printed and a copy is held by Croydon Museum and Archives.

Eric (1875-1964), who married Margaret Daisy Robinson. Eric stayed in England; he is the main recipient of personal family letters held by the archive and he is the one who essentially amassed and preserved the Byron archives. He donated an important archive to the Museum of Croydon in 1934, AR384.
Eric and Margaret Daisy had three children. The oldest, Robert (1905-1941), did not marry. He was a renowned author of travel books, art historian and political campaigner; the second was Anne (1909-1977), who married Percy Charlesworth; and the youngest was Lucy (1912-2009). It was Lucy who took on custodianship of the archive.

Mary Eva (1880-1964), who married Charles Hilton. Eva was the youngest child of Edmund and Charlotte. Eva and Charles had no children.

Lucy Byron later married Ewan Butler (married 1934-1955) and Ewan’s brother, Rohan (married 1956); Lucy and Ewan had three daughters, the youngest of whom, Setitia (1946-2017), donated the archive (AR1057) to Croydon Museum over 2010-2012. Following her death, her husband, Anthony Simmonds, assumed any copyright issues relating to the Byron papers and archives.

Family trees are available in:
• Elliott, Nigel (2020) The Byrons of Coulsdon: Abroad and at Home, Bourne Society, Surrey, p.XIX.
• Scales, Ian (2000) ‘The Byrons of Coulsdon’ in Ian Scales (ed.) Bourne Society Village Histories 5: Coulsdon, Bourne Society, Surrey, p.48. These two family trees serve to complement each other in the periods covered. The volume by Elliott has a specific focus on the Byron archive, drawing extensively upon it.
• The Museum of Croydon holds a copy of a handwritten and comprehensive family tree running from the seventeenth century through to the 1970s/1990s, including the ties with the Jeffreys family. This was produced as a working research document and may be used in conjunction with the published family trees.
• Byron, Arthur (1982) A Short History of the Byron and Jeffrey Families, privately printed. This work may also be consulted for reference. The book is primarily text based rather than providing family trees but it takes the reader through the generations of these two families in a structured manner. A copy is held by the Museum of Croydon.