Midhurst: 5 things you didn't know about the town

Guy Fawkes worked as a footman for the Montagu family of Cowdray, the estate beside Midhurst. Wikipedia says he served the 1st Viscount Montagu and then the 2nd, and a page from West Horsley Place on the Gunpowder Plot agrees that he was a footman who moved to the 2nd Lord. That is a surprising start for a town that has a lot of history packed into it. Here are five more stories, with the doubts marked.

What the name means

Wikipedia says Midhurst was first recorded in 1186 as Middeherst, which it glosses as "middle wooded hill". That is the only source we found for it, so it is the commonly given meaning rather than a proven one.

The teenage MP

Charles James Fox was elected MP for Midhurst in 1768, while under the legal age. Born on 24 January 1749, he would have been 19, though one source says 20. Wikipedia's page on the constituency and the one on Fox describe the election. A seat in Parliament for someone still too young to take it is one of the stranger facts about the town.

Shakespeare's patron

Henry Wriothesley, 3rd Earl of Southampton, was born at Cowdray on 6 October 1573, according to the Wikipedia pages on Cowdray House and on the earl. Shakespeare dedicated Venus and Adonis to him.

A very small electorate

Midhurst sent two MPs to Parliament from 1311 to 1832. At the time of the Reform Act it had 41 qualified electors, and no more than 20 of them voted, says Wikipedia. The two-MPs part is given by two Wikipedia pages, but the figure of 41 is a single-source claim, and we could not confirm it in the History of Parliament.

Fire, water and a curse

Cowdray was largely destroyed by fire on 24 September 1793. George Browne, 8th Viscount Montagu, drowned in the Rhine within weeks. Wikipedia says it was "less than three weeks" later; other sources say the same week or a fortnight, so the exact interval is uncertain. The legend adds a curse, said to have been laid by a monk of Battle: that the family would die "by fire and water". It is a legend, and Wikipedia calls it a factitious one. A page from The Novium on Cowdray House covers the story too.

What we left out

We did not include stories that we could not confirm: a tale of cricket being played during Sunday prayer in 1637, or the idea that H. G. Wells based a fictional town on Midhurst. Neither is confirmed in any source we checked.

Visiting

Cowdray lies beside the town. We have not checked opening times or prices, so check Cowdray's own website before going.

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