Henry Lytton Cobbold

2024 has been a year of significant distractions – from the very sad death to cancer of my mother in the Spring, followed by the clearing of her house, full to the brim with every vestige of my parents’ busy and full eight decades; to the very happy birth of two bonny grandchildren in the last six months; to an autumn of successive film companies stripping Knebworth House to its floorboards and removing all its furniture and decorations, repainting its walls and then repainting them all again.  These momentous events alongside all the regular activity of Knebworth Park, and farm, woodland & estate business has left little time for book production.

However the constant for me in 2024, through all this, has been a fascinating and deep delve into our archive to compile a scrapbook to celebrate 50 years of Knebworth Park concerts.  Knebworth Park is a rare concert venue with continuity of management, an archive and an archivist, so we have literally thousands of photographs, piles of books of newspaper cuttings, boxes stuffed with event t-shirts, walls of event posters, drawers of old tickets, and every type of memento of half a century of our music history.  It has been good fun to go through all this and to condense it down into a single album of colourful scrapbook layouts covering every one of our major concerts since 1974.

The distractions of the year, however, have made the book late.  It was originally scheduled to appear in the summer.  Then some of you very kindly pre-ordered it in September for a declared November release.  Thank you for your patience.  As this magazine is published it should be finished, but unavoidably copies will not appear from the printers for another few weeks.  It’s almost here!  I’m not changing the title to “51 Years of the Greatest Rock Venue in World!”

Henry Lytton Cobbold
@HenryCobboldKH

One of the great privileges of being the current custodians of Knebworth House is walking our dog every evening in its beautiful gardens.  In the twenty-four years Martha and I have done this we have particularly enjoyed watching the gardens evolve, not only through the seasons, but through the decades, little bits of progress, one step back, two steps forward…

Losing treasured trees to old age or disease is the most painful part of loving this garden, so I have especially valued the wood carvings that we have commissioned to give lost trees something of an afterlife.  When we started doing this back in 2003, the artist we worked with was Stevenage-resident Dennis Heath.  Two decades later Dennis’s very fine – always fun and fantastical, idiosyncratic and imaginative – chainsaw carvings are to be found all over Knebworth House gardens.

We have recently received the sad news of Dennis’s death.  He is in my thoughts every evening as I admire his sculptures.  What a unique talent he had.  Farewell Dennis – hoc virtutis opus famam extendere factis (as the Lytton motto goes) – you live on in your beautiful work.

Henry Lytton Cobbold
@HenryCobboldKH

Amongst the many fascinating historical items that came to Knebworth House with The Cobbold Family History Trust charity when it relocated here in 2022, is over 500 very lovely and intricate papercuts made by Elizabeth Cobbold (1767-1824) of Holywells Park, Ipswich.  17^th October is the bicentenary of Elizabeth’s death, and so I have been preparing a book celebrating this unique aspect of her legacy.  Papercuts are but one arrow in her creative bow.  This remarkable woman was also a poet, a novelist, a geologist, a character who appears in Charles Dickens’ “The Pickwick Papers” and – perhaps most impressively – stepmother to fifteen, and mother to an additional seven, Cobbold children.

Papercutting art is as old as paper, but although paper was first produced in China almost two thousand years ago, what we know as paper did not reach Europe until the 13^th Century.  Papercutting has never been a particularly English art, so Elizabeth’s very fine work stands out as special, and I think underappreciated.  Looking at the example reproduced here, I marvel at the hours it must have taken to cut out each of these leaves – and how she found those hours with 22 children running around the house!  But the result is very splendid.

Henry Lytton Cobbold
@HenryCobboldKH

Donating household items from my late mother’s home to the YMCA charity shop in Knebworth High Street, Martha and I were delighted to be offered a fine original edition of “Letters of Constance Lytton” kindly held back for Knebworth House by the shop’s Nicola Latimer.  We happily paid £10 for the book (+ Gift Aid, register if you haven’t).

The hardback has two photographs tucked in it of my great-great-aunt Constance, one sat with an elderly lady and the other petting a beautiful dog.  Our Archives team did not recognise the dog, but they did recognise the lady as Frau Betty Oser, Constance’s beloved Austrian piano teacher.  Frau Oser, who had been admired by Brahms, was a pupil and good friend of Clara Schumann, with whom she travelled to England in 1881.  Beyond inspiring Constance to become a fine pianist, Frau Oser became a good friend of the Lytton family, and we have another photo in our Archive of her sitting with Constance’s mother Edith, in front of Constance and two unidentified ladies.

The inscription handwritten on the book’s flyleaf reveals its original owner as ‘Hedwig Pauli’.  Our bloodhound-of-the-keyboard archivist, Jill Campbell, quickly discovered that this was Frau Oser’s niece.  Perhaps she is one of the ladies in the photograph?  How this book came to be in the Knebworth YMCA charity shop is a mystery we will probably never solve.  But I returned to the shop to donate an extra £20 for this treasured fine and for Nicola’s thoughtfulness in putting it aside for us.

Henry Lytton Cobbold
@HenryCobboldKH

“Aujourd’hui on va à la plage” – a jaunty ditty that featured heavily in our children’s French homework 25 years ago, returned from somewhere deep in my brain to accompany me on the splendid Knebworth Twinning weekend we spent in Châtelaillon-Plage.  Martha and I joined the Knebworth delegation at La Fête du Jumelage and paraded up the beautiful seaside town’s main street to the brilliant accompaniment of the Knebworth Primary School Drummers – what a credit to Knebworth they were!

Knebworth was celebrated the length of the parade route with all things British and all things Knebworth, including, from our end of the village, giant images of Knebworth House, Knebworth House Garden’s Dinosaurs, Knebworth Park’s rock heritage and – a backcloth to fine dance performances to Queen’s “We Will Rock You” and Robbie Williams’ “Angels” by enthusiastic locals of all ages – a giant Cobbold coat-of-arms featuring my grandfather’s two labradors.  We were treated like royalty – in the English sense, perhaps, rather than the French!  (No guillotine at the end of the parade.)  Although it is the case that Châtelaillon’s region, Poitou-Charentes, is historically more royalist than the rest of France, and of course once-upon-a-time was ruled by English kings.

The very warm and welcoming Mayor of Châtelaillon, however, spoke no English at all, so, sat next to him at some very generous and deliciously creamy dinners, I had to call on my O-Level French from 50 years ago.  I did my best to make conversation more interesting than what ‘Pierre’ and ‘Françoise’ got up to in my 1970s French Textbook – days spent at school, visits to the farm and the zoo… although I am grateful ‘Pierre’ and ‘Françoise’ did, usefully, spend their vacances à la plage!  Required – and keen – to honour the Mayor with a gracious thank you speech in French I was thankfully coached by our excellent Knebworth delegation leader Rob Smith (who along with Ann Judge, Ruth Burr and all the KTA team are owed huge thanks for the brilliant organisation of this very special weekend) and managed it with sufficient Inspector Clouseau accent to receive polite applause from the assembled French, although of course it did help to end with some trusted Franglais, “C’était un weekend superb!”

Henry Lytton Cobbold
HenryCobboldKH

“STATELY HOME IS GOING POP”, wrote The Evening News in May 1974, “A Stately Home is to open up its gates to thousands of discerning fans in a summer pop extravaganza.  A one-day event of modern progressive music will take place in Knebworth Park, Herts., on Saturday July 20 and it is thought that up to 100,000 may attend.”  And so it began.  On 20^th July 1974   The Allman Brothers, The Doobie Brothers and Van Morrison became the first Knebworth Concert headliners.  It’s a shame that Van Morrison is not coming back this Saturday 20^th July to mark the 50^th Anniversary of Knebworth Rock Concerts.  But in the absence of a 2024 concert, we will be marking the anniversary with an update of my 30^th Anniversary book, now entitled ‘Knebworth – 50 years of the greatest rock venue in the world!’.

Trying to find the perfect cover for the book, I set myself the challenge of making a denim jacket with a sewn patch of every headliner that has played Knebworth Park.  The challenge then was to find someone to sew every one of those hundred patches on!  Brilliantly Dogan Sahin at Knebworth Alteration took on the challenge, and the beautiful jacket will have made its debut by the time you read this on the Knebworth Twinning float in the Châtelaillon parade.  If you want to see the jacket – and I promise you it looks even better in colour – please join us for a talk I will be giving ‘Celebrating 50 Years of Knebworth Rock Concerts’ in Knebworth House on Wednesday 4^th September in aid of Knebworth Twinning.  Tickets from knebworthtwinning@gmail.com.

Henry Lytton Cobbold
@HenryCobboldKH

KHEPT Going For 40 Years!  The Knebworth House Education and Preservation Trust (KHEPT) charity is celebrating its 40th Anniversary.  Since its creation in May 1984, the charity has worked tirelessly to preserve, restore, interpret and provide access to Knebworth House and Gardens.  Its nine volunteer Trustees are immensely proud of the progress that has been made during that time.  Declared a ‘Priority Building At Risk’ by English Heritage, six phases of Knebworth House’s ten-phase urgent restoration progamme have been completed over four decades, through careful and creative management of limited resources.  The remaining four phases will require an eight-figure sum, but land designated for Local Plan development in KB2 has been donated to KHEPT which should significantly assist in completing this programme.

Pictured below are Trustees (prior to the local elections, L to R):  Cllr. Roger Willcocks, Chair of Knebworth Parish Council; David Morgan, retiring after a remarkable 32 years’ service; Marcus Taverner KC; Cllr Daniel Allen, Chair of North Herts Council; Morwenna Cobbold Bush; John Hoy; Cllr Myla Arceno, Mayor of Stevenage; Bob Rutter, Chair; and Edward Lytton Cobbold.  A visit to the new exhibition of Knebworth House’s use as a Film Location is indication of the progress KHEPT has made over 40 years.  The exhibit displays chronologically all 90 films that have been made here since 1956.  In the early ones Knebworth House tended to play run-down old ruins and forgotten gothic castles.  In the more recent ones the house has been playing palaces and home to royalty.  Knebworth House is clearly moving in the right direction and that is thanks to the commitment and dedicated work of KHEPT trustees over four decades.  Happy Anniversary KHEPT!

Henry Lytton Cobbold
@HenryCobboldKH

A few weeks before my father died in May 2022, from complications caused by Parkinson’s disease, my mother commissioned a stone bench for the Gardens of Knebworth House.  She asked that, when the time came, they both be buried in front of the bench in biodegradable coffins to become a part of the garden that they loved.  And so my father, David, was buried, two years ago, in a cardboard coffin decorated with the album artwork of Pink Floyd’s “The Dark Side of the Moon”.  This was his all-time favourite piece of music and was played religiously on Sunday mornings throughout my youth.

Pink Floyd themselves came to play “The Dark Side of the Moon” live in Knebworth Park in July 1975, and highlights from it again in 1990.  It was the soundtrack of my parents’ custodianship of Knebworth House, as the 18^th generation of the Lytton family to live here, and the generation that – in the 1970s – secured the house’s future by diversifying into public opening, rock concerts, filming, etc. and beginning the long process of this historic house’s restoration and survival into the 21^st Century.  My mother left a place for herself next to my father, and had carved on the bench the words, “SEE YOU ON THE DARK SIDE OF THE MOON”.

A year after my father’s death, my mother was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.  She fought this wretched disease bravely for nine months, but it finally got the better of her in the first week of April.  We buried Chryssie next to David late in the day on Monday 8^th April, in the brief moment when – extraordinarily – the Earth was actually on the dark side of the Moon, during a lunar eclipse.  The next day The Times printed a full-page obituary, but what brought tears to our eyes was the large image on the front of the newspaper of the dark side of the moon.

There will be a Memorial Service for Chryssie at 3pm on Monday 6^th May at St Martin’s Church.  We would be delighted if those that knew and loved her would like to attend and ask only that you let me know in advance at the email address below.

Henry Lytton Cobbold
@HenryCobboldKH

If you saw Knebworth House in Episode 4 of the Netflix show “The Gentleman”, what were you doing watching such nonsense?  And no, the mad old boy running around naked at the beginning was not a cameo from me.  We, of course, love Knebworth House being used in movies and TV shows, however silly they might be, because movies provide a repair fund to tackle those restoration projects which, even if they are not the urgent ones, make such a big difference to visitors’ experience of the House.

A good example is this wallpaper, which was recently restored thanks to funds from film work.  Film work can be problematic for wallpaper, because it doesn’t like the mist that Directors of Photography like to use to add atmosphere to a room.  So it has been a particular pleasure to see this example recently restored with film funds.  Rather than reprinting the wallpaper, the work is done by repairing the paper and stenciling back the pattern.  This piece is from the 1840s and displays the Lytton family motto, ‘Hoc Virtutis Opus’.

I have always struggled to make sense of this motto – it translates along the lines of ‘This is Virtue’s Work’, and I have never really understood what that means.  Not like the Cobbold motto, ‘Rebus Angustis Fortis’ – ‘Courage Through Adversity’ – which I have always found a very helpful mantra.  But recently we found the origin of ‘Hoc Virtutis Opus’, and now, suddenly, it makes sense.  It is about good deeds extending beyond one’s lifetime.  It is from Virgil’s “The Aeneid” and the full quote translates as, “To each his day is given; man’s brief and irretrievable time runs by; but to prolong life’s fame with great deeds, this is virtue’s work.”

Henry Lytton Cobbold
@HenryCobboldKH

The Aladdin’s Cave of Local History that is the Knebworth House Archive received another fine magic lamp for the summoning up of the stories of the past when it took possession of three Minute Books of Knebworth Tenants Ltd, covering the period from 1912 to 1976.  Knebworth Tenants Ltd was set up in 1912 as a co-partnership scheme that would purchase houses being built in Knebworth Garden Village.  It still exists as a non-profit Housing Society.

The minutes from 21 March 1912 give us a glimpse of its beginnings, when a number of tenders “for building cottages to Mr Peplar’s plans and specification were considered, and it was decided to accept (Mr) Dearman’s price of £665 for the block of four and £369.6.0 for the pair with (an) extra parlour, of which two pairs were ordered.”  These are now 44-56 Stockens Green.  On 18 April 1912 Mr Peplar reported that Garden Villages Ltd had arranged a ceremony to include “the cutting of the first sod for the Knebworth Tenants cottages, provision of tea, etc.”  By 1916, in the midst of World War One, some of the cottages were rented by the Belgian Relief Committee of the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies to house Belgian refugees.  In August 1919, the Committee was informed of “a report of overcrowding at one of the Society’s cottages, and also of alleged illegal practices of a visitor at the same cottage.  With regard to the former the Secretary was instructed to enquire discretely into the actual facts, and as regards the latter to report the matter at Scotland Yard”!

As I say, the books are a precious resource of Knebworth stories, but to me the most splendid story they bring is that the genie behind the magic lamp, the Society’s current secretary Lynne Farr, has been in post doing that work for an extraordinary 50 years of Knebworth’s history.

Henry Lytton Cobbold
@HenryCobboldKH