La Haule Manor
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Perhaps it is worthwhile putting together the history of La Haule as the various deeds kept there show its continuous history for the last five centuries. The earliest deed is dated 1430 and is the will of Guillaume du Marest, who was a jure-justicier in 1497 and Lieutenant for Thomas Danyell, Bailiff, when he used for his seal the letters G M with a crown above. (Editor: this date cannot be correct. Records of Jurats in the 14th and 15th century are incomplete, but in Jerripedia's listing Guille (or Guillot) Dumaresq is shown as Jurat between 1403 and 1413, and Thomas Danyell was Bailiff between 1406 and 1425).
Family
He had married a daughter of Jacques de Beaucamp, as is shown in a Guernsey contract of 1430, when James Coquerel was Bailiff. This contract shows that Oliver Le Loe, son of Oliver, owes Pierre Nicolas, Attorney of Guille du Marest of Jersey, and Lucas de la Mare, attorney of Jennette de Beaucamp, widow of Guille Morin, (Jure-Justicier in Jersey 1415-1429) deceased, two quarters of rente on land in St Sampson's, Guille du Marest's wife and her sister being daughters of Jacques de Beaucamp and heirs of Philip de St Martin.
By his will Guille du Marest left to his elder daughter, wife of Perrot Nicolas of Guernsey, the manor of La Haule, with its gardens, the côtils of Mont de la Rocque (the hill west of the present Mont au Roux, or La Haule Hill) with the meadow near to the Spring, the neuf clos in front of the yard, the mielles or sand dunes, the côtils of Mont es Vales (the hill East of the present La Haule Hill) some fields at the top of this hill, le camp es potirons, le clos Jehanne de la Haule, le rondin, le clos de la hougue, with the house in it, le camp au geon, and some other bits of land. This shows that La Haule owned then, as it does now, the valley of Mont au Roux with the cotils on both sides.
The younger daughter, married to John Payn, Seigneur of Samares, received the house in St Ouen and, among the fields, the clos de Vincheles. I think that this shows that the original home of this Dumaresq, as of those who came later to La Haule, was St Ouen and not, as Mr Messervy thought, St Brelade.
A Philippe du Marais is, however, mentioned as belonging to St Brelade in 1309 and in 1331 John du Marais is one of the jurors of that parish. The fact that Guille du Marest left only two daughters shows that the Armorial is wrong in making him the ancestor of all the Dumaresqs.
Perrot Nicolas, husband of the heiress of La Haule, is mentioned in 1433 as guardian to the children of Michel Le Feyvre, Seigneur of Vincheles de Bas. The Nicolases were an old Guernsey family of whom three are mentioned in 1309 as owing rentes to the Prior of the Vale on the Vale Mills. From one of these Perrot was descended. From the the Croniques of Mont St Michel we learn that Perrot himself was Jurat in Guernsey 1428 to 1444 and was captain of La Marie, one of the three Guernsey ships with the fleet at Rouen, 20 June 143S, the other two captains being Denis Le Marchant and Edmond Henry.
Perrot Nicolas left two children; Jenette, married first to Thomas de la Cour of Guernsey and secondly to Raulin Lempriere, Seigneur of St John, Jersey, and James Nicolas, who inherited La Haule.
Payment failures
James died before 1479, as a Guernsey deed of that date mentions that Hon Homme Drouet Le Marchant is granted possession of a house near the Town Church (mentioned in a deed of 1367) which belonged to James Nicolas son of Pierre deceased, at the failure of the heirs to appear and guarantee payment of rentes and arrears due.
For the same reason La Haule escheated to the Crown in 1488 "a cause de la renunciation des hers de James Nicolas pour payer les rentes sur ledit manoir et un quartier de froment de rente et deux capons annuellement au recepte du roi".
That same year John Cowper places before the Court a deed of sale signed by Matthew Baker, Governor of the Island, by which, in the name of the King, he sells the manor of La Haule to John Cowper and his wife. Cowper did not keep it long for in 1498 he sells it to Nicolas Vallepy and Collette his wife and afterwards to the heirs of John Vallepy his son. Cowper appears not to have departed. In 1500 he was condemned to leave the house and deliver it to Nicolas Vallepy. In a contract of 1501, when Cowper sells Vallepy a piece of land near La Haule, called 'la tocque', Vallepy is called Nicolas Vallepy dit genvryn.
In 1513 La Haule changed hands for the last time, when Nicolas Vallepy sold it to Thomas du Marest (son of John, son of Jacquet, son of Nicolas) of St Ouen, who had fought for a share of the property of Katherine de Vincheles, but had finally given up Vinclieles de Haut to Richard de Carteret after compensation had been given. This Thomas du marest was Jurat in 1504 till his death between 1526 and 1529.
He married Georgette daughter of Guille Hamptonne (Jurat 1470-1505). La Haule came from father to son till the death of Elie Dumaresq in 1644, when it passed to his sister Suzanne, who married, as her second husband, Elie Maret.
The Dumaresqs added to the property. Between 1516 and 1546 they bought the lands of Simon Clement, whose house was probably in the fields below the cotils, as in 1516 Pierre du Heaulme sold Thomas du Marest a field on the hill above the house of Simon Clement touching the cotils of La Haule. Later, between 1552 and 1619, land was bought from Nicolas Le Boutillier, who lived near where later Blanc Pignon (now called Frontenac) was built. Mon Plaisir was built by Philip Marett in le clos du Boutillier and the field next to it still bears that name and these lands still form part of La Haule. In addition the Dumaresqs bought a great deal of land in the parish and Edward Dumaresq purchased in 1565 the Moulin desgoutepluye in St Aubin, which the Maretts kept till it was finally disposed of to the Jersey Railway Company.
New house
The present house was built in 1796 by Philip Marett, and he used a great deal of the material of the old house, incorporating the shaped tops of the old windows and doors in the walls. The present cellars are no doubt part of the main building of the older house, which seems to have faced the hill. The yard by which they are approached is much lower than the level of the present house and on the entrance door are the arms of Payn, the three trefoils.
One wonders why those arms are here and why these Dumaresqs never used the three escallops which were used by the Dumaresqs of Vincheles and Samares. Edward Dumaresq of La Haule, when Juge Délégue, in 1564, used as his seal the arms of Payn quartered with those of Hamptonne (his mother was a Hamptonne) and his great grandson Elie used the same seal. As no Payn appears in the pedigree as far back as 1453 it seems as if the Dumaresqs had no arms of their own, but that those of La Haule took the Payn arms from the builder of the original La Haule, while the branches of Vincheles and Samares, which both start from a Thomas Dumaresq, who married the heiress of Michelle Febvre, Seigneur of Vincheles, took either his arms or more probably those of Vincheles.
What was the chapel of the manor is now La Haule Cottage, "La fosse devant la chapelle" being the present road, the ancient fosse-way or water lane. The Colombier quarré (a square one) is still in existence.
Twice La Haule housed the artillery from St Aubin's Fort. An Act of the States of 30 June 30 1546, orders the soldiers to be discharged from St Aubin's Tower and sera lartillerie pouldres et aultres estancilles appertenantes a ladite tour mynses par escript et portes en garde a la meson de Edouard Dumaresq.
Sir John Peyton's order for the militia, 7 August 1621, contains this paragraph: "that for the surer keeping of the harbour of St Albons the Ordinances of the Compannyes (of the West) that come to the defence thereof to be placed in Mr la Hole's garden over against the Fort".
When the present road between La Haule and St Aubin was made, in 1844, the site of these guns was marked by openings left in the wall bounding the garden and can still be seen. Before this road was made, La Haule was cut off from St Aubin by a promontory called Le Croc, and there were cottages on the hillside where the avenue now is. These can be seen in a print published by J Brooks, Jersey, printed by W Clark, London.
Chevalier mentions that Sir Peter Osborne, after giving up the command of Castle Cornet in 1646, came to Jersey allant ala haulle ou il prit une chambre se tenant la luy et son train the latter consisting of a captain and four soldiers.
Plague casualties
The plague of 1626 carried off some 120 persons in St Brelade's parish including Elie Dumaresq of La Haule and his daughter Elizabeth. The St Brelade Register also mentions that five of the servants of the house were buried in the garden and fosse of La Haule, and there is a tradition that a Russian soldier, who met with an accidental death while helping to build the present house, is also buried there.
In 1587 Helier Dumaresq bought the Franc Fief de St Brelade lying in the parishes of St Brelade and St Peter, from Francoise, wife of Hugh Lempriere and daughter of Jean Langlois, who held the inheritance of Nicolas Gervaise, son of Thomas. With the fief he bought la maison du Franc Fief. Since that time the owners of La Haule have been Seigneurs du Franc Fief.
The fief is mentioned in the Extente of 1274 as the fief es Gervays, which, like La Hague, owed demi-relief. In the Rolls of the Assizes the fief is held by Philip Gervaise, who pays 5 sols greverie for it. He holds of the King "one carucate of land and owes relief and owes to the Lord the King the service of keeping the prisons and he ought to have one pair of irons and if more are wanted the lord the King ought to find them. And they say that all the tenants residing in the fee owe to the lord the King fumage except only the chief messuage . The Seigneur has to come to the three principal courts of the King without summons."
In the Extente of 1331 the fief is mentioned as paying 15 sols a year. The fief remained in the hands of the Gervaise family till 1546 when Nicolas Gervaise, son of Thomas, renounced it and it was sold to Sire Philip Langlois. In 1553 it belonged to John Langlois' daughter, who sold it to Helier Dumaresq in 1587. In 1607 it is said that Richard Bisson owes suit of Court for the Franc Fief. Helier Dumaresq was then dead and his eldest son a minor, so probably Richard was representing the son. Richard was the son of Helier Dumaresq's first wife by a previous marriage.
The old house of the Franc fief in 1630 belonged to David Bandinel "ayant droit de Elie Dumaresq fils Helier". Bandinel had married the daughter of Nicolas Gervaise. This house is probably the old house, Maison du Bas, belonging to J H Orange.
Boundaries
The boundary of the fief in St Brelade seems to be the two streams which meet at Pont Marquet, and in St Peter it is bounded by the road which runs from the Arsenal to Saut Faluet. The fief is the legal size of the older fiefs-a caruee (10 bouvees, 240 vergees).
The former burial place of the Seigneurs was under the altar of the Parish Church, Philip Marett, senior, being the last to be buried there in 1826.
The part in St Peter is probably the fieu de Bekalowe or Bequeloe. In 1274 Guille Gervaise had an acre in the Fief de Bekalowe. In 1309 Richard de St Clement held the fee of Bekeloye in St Peter containing 15 vergees and he pays 2 quarters of wheat rente, one hen and 2 deniers. In 1331 Guille Sotel and Robert Pastey pay ferme de Roi for a bouvee on the fief Bequeloe Extente.
In 1613 Thomas Dumaresq, the same year that he bought La Haule, also bought from John Le marcant in St Peter a field "seant es lan des beclone ou franc fief", which seems to show that by that time the fief bequeloe was incorporated in the Franc Fief.
It is interesting to note that in the Aveus of the fief at the end of the 18th century the fields in St Peter are mostly called "clos des landes".
The front pew in St Brelade's Church facing the pulpit belongs to La Haule and I have included in the deeds at the end of this article Susanne Dumaresq's claim in 1660 to these seats with the depositions of the oldest inhabitants, shewing that her ancestors had always been possessed of them.
The name de la Haule occurs as a surname in early times in Jersey and a Sieur de la Haulle, bailliage de St Lo, married a descendant of Jeanne d'Arc's niece. A Fief La Haule, St Andrew's, Guernsey, escheated to the Crown by 1331.
- La Haule, St Brelade
- La Haule, pictures of the area
- Descendants of Raoul Marett
- Maretts of Avranches Manor
- Dumaresqs of La Haule
