| Administrative History | The estate was founded by Robert Holden (1594-1660), second son of Henry Holden of Wilne (Great Wilne in Aston parish) and his second wife, daughter of Robert Wilmot esquire of Derby and Spondon.
Henry may have originated from Findern, but little is known of the family's early history, although he settled in Aston about 1569 (see D779/T/149). Henry seems to have prospered and was able to leave £100 to each of the six children of his second marriage in his will which was proved in March 1610. Presumably his small estate descended, together with his chiefly leasehold property, to his eldest son and heir John. It was, however, Henry's second son, Robert who founded the Aston estate, perhaps using his father's legacy to fund the early years of his career along with the proceeds of rearing beef cattle (see D779/B/36). However, Henry made no direct contribution to the Holdens' Aston estate and strictly none of his documents survive here.
Robert was leasing property in the Wilne area from 1617, but his first known purchases were elsewhere, in Mapperley, Osmaston by Derby and probably Belper (1631-c1640). In 1647, he bought the lease of Weston manor, Hall and desmesnes and in March 1648 he purchased the freehold of the manor, Hall and lands in Weston, Aston, Wilne and Shardlow. Meanwhile, he had purchased Aston Hall with its relatively small estate in February 1648. The advowsons of Aston and Weston were bough later in the same year.
The purchases of 1647 and 1648 cost nearly £6000 but evidence as to how Robert Holden became so wealthy is scanty. What there is points to his involvement in raising or fattening cattle for the market. Robert's sons seem also to have been involved in what was a family business, continued for at least two years after Robert's death in 1660, but whether for longer is not known. Robert settled Weston Hall with lands, together with his Osmaston and Mapperley properties, on his eldest surviving son Henry, but Aston Hall, lands and advowson were settled on Samuel, his second surviving son. Robert also divided the manor of Weston (that is the lordship and royalties, not the land) among three of his sons. As a result of these and other dispositions made by him and some sales, neither Henry nor Samuel had a large inheritance.
Samuel did not add to his inheritance and much of the property purchased by Robert was lost to the family by 1681 (see D779/T/209 and many of the documents from D779/T/224 to D 779/T/319). His son, another Robert (died 1746) and a highly successful lawyer added considerably to the relatively small estate he had inherited, and also rebuilt Aston Hall. He extended his property beyond Aston and Weston, including in Long Eaton, Little (Church) Wilne, including Wilne Hall, and Sawley. He also bought a lease of the prebend of Sawley and (Little) Wilne in 1733, and after his death lands in Leicestershire further enlarged the family's holdings.
Robert II's only child Mary married James Shuttleworth esquire of Gawthorp and Forcett (Yorkshire), MP for Preston, in 1742. Between the deaths of Robert in 1746 and James Shuttleworth in 1772, further property in Aston was added to the estate, together with a substantial property in Halstead and Tilton (Leicestershire). Mary and James' eldest surviving son inherited the Shuttleworth estate but Aston was intended for the next son. In fact, it was Charles, their fifth and second surviving son, who eventually inherited the whole of the Holden estate, half from his deceased brothers, the remainder from his mother on her death in 1791. Charles took the name Holden.
The Reverend Charles (Shuttleworth) Holden made no significant contribution to the estate, except for an attempt to develop plaster (gypsum) pits, including the building of a railway from the pits to the canal at Shardlow. His son Edward Anthony Holden, who succeeded him in 1821, made numerous purchases of houses and land in Aston between 1827 and about 1868. So far as is known, the estate in the Aston area was now complete and now consisted of over 1500 acres in Derbyshire, mostly in Aston parish, and nearly 500 acres in Leicestershire. Exactly when the Halstead and Tilton estate was sold is uncertain as the evidence is unclear, but it must have been in the latter half of the 19th century.
On the death of Edward Anthony Holden in 1877, his grandson Edward Charles Shuttleworth Holden succeeded to the estate. Perhaps because of over-generous settlements made on his large family by E A Holden, E C S Holden sold the Aston estate in 1898 to William Dickson Winterbottom, a bookcloth manufacturer in Manchester. E C S Holden fought in the Boer War and later married and had one son. He died in 1916. Major W D Winterbottom died in 1924 and the Aston estate was sold in lots, the Hall becoming a hospital. |
| Custodial History | These documents were deposited in the Derbyshire Record Office in March 1970, February 1971 and November 1972, by Messrs Moody and Woolley solicitors of Derby. |