Local History Group - People
The Parish is dominated by 2 large houses - The Mynde and Bryngwyn.
The Mynde - Home of the Pyes and the Symons
Bryngwyn - James Rankin (25 Dec 1842 - 17 Apr 1915) was from a wealthy family, his father having made his fortune in the Canadian timber trade and from shipping. Upon his marriage, his father bought him the old estate of Bryngwyn, Much Dewchurch. A new Mansion was required, and Frederick Kempson was commissioned to design the building we see today.
He was elected the Member of Parliament for Leominster from 1880 to 1885, and from 1886 until the general election of 1906. He regained the seat in January 1910 and resigned in March 1912.
On the 1881 census, we see
He was made a Baronet on 20 June 1898, of Bryngwyn, Herefordshire, and was granted the following Arms
They are described as "Or a cinquefoil Gules between in chief a battleaxe erect between two boars' heads couped and in base a boar's head couped between two battleaxes erect Sable"
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He received a baronetcy and was High Sheriff of the county and Chief Steward of the City.
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| 20 Jun 1898 | 1 | James Rankin | 25 Dec 1842 | 17 Apr 1915 | |
| 17 Apr 1915 | 2 | Reginald Rankin | 31 Aug 1871 | 9 Sep 1931 | |
| 9 Sep 1931 | 3 | Hugh Charles Rhys Rankin | 8 Aug 1899 | 25 Apr 1988 | |
| 25 Apr 1988 | 4 | Ian Niall Rankin | 19 Dec 1932 |
| Sir Hugh was one of the very few baronets
who were born in the middle of the Tunisian desert. His father, Sir
Reginald, the 2nd baronet, was a big-game hunter who had shot the largest
snow-leopard on record in India and who had survived being frozen after
falling asleep in the Andes. Hugh
was educated at Harrow, but ran away to work in a Belfast shipyard before
joining the 1st Royal Dragoon Guards. By 1921, he was
the broadsword champion of the cavalry. Posted to Ireland during the Troubles, he was shot
by a sniper and invalided out of the army.
He then devoted himself to the study of sheep. When he succeeded to the baronetcy in 1935, he was a sheep shearer in Western Australia. During his travels in the Middle East, he fell under the influence of the Muslim peer, the 5th Baron Headley and, in 1935, succeeded Headley as president of the British Muslim Society. However, finding that 'they were very rude and knew nothing of law and order. I was disgusted with the whole lot of them', he resigned a few weeks later. Having never been a strong Christian, and now disillusioned with Islam, he turned to Buddhism. In 1959, he came out in support of the existence of Abominable Snowmen. He also confirmed that one of Buddhism's five Bodhisattvas (Perfected Men) lived in the Scottish Cairngorms and met with his fellow Bodhisattvas each year in a cave in the Himalayas to decide the destiny of the world. In 1965, Sir Hugh claimed that he was the only baronet in the UK who was living on National Assistance. Asked what job he might like, he replied 'Anything except being a butler. I hate snobbishness.' |
4655 - London Gazette - TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 14, 1871.
THE names of those who were nominated for Sheriffs by the Lords of the Council at the Exchequer on the Morrow of Saint Martin, in the thirty-fifth year of the reign of Queen Victoria, and in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and seventy-one :—
ENGLAND
Herefordshire,
John Habington Barneby Lutley, of Brockhampton, Esq.
James Rankin, of Bryngwyn, Hereford, Esq.
Colonel Broadley Harrison, of Kynastone, near Ross.