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A FORGOTTEN ESSEX GARDENER-BOTANIST.
By CHARLES HALL CROUCH, F.S.G.
(Concluded from p. 168.)
The location of Gilbert Slater's house in Leyton has been
difficult. A book appeared in 1871, which gave the name
of his house as "Leyton House, Essex," but there have been
three "Leyton houses" in the parish, two of them at Knotts
Green, where we know Gilbert Slater lived.
Some thirty odd years ago I copied the Leyton rate-books
from 1783 to 1806, and a few for later years, and these show
that Gilbert Slater must have lived in what is now known as
"Livingstone College," a medical missionary college incorporated
in 1900 as a memorial of the late Dr. Livingstone, and formerly
the home of the Barclay family for 80 years. The fact that it
was at one time known as "Leyton House" is something new
for the history of Leyton.
Kennedy, in his History of Leyton, regrets that all he is
able to say about the house, which he calls "Mr. Barclay's
House," is that it was purchased by the father of Mr. J. G.
Barclay from a Mr. McTaggart, a gentleman of Scotch extraction,
about 1821. Actually this must have been the purchase of a
leasehold interest, as Mr. Joseph Gurney Barclay bought the
freehold of the estate from Colonel Boldero in 1862.
The house is shown in Rocque's Map of London and Environs,
1741-5, but the only place it is given with the name "Mr.
Slater" attached to it is in the first edition of Cary's Survey of
the High Roads from London, 1790, and then on so small a scale
that no stretch of imagination could locate it with Livingstone
College.
The name of Gilbert Slater first appears in the Leyton rate
books in 1786. He was succeeded by Mrs. Slater in 1794, Wm.
Blake in 1795, the above Mr. McTaggart in 1799, and a Robert
Barclay in 1834.
The house seems to have been built between 1733 and 1745.
In 1755 it was in the occupation of a Mr. Johnson. He was
followed in 1758 by Mr. George Stow. Stow was the tenant
until 1768, when it became the residence of "Charles Jackson,