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History » Owners of the Shay Estate
The John Caygill that principally interests us was born unto John Caygill senior and Martha Stead in 1708, and it was he who built the beautiful Georgian mansion that was once found at the Shay. John Caygill was a very important person amongst the people of Halifax, so it would seem fitting to look at the Caygill's history, and to see how they acquired the Shay Estate in the first place.
John Caygill senior married twice - his first wife, Ann, died in September 1704, but he married his second, Martha Stead, the following year. In the will of her father dated 9th September 1735, Martha was left the land known as Upper Shaw and Lower Shaw Syke, while the remainder of the estate was left to her son, John Caygill junior.
Caygill junior was one of at least eight children and he went on to marry Jane, daughter of William Selwin of Down Hall, near Harlow, Essex. They had just one child - a daughter also named Jane, but more commonly referred to as Jenny. Caygill became one of the wealthiest men in Halifax - the Valuation of 1735 shows that he was the owner of numerous houses in the town as well as a house, warehouse, barn, garden and shops at the Shay estate. He also claimed ownership of several local fields and sundry woolshops which were at the time only part constructed. His whole property in Halifax was valued at £160 16s, and only Viscount Irwin of Templenewsam appeared to have property of greater value in the town.
Certainly John Caygill contributed to Halifax's lasting heritage - as well as building the Shay mansion, he contributed to the erection of two other landmarks in the town.
The first of these was the building of houses on a piece of land known as The Square, of which construction was finished around 1758. Designed by John Carr of York, they were grand buildings and some even became offices. The Halifax Courier began as a weekly newspaper and was first printed here at 9, The Square in 1853. In 1923 the Halifax Corporation purchased the land and the buildings were demolished in 1959.
John Caygill's second big achievement was in providing the land and a sum of £840 for the construction of the Piece Hall - a monument which still stands today as a tourist attraction. The architect was a local man, Thomas Bradley, and the Piece Hall opened as a trading centre for wool and woollen products on 1st January 1779.
John Caygill junior's only child, the aforementioned 'Jenny', became sole heiress to her father's estates, including the Shay. She would marry Sir James Ibbetson Baronet of Leeds and Denton on 8th February 1768, and thus the ownership of the Shay estate passed into the Ibbetson family.
It is clear that the Ibbetson family did not live at the Shay - they did not need to, and so in the Halifax Journal of 18 April 1807, the mansion built by John Caygill was advertised for letting. The Shay's grounds were described thus:
"The elegant mansion house... beautifully situated on the south side of the town of Halifax, with a convenient terrace on the south and east fronts; reclining grass banks, shrubbery, serpentine, and other walks to a considerable extent, adorned with plantations and a pleasure garden; well stocked with wall and standard fruit trees; a hothouse and greenhouse with vines, exotic and other plants etc; besides two kitchen gardens in excellent condition; the whole bounded by a rich meadow forms a lawn of nine acres or thereabouts."
A beautiful site then, and a pity there are no further photographs to help illustrate how grand the Shay Estate must have been.
The same advertisement in the Halifax Journal also gave details of the mansion itself. On the ground floor was a dining room 29ft by 23ft and 13ft high, breakfast room, and parlour, housekeeper's room, butler's pantry, servants hall, a large kitchen and gallery 'fitted with every modern improvement for cooking on the steam principle', a spacious passage 12ft 6in wide and 44ft long, an elegant staircase with a double flight of stone steps.
There was a landing 13ft wide and a spacious gallery on the second floor, while the drawing room and the five 'lodging rooms' with dressing rooms adjoining, were on the same scale as the rooms below. The doors were of solid mahogany and it was evidently well fitted for its purposes.
A Mr Thomas Carr, of Shaw Syke, was concerned with the letting of the place.
Besides the Shay mansion itself, there were three other buildings on the estate which were occupied by various gardeners, servants and professionals at different times between 1841 and 1887.
It is interesting to note the addresses given to all the houses on the Shay Estate in the census returns. The Shay mansion's address is down as 'The Shay, Caygill's Walk' in two reports whilst addresses for the other houses are termed variably as The Shay, Shay Stable Yard, Shay Yard, Caygill's Walk and Shay Farm, though there is no doubt that they all refer to the same appropriate buildings, and are not new or separate ones.
Subsequent Owners
The census returns, first published in 1841, now provide us with a closer look at the owners of the Shay. Not only can we see who lived at the Shay mansion, but also who lived at the other houses on the estate.
Below are brief details of the Shay mansion's owners, listed in chronological order.
Jeremiah Rawson
Jeremiah became the Shay's first owner after the mansion was advertised by the Ibbetson family, and it was while during his time there that Lady Ibbetson took out an insurance policy on the property to the value of £1,000. This would later come in handy as during the local elections of December 1834, the mansion - like many buildings in the town - was targeted by a 500-strong mob and all its windows were smashed and some damage was caused to the interior. A sum of £250 was paid in March 1835 to cover the damages.
William Haigh
Jeremiah lived at the Shay for some time but he was not living there by the time of the first census in 1841. William Haigh was the new owner and he was to stay at the Shay for over ten years.
Henry McCrea
The census of April 1861 shows a new owner residing at the Shay; Henry McCrea. The history of Dublin-born McCrea is well documented - he was part responsible for funding the construction of what is now Albert Promenade, a favourite destination of his while out walking. He was later elected onto the town council and by 1869 became the Mayor of Halifax. McCrea also had strong connections with Blackpool where, in 1863, he began an association with the North Pier Company, later becoming it's chairman in 1864. Henry died on 3 June 1901 aged 91, having earlier left the Shay some 30 years previous.
Joseph Wood
Joseph was another who had a long association with the Shay, where he lived for over ten years with his wife Suzannah and their two daughters.
Due to the nature of the Hundred Years Closure Act regarding census returns, further use of these became impossible. However, electoral registers became the next best thing and these show that Joseph Wood lived at the Shay until 1883.
William Dyer
According to the electoral registers, William Dyer took up the residency of the Shay in 1886 and he lived there until 1894 before moving on.
William Boocock
William was the Shay mansion's last owner, though he only lived there for a few years up to 1903. By this time the Shay Estate was in the hands of the Halifax Corporation, and with the completion of the new Skircoat Road, the future of the Shay must have looked very much in doubt.
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