Holderness House

Summergangs Hall became the property of the brothers B.M. and W.E. Jalland in 1838. The old house was pulled down and the present house in an Elizabethan style, was built and named Holderness House. It was built to designs by James Clephan of London by the builders, Messrs Hutchinson of Hull. Holderness House has stone vaulted cellars and the entrance has stairs up to the ground floor. The Holderness Road end of the farm lane was incorporated into the Holderness House grounds and another access road made for the farm, although this doubling of the size of the grounds might have been done by a previous owner. The Holderness House grounds then extended over what are now Jalland Street, Village Road and Laburnum Avenue and extended back almost to where Maple Grove now is. A lodge (this was the one mentioned in Blashill's 'Evidences Relating to East Hull' although it had been demolished long before the book was published in 1903) was built on Holderness Road near where Jalland Street now is and, from here, the drive turned right to run parallel to Holderness Road and then turned left to go along the elm-lined avenue. Eventually the drive left the avenue and swung round to the right towards the Holderness House stone stairway. There were many statues in the grounds and might have been those in the grounds of Summergangs Hall. On the 1888-89 Ordnance Survey Map, twelve statues and a sun- dial are shown.
Holderness House from the S.W.

Holderness House from the South West

The far end of the elm-lined avenue, which ran along where the bottom of the gardens of 42 to 80 Village road now are, was in the 19th century a shady walk in the Holderness House grounds. At the end of the avenue were two iron gates, which had been brought from Newark Castle and were, perhaps, 800 years old according to Sheehan's 'History of Hull'. The gates were set in two stone arches. These stone arches were donated to the Hull Corporation and removed to East Park but, on 27th November 1906, the Corporation's East Park Sub-Committee inspected the remains of the ancient stone archway presented to the Corporation by Mrs. Jalland and it was resolved that owing to the expense that would be incurred, the Sub-Committee consider it undesirable to erect the remains of a gateway as originally proposed; and that the Superintendent be authorised to make such use of the remains in connection with rocks at the Park as he may consider desirable.
Holderness House from the S.E.

Holderness House from the South East

Boswell Middleton Jalland was Mayor of Hull in 1836 and 1846 and he was a leading local Liberal. His brother, William Empson Jalland, was Sheriff of Hull in 1842. James Clay, the Hull M.P., often visited Holderness House. Liberal Party events were held in the grounds of Holderness House in the 1840s and people strolled along the elm-lined avenue. Boswell Jalland was called the Adonis of Holderness House and he remained a bachelor until he attended the Liberal Party Conference at Brighton when he was 61. He married Emily Williams, 22 years old and the only daughter of Mr. John Williams of Penlee, Devon, at Brighton on 10th April 1851. When he returned to Hull after the conference with his young wife, local Tories had a lot to say.

Boswell and Emily Jalland had four children, born in 1852, 1853, 1855 and 1861, named Emily, Boswell George, Walter Clay and Gerald William. Boswell Jalland was 71 when his youngest son was born. It would seem that B.M. Jalland acquired his brother's share in the Holderness House estate in 1868 and was then the sole owner. Mr B.M. Jalland died on 29th September 1880 aged 90 but his widow continued to live at Holderness House for many years. Boswell Jalland had left the Holderness House Estate in trust for his children with his wife as trustee and life tenant.

The Holderness Road lodge was demolished in the mid 1880s and part of the Holderness House grounds was sold for the building of Jalland Street, some shops and Chestnut Villas (now 365-371 Holderness Road), where Joseph Rank and Alfred Gelder occupied opposite ends of the block at the time of the 1891 census. At 1 Chestnut Villas, now Annisons & Boddy's undertakers, seven people were recorded in the 1891 census. They were the architect, W, Alfred Gelder, his wife and niece, three children and two domestic servants. At 4 Chestnut Villas, now 371 Holderness Road, thirteen people were listed in the census. They were the miller, Joseph Rank, his wife and her sister, six children, a school governess, a sick nurse, a nursemaid and a servant. Some of them were there as Mrs. Rank had given birth to a baby a month earlier. The two-year old child, Joseph A. Rank, became famous later in life as J. Arthur Rank, the film magnate and head of the Rank Organisation, eventually becoming Lord Rank.

At Holderness House, there were eight residents recorded in the 1891 census. Mrs. Emily Jalland was aged 62. Her unmarried sons, Walter Clay and Gerald William were aged 35 and 30. They were all described as living on their own means. There were also four servants and a footman. Like Queen Victoria, Mrs. Jalland always wore black as a widow and the lifestyle at Holderness House must have been very subdued compared with what it had been like in the 1850s.

Around 1900, when Boswell George Jalland was living at Lambwath Hall, Sutton, and his sister, Emily, had married a Mr. Webster, Holderness House was regarded by some as the seat of Walter Clay Jalland but his mother, as the trustee, really controlled the Estate. For over twenty years, Holderness House had no lodge, and the grounds became overgrown. When small boys went into the grounds to collect conkers, Mrs. Jalland used to chase them away herself. In 1906, the Jalland Trustees applied to the Corporation to construct a road on the north-west side of Holderness Road parallel to Jalland Street. This was agreed to but the road was not immediately constructed. Some land was put up for sale.