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Old Town: Hall's Croft

Description

Copy prints of original photographs of Hall's Croft while inhabited by Besse MacLeod (Betty) Leggett. Includes interior and exterior views and views of the garden. Also includes a photograph of Frances Leggett in the garden on her wedding day. Some of these images are identical to lantern slides in SC39/33.

Custodial History

These copy prints were taken from photographs in an album originally belonging to the Leggetts and passed down through the Montagu family.

Admin History

Betty Leggett (1852-1931) inhabited Hall's Croft from 1913, when it was purchased by her sister Josephine Macleod. The sisters began work on restoring it to its original state, removing the Victorian stucco and plaster. Betty inhabited the house between her travels abroad. After her death in 1931 the house was kept exactly as Betty left it until 1943, when the house passed to Betty's niece, Lady Elizabeth Montagu (b. 1917). Hall's Croft was purchased from Lady Elizabeth Montagu by the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust in 1949. Betty Leggett's daughter Frances (b. 1896) married David Margesson, later Viscount Margesson (Churchill's Secretary of State for War) on 29 April 1916. Some of the above information was taken from 'Late and Soon' by Frances Leggett (London: John Murray, 1968).