Ayot St Lawrence

Human settlement in England

Welwyn Hatfield

Hertfordshire

Region

East

CountryEnglandSovereign stateUnited KingdomPost townWELWYNPostcode districtAL6Dialling code01438PoliceHertfordshireFire Hertfordshire Ambulance East of England UK Parliament

Welwyn Hatfield

List of places: UK; England; Hertfordshire

51°50′04″N 0°16′02″W / 51.83434°N 0.26709°W / 51.83434; -0.26709

Ayot St Lawrence is a small English village and civil parish in Hertfordshire, two miles (three kilometres) west of Welwyn.^[1] There are several other Ayots in the area, including Ayot Green and Ayot St Peter, where the census population of Ayot St Lawrence was included in 2011.

Heritage

George Bernard Shaw lived in the village, at Shaw's Corner, from 1906 until his death in 1950; his ashes are scattered there.^[2]^[3] The house is open to the public as a National Trust property.^[4]

Other residents of the village included Shaw's friend, neighbour and bibliographer Stephen Winsten (1893–1991) and his wife, the artist Clare Winsten (1894–1989).

During the 1950s, the silk-maker Zoe Dyke (1896–1975) moved her business to Ayot House.^[5] The historical novelist, biographer and children's writer Carola Oman, Lady Lenanton (1897–1978) lived at Bride Hall with her husband. She died there on 11 June 1978.^[6]

Amenities

The village has a timber-framed public house, The Brocket Arms, which may date back to the early 16th century.^[7] It also offers meals and accommodation.^[8]

The village has two churches:

Old St Lawrence Church, in the centre of the village, was partially demolished in 1775, because it was obstructing the view from Sir Lionel Lyde's new home.^[9]

Field Marshal Frederick Rudolph Lambart, 10th Earl of Cavan (1865–1946), a British Army officer and Chief of the Imperial General Staff, is buried in the churchyard.^[10]

New St Lawrence Church was designed in a neo-classical style by Nicholas Revett^[11] and features a Palladian-style frontage with Doric columns.

References

^ AA Book of British Villages. Drive Publications Limited. 1980. p. 44. ISBN 9780340254875.
^ "Shaw's Corner". Archived from the original on 8 March 2009. Retrieved 13 March 2009.
^ "Open house at Shaw's Corner". The Welwyn and Hatfield Times. 6 September 2009. Archived from the original on 24 August 2005. Retrieved 13 March 2009.
^ "Ayot Saint Lawrence". Hertfordshire Genealogy. Retrieved 13 March 2009.
^ John Martin, "Dyke, (Millicent) Zoë, Lady Dyke (1896–1975)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004; online edn, Oct 2007 accessed 12 July 2017
^ Bostridge, Mark (4 October 2007). "Oman, Carola Mary Anima [married name Carola Mary Anima Lenanton, Lady Lenanton". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/71516. Retrieved 10 April 2019. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
^ "The Brocket Arms, Ayot St Lawrence". Mysterious Britain. Archived from the original on 24 September 2009. Retrieved 13 March 2009.
^ "The Brocket Arms". Retrieved 25 November 2018.
^ "Van Gogh walked here". St Albans & Harpenden Review. 4 February 2002. Retrieved 13 March 2009.
^ "Ayot (St Lawrence) Old Churchyard". Commonwealth War Graves Commission.CWGC casualty record.
^ "Parishes – Ayot St. Lawrence or Great Ayot". British History Online. Retrieved 6 February 2009.