| Warter...living in an estate village |
WarterD. The Victorian and Edwardian owners of Warter
The Wilsons, Lords Nunburnholme
Charles Henry Wilson, was born in 1833, the eighth son of Thomas Wilson, the founder of a Hull shipping firm. As well as becoming head of what became, by his death, the largest private shipping line in the world, he was director of the Hull Dock Company and of the North Eastern Railway Company. He was chosen as Sheriff of Hull in 1870. In 1874 he became Liberal MP for Hull, transferring to West Hull in 1885 when the borough was split into three constituencies.
A great philanthropist during his lifetime he was generous to many charitable causes and in particular hospitals and orphanages in Hull as well as numerous charities associated with care of the bereaved families of sailors and fishermen. Charles Wilson remained an MP until 1906 when he was created 1st Baron Nunburnholme and entered the House of Lords. George Noble, who began work on the estate in 1908 recalled that: 'There was rumours all over Warter that they were going to call him Lord Warter, Lord Highcliffe, because they had a big wood called Highcliffe, then it came out Nunburnholme. Well, they had a lot of property in Nunburnholme, they owned about nearly half of Nunburnholme.' Lord Warter might have been appropriate for the head of a shipping line.
Little more than a year later Lord Nunburnholme died and his funeral on 31 October 1907 was probably the largest and most impressive event to occur in the history of Warter.
Who are the men in uniform accompanying the coffin? What was the weather like on the day of the funeral? Lord Nunburnholme was succeeded by his eldest son, Charles Henry Wellesley Wilson (1875-1924), who became 2nd Baron Nunburnholme; however Warter Priory remained the home of his mother, the Dowager Lady Nunburnholme, for another 20 years.
