On Wed, 29 Sep 2010, Sacha wrote:

The man who used to own this house - Edward Hyams - was one of the
first to try growing vines for modern wine making in England. In fact,
he grew them here where our greenhouses are now. I don't think he was
terribly successful though he did write one of his many books on the
subject!

And he is mentioned by writers on English viticulture since. My first
book on the subject was written by Gillian Pearkes in 1969 and she
mentions Edward Hyams. I quote:

"Some thirty years later [after the demise of English viticulture which
had kept going down the centuries], in 1946 and 1948 respectively, Mr.
Barrington-Brock and Mr. Edward Hyams started vineyards, thus reviving
viticulture again in Britain, and in the comparatively short time since
their early efforts there has been a tremendous revival of theoretical
and practical interest in the vine in this country, so much so that
there are now [in 1969] 430 acres, nearly 150 established commercial
vineyards, in existence and many more being planned; moreover there are
between one and two hundred private vineyards of varying sizes now well
established."

And in her book she lists all the known vineyards at that time, both
commercial and private.

The reason for Edward Hyams lack of success would have been due to not
having suitable vines varieties for our climate. Indeed when Gillian
Pearkes was writing, and when I started growing grapes about six years
later, the two most popular vines were Seyve-Villard 5/276, a hybrid,
and Müller-Thurgau. Seyve-Villard is now renamed Seyval Blanc and is
still popular. MT is too prone to mildew and has fallen out of favour.
But there is now a multitude of vine varieties to choose from.

David

--
David Rance
writing from Le Mesnil Villement, Calvados, France