Hancox: A House and a Family, By Charlotte Moore

So, who would live in a house like this?

The stand-out character in this engaging enough family history is not its Victorian heroine, Milicent Ludlow, who singlehandedly bought Hancox, a dilapidated Tudor manor.

In spite of Milicent's unusual story – she didn't marry until her thirties, and then to an older man who had been married to her beautiful cousin – it is the extraordinary figure of Barbara Leigh who dominates. A founder of Girton College, Cambridge, a feminist and political activist who even took on the responsibility for one of her maid's illegitimate children, her personality shines through and without her example, it's doubtful Milicent would ever have bought a house of her own and that her sympathetic relation, Charlotte, would be living there now.