324 A HISTORY OF HEREFORD CATTLE 



forage grown was therefore of the very best, and 

 the place owes its name to the excellence of its 

 meadows. Col. Bosley was a fine type of the old- 

 school landed proprietor of that period; his accom- 

 plishments in the agricultural field were widely rec- 

 ognized in the highest circles, a prized possession of 

 the family at this time being a silver tankard pre- 

 sented to him by the Marquis de Lafayette. Upon 

 his death without issue in 1847 he left the property 

 to his grand-niece, the mother of John Merryman, 

 with a life interest in the estate to her husband, 

 entailing it, after the English primogeniture prac- 

 tice, to their eldest son Nicholas Bosley Merryman, 

 who came into the title by the death of his mother in 

 1897. 



Early Purchases from William H. Sotham. John 

 Merryman had not been in possession long under 

 his life tenure until he decided that the white-faced 

 cattle of the old West of England pastures would 

 look well on the green slopes of Hayfields, and so 

 in 1856 he made his first selections. In a letter 

 written Aug. 9, 1881, Mr. Merryman said: "At the 

 New York State Fair held at Watertown in 1856, I 

 purchased from A. & H. Bowen the yearling bull 

 Catalpa and the heifer Lilac. My next purchase was 

 from Mr. Sotham and consisted of 13 cows and 

 heifers and two bulls, including Blenheim 1064. " 



Writing to Mr. George Underwood, July 27, 1875, 

 Mr. Merryman said : 



"My original purchases were made from Mr. Wm. 

 H. Sotham, from whom I got Blenheim, a son of 



