Hertford College, Oxford

Hertford College ( ), previously known as Magdalen Hall, is a constituent college of the University of Oxford in England. It is located on Catte Street in the centre of Oxford, directly opposite the main gate to the Bodleian Library. The college is known for its iconic bridge, the Bridge of Sighs. There are around 600 students at the college at any one time, comprising undergraduates, graduates and visiting students from overseas.

The first foundation on the Hertford site began in the 1280s as Hart Hall and became a college in 1740 but was dissolved in 1816. In 1820, the site was taken over by Magdalen Hall, which had emerged around 1490 on a site adjacent to Magdalen College. In 1874, Magdalen Hall was incorporated as a college, reviving the name Hertford College. In 1974, Hertford was part of the first group of all-male Oxford colleges to admit women.

Alumni of the college's predecessor institutions include William Tyndale, John Donne, Thomas Hobbes, and Jonathan Swift. More recently, former students have included author Evelyn Waugh, the first female Home Secretary Jacqui Smith, the civil servants Jeremy Heywood and Olly Robbins, and the newsreaders and reporters Fiona Bruce, Carrie Gracie, Krishnan Guru-Murthy, and Natasha Kaplinsky. U.S. justice Byron White attended the college on a Rhodes scholarship but left to serve in World War II.

Hart Hall and the first Hertford College

Hart Hall

The first Hertford College began life as Hart Hall (''Aula Cervina'') in the 1280s, a small tenement built roughly where the college's Old Hall is today, a few paces along New College Lane on the southern side. In mediaeval Oxford, academic halls were primarily lodging houses for students and resident tutors.

The original tenement, mentioned in the deed of 1283, which was bought by Elias de Hertford from Walter de Grendon, mercer, lay between a tenement of the university (Blackhall) on the west, and a tenement of the Prioress of Studley on the east. In the deed by which Elias de Hertford sells it to John de Dokelynton in 1301, this last tenement is called Micheldhall. The deed was made over to his son, also Elias, in 1301. The name of the hall was likely a humorous reduction of the name of its founder's home town, and allowed for the use of the symbol of a hart to be used for identification.

At that time, New College Lane was known as Hammer Hall Lane (named after a hall to the east, as New College had not then been founded), and its northern side was the old town wall. The corner of Hammer Hall Lane and Catte Street (which had a postern in the wall called Smithgate) was taken by Black Hall, which was the place of John Wycliffe's imprisonment by the Vice-Chancellor around 1378. On the other side of Hart Hall along the lane was Shield Hall. On Catte Street itself was the entrance to Arthur Hall, which lay down a narrow passage behind Hart Hall, and Cat Hall (''Aula Murilegorum''), which stood further south, roughly where the Principal's Lodgings now stand.

The younger Elias sold on Hart Hall (named in this deed as 'le Herthalle') after a month to a wealthy local fishmonger John of Ducklington, who, seven years later, bought Arthur Hall and annexed it to Hart Hall. In 1312, John sold the two halls to Walter de Stapledon, Bishop of Exeter, who desired to found a college. After just over a year, Stapledon moved his scholars to a larger site that he had purchased on Turl Street, which became Stapledon Hall, later Exeter College. However, Exeter College retained certain rights over Hart Hall, with which it plagued the hall's development for centuries.

In 1379, Hart Hall and Black Hall were rented by William of Wykeham as a temporary home for his scholars as his New College, to the east along what became New College Lane, was being built. The first two Wardens of New College also appear as Principals of Hart Hall. Until the 17th century, there is evidence of scholars (including Thomas Ken) matriculating at Hart Hall while waiting for a vacancy at New College. By this time, it appears that Shield Hall had been partly taken over by Hart Hall and partly demolished to make way for New College's cloister. Although Black Hall continued a separate existence, its principal was often the same as Hart Hall's. In 1490, Hart Hall is described as having a library, which was unusual for a hall. In 1530, Hart Hall annexed Black Hall also. For some time, Cat Hall was leased by All Souls College, and then by Exeter College, until it also was subsumed into the growing Hart Hall early in the 16th century, giving the hall most of the land around what is today its Old Quadrangle.

In the latter half of the 16th century, Hart Hall became known as a refuge for Catholic recusants, particularly under Philip Randell as principal (1548–1599). Because of its connection with Exeter College and that college's increasing puritanism, a number of Exeter's tutors and scholars migrated to Hart Hall. The hall attracted an increasing number of Catholics from further afield, including the Jesuit tutor Richard Holtby in 1574, who was instrumental in the conversion of his student, and later Jesuit martyr and saint, Alexander Briant to Catholicism. Coming from a Catholic family, the English poet John Donne came up to Hart Hall in 1584.

Hart Hall expanded and new buildings were put up. In the early 17th century, the current Senior Common Room was built as lodgings for the principal. From this period also, the main entrance of the hall moved from being a narrow passage off New College Lane to a gate on Catte Street. By the late 17th century, Cat Hall is described as being used as 'the ball-court of Hart Hall'. In the latter part of the 17th century, the principal, Dr William Thornton, provided a proper gate for the Catte Street entrance of the hall, and decorated with a device of a drinking hart with the motto ('As the hart panteth after the water brooks', taken from Psalm 42, verse 1, but in a peculiar translation). Although the current gatehouse is not Thornton's original, it retains the design and motto, and houses the original decorated gates. It has been suggested that this frieze with its Latin motto is the real counterpart of the one translated for the waiting crowd by the title character of Thomas Hardy's ''Jude the Obscure''.

In 1692, the political satirist Jonathan Swift was incorporated from Trinity College, Dublin, on the books of Hart Hall to receive his MA.

Richard Newton's Hertford College

On 28 July 1710, the Rev Dr Richard Newton was admitted principal of Hart Hall. Newton was a well-connected, energetic, educational reformer. He was appointed principal from 'a very peaceful retirement' as Rector of Sudborough, where he was personal tutor to two brothers, who were both destined to be prime minister — Thomas Pelham-Holles and Henry Pelham — bringing the younger with him to Hart Hall. He dedicated himself to raising the hall from debt and securing a firmer financial endowment. Newton planned to redesign the hall around a proper quadrangle, with a tutor, or ''angler'', and students living in each angle, and common buildings along the sides. However, only two buildings in his design were ever built: one angle in the south-east corner of the Old Quadrangle (nowadays known as the Cottage), and his simple stone Chapel on the south side (consecrated 25 November 1716), which now serves as the college's Library. These buildings were financed entirely from Newton's pocket, to the sum of around £2000 (around £ adjusted for inflation).

In 1720, Newton published his ''Scheme of Disciplines'' laying out his scheme of education with a view to obtaining a charter of incorporation, and, on 18 May 1723, he presented his petition for a charter. The proposal met immediate opposition, especially from Exeter College, exercising its old rights, and All Souls, desiring to expand northward onto the hall's land. In addition, the appointments of principals for the various halls had established itself in a game of promotion, and a few would-be principals opposed the plan. John Conybeare, then a Fellow of Exeter, and later Bishop of Bristol, was Newton's most ardent opponent, penning the book ''Calumny Refuted'' against Newton's reforms. After years of struggle, Richard Newton's statutes were accepted on 3 November 1739, and the charter incorporating 'the Principal and Fellows of Hertford College' (''Principalis et Socii Collegii Hertfordiensis'') was received on 8 September 1740.

Newton's Hertford was a relatively spartan college, having received no real endowment. Meals were simple and cheap, and the principal insisted on eating the same as everyone else. Students were expected to work hard, and, where Newton found the university's education lacking, he supplemented it with disputations within the college. Newton allowed gentlemen-commoners to matriculate at the college, but they paid double fees for the same accommodation and food as the others. They were originally allowed to wear their coloured gowns and tufted caps, but Newton eventually made them wear the ordinary black gown. Thus, many a well-to-do family sent their sons to Hertford College to instil in them some disciplined education, unlike the privileged wining and dining had by gentlemen-commoners in other colleges.

Decline and dissolution

After Richard Newton's death in 1753, the principalship of the college fell to a succession of men mostly lacking the desire or energy to continue their predecessor's plan. One exception to this succession was David Durell, who built up the reputation and academic success of the college. Under Durell, the future statesman Charles James Fox matriculated in 1764 (Hertford, unusually for Oxford, was a Whig college). However, the scheme of four tutors in their respective angles was reduced to two, and cheaper junior fellows took over some of the burden of tutoring. It was at Hertford that the tutor Benjamin Blayney prepared his 1769 ''Standard Edition'' of the Authorized King James Version of the Bible. Apart from Durell's principalship, the college went into decline due to the mismanagement of uninterested principals and the lack of decent endowments. In May 1805, Bernard Hodgson, last principal of Hertford College died, and no suitable successor could be found and agreed upon. By 1810, matriculation had ceased, and the last students were awarded their degrees. The last tutor and vice-principal, Richard Hewitt, continued to live in his rooms without students until May 1816, when a commission declared Hertford College dissolved.

Magdalen Hall and the second Hertford College

Magdalen Hall

Magdalen Hall was founded around 1490 on a site to the west of Magdalen College and next to Magdalen's grammar school. The site is now Magdalen's St Swithun's quadrangle. It took the name of an earlier Magdalen Hall in the High Street, which was founded by William Waynflete in 1448 and then closed on the opening of Magdalen College in 1458. The first master of the grammar school was appointed in 1480, and its original school building was erected in 1486. However, as the hall took independent students as well as those belonging to the college, it quickly became an independent institution under its own principal.

The hall was known for its adherence to the teachings of John Wycliffe, and William Tyndale, translator of the English Bible and martyr, studied there. Another famous student of the hall was the political philosopher Thomas Hobbes, who came up in either 1601 or 1602. At the English Civil War, Magdalen Hall was known as a Puritan hall under the principalship of Henry Wilkinson. Famous Puritan graduates include Philip Nye, key adviser to Oliver Cromwell on matters of religion and regulation of the Church. The hall rarely used a badge of arms, but, when it did, it used the same arms as the college.

At the time of the demise of the first Hertford College, Magdalen College had long been searching for a way of expelling Magdalen Hall in order to expand into its buildings. Before the demise of Hertford, Magdalen College conspired to make its site ready to receive a transplanted Magdalen Hall. The current Lodge of Hertford College thus still bears the arms of Magdalen Hall (and so also of Magdalen College) beside those of Hertford College (and Hart Hall) and the university.

Move to Catte Street

John Macbride became both principal of Magdalen Hall and Lord Almoner's Professor of Arabic in 1813, and plans to move the hall to the site of Hertford College were already afoot. On 15 March 1815, Magdalen College submitted a proposal for the move to Convocation. Magdalen College proposed to repair the Hertford buildings and defray the expense of Magdalen Hall's move to the site, while the hall were to relinquish claim to their own buildings to Magdalen College. An Act of Parliament was passed supporting the plan, but no move was made until a fire accidentally started by an undergraduate on 9 January 1820 destroyed almost half of Magdalen Hall's buildings. Not long after this, one of Hertford College's buildings on Catte Street, so flimsy that it was known as the 'paper building', collapsed. With this motivation, the new foundation stone of Magdalen Hall was laid at the new site on 3 May 1820, and the hall's migration was complete by 1822. The Catte Street frontage was pulled down and rebuilt, and several buildings had an extra storey added to them. Magdalen Hall expanded to fill the space, and became the largest hall by far, numbering 214 members in 1846. Macbride and his vice-principals were active in building up the refounded Magdalen Hall. To distance the hall from its namesake college, Macbride attempted to change the name to 'Magdalene Hall', but this change was never accepted. Macbride served as principal for 54 years, until his death in 1868. The Macbride Sermon, one of the University Sermons, is preached each Hilary term