Charsley's Hall Explained

University:	University of Oxford
Charsley's Hall
Latin Name:	Aula Privata Magistri Charsley^[1]
Named For:	William Henry Charsley (Master)
Established:	1862
Closed:	1891, then became Marcon's Hall (1892–1918)
Master:	William Henry Charsley
Location:	Parks Road
Coordinates:	51.758°N -1.2565°W
Location Map:	Oxford (central)

Charsley's Hall was a private hall of the University of Oxford. After 1891 it was renamed as Marcon's Hall.

The hall was established in 1862 by William Henry Charsley, formerly of Christ Church,^{[2] [3]} under the university statute De Aulis Privatis (On private halls), passed in 1855, which allowed any Master of Arts or other member of Convocation aged at least twenty-eight years to open a private hall after obtaining a licence to do so.^{[4] [5]} The hall was in what is now 10 Parks Road, at the eastern corner of Museum Road, on the other side of the road from the Oxford University Museum.^{[6] [7]} It was a red-brick Victorian house designed by Charles Buckeridge and built in 1862.^[8] At the 1871 census, it contained nine residents.^[9]

Charsley's Hall had no published tuition fees, members electing their tutors and making their own arrangements for payment, but in general the terms were higher than elsewhere. Despite this, the hall was popular.^[10] One writer noted in 1883

By 1889, migration to Charsley's was seen as a way of circumventing some requirements of the colleges, and its demise was prematurely foreseen by The Oxford Magazine. Charsley's Hall features several times in The Lay of the First Minstrel, a parody of Sir Walter Scott dating from the 1870s, beginning:

In 1889–1890 Charsley's had forty-seven undergraduates, while Turrell's, the only other private hall, had seven.^[11] The Master, William Henry Charsley, appears to have kept a school for boys as well as a house of the university. This is suggested as a reason for matriculations at Charsley's at an unusually young age. By the end of 1891 Charsley's Hall had closed,^[12] to be reopened by Charles Abdy Marcon as Marcon's Hall in 1892.^[13] Marcon had himself been educated at Charsley's.^[14]

Whitaker's Almanack for 1897 lists three private halls in the university, based on the University Calendar for 1895: Marcon's, Turrell's and Grindle's.^[14] Marcon's continued under that name until C. A. Marcon retired in 1918.^[15]

Notable people

• William Morfill taught philosophy and modern history at Charsley's between 1865 and 1869
• Edward John Payne completed his first degree at Charsley's in 1871
• Charles Abdy Marcon, who took his first degree from Charsley's in 1878, succeeded W. H. Charsley as Master in 1891^[15]

Notes and References

1. George Valentine Cox, Recollections of Oxford (1868), p. 373: "Since the above was written, the ' Aula Privata Magistri Charsley ' has proved a great success."
2. Christopher Hibbert (ed.), "Private halls" in The Encyclopaedia of Oxford (London: Macmillan, 1988), p. 337
3. Kelly's directory of Berkshire, Bucks and Oxon (Kelly's directories, 1883), p. 640: "... a private hall under licence from the Vice-Chancellor... There are now two of these: Charsley's Hall, in the Parks road, William Henry Charsley MA late of Christ Church, licensed master..."
4. Book: Statuta Universitatis Oxoniensis. Latin . Oxford University Statutes. 6 September 2018. 1876. University of Oxford. 275–279.
5. William Geddie, Chambers's Encyclopaedia, Volume 7 (1874), p. 174: "To these may be added Charsley's Hall, being a private hall under the mastership of WH Charsley, in virtue of a statute passed in 1854..."
6. The pictorial and historical gossiping guide to Oxford James J. Moore, Herbert Hurst (A. Thos. Shrimpton & Son, 1889), p. 149
7. Physics in Oxford, 1839-1939: Laboratories, Learning and College Life Robert Fox, Graeme Gooday (eds.) (Oxford University Press, 2005), p. 67
8. Jennifer Sherwood, Nikolaus Pevsner The Buildings of England: Oxfordshire (Penguin Books, 1974) p. 276
9. Digest of the English Census of 1871 (Adamant Media reprint, 2004), p. 78
10. Edwin Wooton, A guide to degrees in arts, science, literature, law, music, and divinity, in the United Kingdom, the colonies, the continent and the United States (L. Upcott Gill, 1883), p. 39: "At Charsley's Hall the members elect their own tutors, with whom they make their own arrangements."
11. Paul John Rich, Creating the Arabian Gulf (1991), p. 231: "CHARSLEY HALL Oxford... private halls licensed by the Vice Chancellor. In 1889-90 there were two: Charsley's with 47 undergraduates, and Turrell's with 8.
12. Maggie Macdonald, Oxford University Archives, quoted in Paul John Rich, Creating the Arabian Gulf (1991), pp. 231–232: "It is my guess that W. H. Charsley, the licensed master, in addition to teaching undergraduates as in a College, also taught younger boys, i.e. he ran a school. There was at least one other 14-year-old from Charsley's matriculating at the same time as Stewart. The Hall itself had ceased to operate by the end of 1891."
13. T. H. Aston, Brian Harrison, The History of the University of Oxford, vol. 7, Nineteenth-Century Oxford, Part 2 (1994), p. 120
14. Whitaker's Almanack for 1897, p. 258
15. 'MARCON, Charles Abdy', in Crockford's Clerical Directory (1930)