In April, 1918, the Wellbury Estate in Hertfordshire was put up for auction. For over fifty years the estate had been the home of Francis Gosling and his family. Gosling, a director of Barclay's Bank had died in 1910 while his wife, Henrietta, died in 1916. The estate comprised a mansion, park and a farm of some 300 acres.  

The estate was sold to Sir William Austin Bart. whose family was prominent in both Yorkshire and Cornwall. Sir William had been Master of successive hunts and the local papers expressed the hope that he would continue the tradition of hosting the Hertfordshire Hunt, as was the tradition at Wellbury during the Gosling years. In 1919, one of Sir William's Friesian cattle, 'Wellbury Prima' was listed in the Herd Book of the British Friesian Cattle Society. 

However, Sir William's time at Wellbury was to be short. In February, 1920, he was elected to the mastership of the Suffolk Hunt. He assured the Hunt Committee that he would be searching for a house locally, rather than travelling between Suffolk and Hertfordshire. Apparently he decided to sell the estate in two separate parts: Wellbury House and park with around 110 acres, and Wellbury Farm with an acreage of 296. There were two further lots which comprised two small plots of land and a stables and coach house in Great Offley. The farm was advertised in The Times in August, 1920, but at the auction in September, 1920, the farm was withdrawn from sale at £6000 . There is no record of a public auction of the House and park at that time.

In December,1920, it was reported that the Wellbury Estate had been sold by private treaty. The 1922 edition of Kelly's Handbook of Hertfordshire has the House and Park occupied by Stanislas Eyre, a prominent London Solicitor.* Part of Wellbury Farm totaling 21 acres was sold to Ralph Delme-Radcliffe - Lord of the Manor in neighbouring Hitchin. The remainder, some 233 acres, was sold to Alfred Bullard.** 

The new owner of Wellbury Farm was a remarkable man. Farmer, Antique Dealer, Property Developer, Church Organist, Archaeologist - Alfred Bullard was something of a celebrity in his home town of Newport Pagnell. A full account of his long and multi-faceted life can be found by pasting this address to your browser:

http://www.calameo.com/read/001777910d08999c19ffb

Bullard's reasons for buying the farm, which was quite a distance from his home, are not known. In February, 1923 he sold his herd of pedigree Friesians at auction raising almost £1900 - possibly to complete his purchase of Wellbury. By the summer of that year the newspapers reported his growing a  species of American clover on his farm at Offley which reached a height of eight feet. Similar reports were in the newspapers two years later, though by then he had apparently decided to give up farming - sales of crops and livestock at Wellbury and at Newport Pagnell were advertised in 1925 and 1926 respectively.        

Given his numerous connections in Bedfordshire and the surrounding counties, it would have been quite easy for Bullard to find a buyer for Wellbury. So it happened that sometime in 1926,  he negotiated the sale of his farm to Mary Jane Muddle.