Obituary - MICHAEL Foljambe

It is with great sadness that the board of MCE announce the death of Michael Foljambe a great friend to all who knew him and the person who gifted us our estate.

G M T FOLJAMBE   28 May 1934 – 16 August 2021

Mr Foljambe was born at Wormingford Grove, Colchester, Essex on 28 May 1934 to Zaida Nell & Robert Francis Foljambe.  He was educated firstly at Manor House, Horsham then at St. Aubyn’s in Rottingdean before going to Eton in 1947 where he enjoyed sport and photography.  From there he went to study Rural Estate Management at Cambridge University. 

After university he spent a year working as assistant agent on Lord Ellesmere’s Newmarket estate.

In 1960 he inherited Osberton, Sturton and Wadworth Estates on the death of his uncle, Captain E.W.S. Foljambe and lived at Osberton Hall for 27 years before relocating to Osberton Mill which had previously been occupied by a farm tenant and was a smaller property.

Mr Foljambe was a keen horseman who started the East Midlands Dressage Group in 1962 which continues to this present day.  In 1968 he started the Osberton Horse Trials which is now an international event.  Over the years he himself competed in many horses trialing events around the country.  

Throughout the earlier years Mr. Foljambe worked hard at the rationalization of his different farms and on 7th July 1983 he was awarded the Bledisloe Gold Medal by H.R.H. The Duke of Gloucester.  The citation describes how the Foljambe Estates, “have been transformed from a fragmented tangle of low profit farms, to a network of highly efficient units each capable of making a good living whether tenanted or in hand”.

Mr. Foljambe inherited the Hope Estate from his family.  He always enjoyed coming to Hope each year, fishing with friends and visiting many crofting families in the village of Melness, where he was always made welcome. In 1994 he was awarded The Land Stewardship Prize by the Bank of Scotland for nature conservation with farming. He was an enlightened and forward-thinking man, ahead of his time.  In 1995 he gifted the Melness crofters their croft land in North-West Sutherland which his family had owned. This is when Melness Crofters’ Estate (MCE) was first formed. He stated that he, “wanted crofters to have a say over their own land”. 

At Osberton the farm milked The Osberton herd of pedigree Jerseys which was one of the oldest in the country having been established in 1869 and Mr. Foljambe re-established the breeding of beef Shorthorns which was a tradition started by his ancestors six generations before.

In 2014 Mr. Foljambe had a fall and, despite his fighting strength, his health gradually deteriorated over the years but he still enjoyed his small birthday celebration on 28 May this year – especially the homemade decorated cake with a horse on top.