Mr and Mrs Henry Elwes
Henry Elwes farmed most of the estate during the 1970s and 1980s and served for 32 years on the District
and County Councils. In addition he takes a particular interest in forestry on the estate and in the Arboretum
planted by great-grandfather, Henry John Elwes, and, with his wife Carolyn, in developing the snowdrop collection,
open to visitors for the first time in 1997. He was appointed The Queen's representative, the Lord-Lieutenant of
Gloucestershire, in 1992.
Carolyn Elwes was encouraged to take an interest in snowdrops by her
cousin Mary Biddulph of Rodmarton Manor, who introduced her to Herbert Ransom, gardener to the Mathias family of
The Giant Snowdrop Company fame. He, with Richard Nutt, helped to identify the surviving snowdrops from Henry John
Elwes' original collection. The collection developed rapidly under her care and there are now over 160 different
varieties at Colesbourne. These include several new varieties found in the garden such as the very early G. 'Colossus', G. 'George Elwes', the first yellow cultivar of Galanthus elwesii, appropriately named 'Carolyn Elwes', and of course G. 'Lord
Lieutenant'.