Pope: His Descent And Family Connections Part 6

[5] The collection of these pieces is usually attributed to Steevens. But I am in possession of a copy which belonged to a person who claims to be the editor. It is handsomely bound, and has this note in his own handwriting on a fly-leaf of the first volume:--"These collections were made by me from the London Museum, &c., and the Preface written by me, W.

C." Lowndes gives this account of the book, "culled, says Mr. Park, by Baldwin, from the communications by Mr. Steevens in the _St. James's Chronicle_, and put forth with a Preface by William Cooke, Esq." There is an account of Cooke in the _Biographia Dramatica_, 8vo. 1812. p. 147.

[6] "Perhaps as probable a conjecture as is likely to be made is, that he was connected with the Council of the North, or a successful pract.i.tioner in that Court."--_Pope Tract_, p. 29.

[7] Another person of the same name was sheriff of York in 1571.

[8] Among the numerous officers of whom the court consisted were two called Clerks of the Seal.--TORRE'S _MSS._

[9] The mansion in the street now called Lendal (formerly Aldconyngstrete), which was built by Dr. Wintringham, an eminent physician, in the early part of the last century, and is now appropriated to the use of the judges at the a.s.sizes, stands upon part of the ancient churchyard of Saint Wilfred, which in the sixteenth century was the property of Edward Turner.

[10] In his houses at York and Heslington the rooms were hung with costly tapestry, and the buffets laden with gold and silver plate. He states in his will, that his plate weighed 759 oz. The Heslington mansion, a short distance from York, was standing nearly as Mr. Eymis left it, until a few years ago, when it was almost wholly rebuilt by the late owner, Yarburgh Yarburgh, Esq. The princ.i.p.al front still remains without much alteration, and presents an admirable example of the sumptuous style of domestic architecture that prevailed in the reign of Queen Elizabeth.

[11] The testator was the son of Thomas Eymis, Esq., of Church Stretton, in Shrops.h.i.+re, by Joyce or Jocosa, sole daughter and heir of Humphrey Gatacre, of Gatacre, in the same county, esquire of the body to King Henry VI. The testator's only sister, Margaret Eymis, married Thomas Thynne, Esq., and was the mother of William Thynne, and Sir John Thynne, Knight.

She appears ultimately to have become the heir of both her father and her brothers, and thus to have carried all the wealth of the Eymis's and Gatacres into the family of Thynne. From Sir John Thynne, the nephew of Mr. Eymis, who built the magnificent mansion of Longleat, in Wilts.h.i.+re, the Marquesses of Bath are lineally descended.

[12] On a plain tomb in York Minster was once this epitaph:--

+ "Here lyeth the body of Thomas Eymis, esquier, one of her Majesty's counsell established in the north parties, and secretary and keeper of her Highness signett appointed for the said Counsell, who married Elizabeth, one of the daughters of Sir Edward Nevill, Knight, and departed out of this life to the mercy of G.o.d the XIXth day of August, An. Dom.

1578."--_Eborac.u.m_, p. 496.

[13] These Chamberlaynes were a younger branch of the ancient Oxfords.h.i.+re family of that name. It appears from the pedigree they recorded at the Heralds' visitation in 1584, that the William Chamberlayne named in Edward Turner's will was the first who settled at Thoralby, in Yorks.h.i.+re. It is very probable that he, or his son Leonard Chamberlayne, was in some way or other connected with the Council of the North, which might account for the circ.u.mstance of their having granted an annuity to Edward Turner. Thoralby Hall is in the parish of Bugthorpe, of which Mr. Secretary Eymis was the proprietor. Francis Chamberlayne, Esq., the eldest son of Sir Leonard Chamberlayne, Knight (as he is styled in the pedigree), by his first wife, the daughter of Sir William Middleton, Knight, of Stockeld, near Wetherby, was living at Thoralby in 1584. Sir Leonard's second wife was Katherine, daughter of Roger Cholmeley, Esq., of Brandsby, a sister of Lady Beckwith, the tenant of Edward Turner.

[14] Few persons who have visited our n.o.ble Minster will have failed to notice, affixed to the south side of one of the ma.s.sive piers which support the central tower, a monumental bra.s.s engraved with the portraiture of a prim old lady in the starched ruff and pinched-up coif of the days of Queen Elizabeth. The inscription beneath it informs us that this is the effigy of Elizabeth Eymis, widow, late the wife of Thomas Eymis, Esq., deceased, who was one of the gentlewomen of the Queen's privy chamber, and daughter of Sir Edward Nevill, Knight, one of the privy chamber to King Henry the Eighth. Mrs. Eymis, "the singular good mistress"

of Edward Turner, did not long survive him. In her last will, which is dated the 31st of January, 1584-5, she desired, if she died at York or Heslington, to be buried in the Minster of York, nigh her late husband; and she ordered her executors to provide a stone of marble to be set upon a platt, with superscription of her descent, and also the arms of her late husband and her own, graven thereupon. Had her injunctions been implicitly obeyed by her executors, her monument would have shared the fate of that of her husband, and of numberless others which have long since disappeared from the nave and aisles of York Minster. Her epitaph, being written in bra.s.s instead of marble, has escaped the wear and tear of nearly three centuries. It is not irrelevant to my subject to introduce here a few of the bequests contained in her will. To "my good Lord of Huntingdon" she gives "one portingue of gould"; to "my good ladie his wife," her best silver tankard, double gilt; to her brother, Sir Henry Nevill, Knight, she gives her great goblet of silver with a cover, and to her brother, Edward Nevill, Esq., her "jewell of gould with the unicorne horne in the same, maid licke a s.h.i.+ppe, and a gilt canne of sylver"; to her sister "Frogmorton, my best tuftafitie gowne"; to her very good friend, Mr.

Pailer, "a tankard of silver, parcel gilt"; to Alice Hall, "one morning gown" and 20_s._; and to her G.o.d-daughter, Elizabeth Darley, one silver spoon. The residuary legatees and executors are Robert Man, and Francis Nevill, the son of Edward Nevill. Witnesses--William Payler, Anne Payler, Thomas Wanton, Alice Darley, John Stevenson, Katherine Blenkarne. We have here one or two facts showing the intimacy that subsisted between the families of Edward Turner and Mrs. Eymis. Alice Hall, one of her legatees, was the widowed sister of Edward Turner; Robert Man, her executor, was one of the supervisors of Edward Turner's will; Katherine Blenkarne, one of the witnesses of Mrs. Eymis's will, was a daughter of Edward Turner; John Stevenson, another witness, was most probably the person of that name who married Margaret Willowbie, another daughter of Edward Turner.

Mrs. Eymis had reason to be proud of her descent. Her father, Sir Edward Nevill, a younger brother of George Nevill, Lord Abergavenny, was a distinguished ornament of the court of Henry VIII. in its palmiest days.

He was one of "the n.o.ble troop of strangers" who formed the royal masquing party when the King visited Wolsey, and first saw Anne Boleyn. A few years after that event, he incurred the displeasure of the suspicious Henry, and was brought to the scaffold upon a charge of being implicated in the pretended conspiracy of Cardinal Pole and his brothers.

[15] A monumental bra.s.s to the memory of the testator's "very good friend, Mr. Thomas Wood," is still preserved in the church of Kilnwick Percy, near Pocklington, in the East Riding of Yorks.h.i.+re, where he was buried in the month of October, 1584. The inscription has not, I believe, been printed:--

"Thomas Wood Gentilman, who in warfare hath be, He fought in Scotland, in Royall armyes thre, Lyeth now buried, in this grave hereunder.

Of Bulloign when it was English, Clerk comptroller; Of the Ward Court, sixe and twenty yeres together Depute Receyvor; of Yorks.h.i.+re once eschetor; Clerke of the Statut, in London n.o.ble cytye; Collector of Selby, with tenne pound yerely ffe.

For thought wordes or deeds which to G.o.d or man were yll, Of bothe he askt forgyveness with glad hart and will.

He buylt th'owse hereby, and this churche brought in good case: G.o.d grant his wyfe and sonnes to pa.s.se a G.o.dly race.--Amen."

In the seventeenth century, Mary Wood, the grand-daughter of this Thomas Wood, and the niece and heiress of his eldest son, Barney Wood, married Sir Edmund Anderson, Baronet, and carried the estate of Kilnwick Percy into that family, by whom it was long enjoyed.

Kilnwick Percy is now the beautiful seat and domain of Admiral the Honourable Arthur Duncombe, M.P. The Rev. M. A. Lawton, vicar of Kilnwick Percy, has obligingly favoured me with a copy of the above inscription.

[16] John Stephenson was the owner of a "capital messuage" in Coney-street, York, which was occupied by himself and Ralph Rokeby, Esq., one of the secretaries of the Council of the North, and which was at one time distinguished by the sign of the Bear, and afterwards of the Golden Lion. In 1614, Margaret Stephenson and her son, John Stephenson (the nephew to whom Lancelot Turner bequeathed all his books, except his song-books), sold the messuage to Thomas Kaye, who established there an hotel which he called the George Inn, a name it retains to this day.

[17] Miles Newton was the name of the town-clerk of York who died in 1550, and was succeeded in that office by Thomas Fale, the first husband of the testatrix. He was very probably the same person who is named in the Newton pedigree of 1585 as the grandfather of the Miles Newton who married Jane Beckwith.

[18] _Pope Tract_, p. 32.

[19] Mr. John Darley, of York, and of Kilnhurst in the West Riding, was a younger son of William Darley, Esq., of b.u.t.tercrambe, near York. His wife was Alice, daughter of Christopher Mountfort, Esq., of Kilnhurst. Mr. John Darley bought the manor of Kilnhurst of his wife's brother, Lancelot Mountfort, Esq. _Vide_ Hunter's _South Yorks.h.i.+re_, vol. ii. p. 49. Mr.

Darley's town residence was in Coney-street, and it is very probable that he was officially connected with the Council of the North. His daughter, Elizabeth, the G.o.d-daughter of Mrs. Eymis, married, for her second and third husbands, Sir Edmund Sheffield and Sir William Sheffield, sons of the Earl of Mulgrave, who was made Lord President of the North upon the accession of James I.

[20] George Hervey of Merks in the county of Ess.e.x, Esq., married Frances, one of the daughters of Sir Leonard Beckwith.

[21] William Allen married Jane Beckwith, sister of Sir Leonard Beckwith.

He was an alderman of York, and Lord Mayor in 1572.

[22] _Eborac.u.m_, p. 358.

[23] The will of Robert Gylminge is dated April 20, 1571. "I bequeath my soule to Almightie G.o.d and to all the celestial company of Heaven." He makes his wife, Nicholas his son, Mary, Agnes, Meriall, and Jane, his daughters, his executors; and his brother William Gylminge, and William Alleyne, draper, supervisors. Proved June 25, 1580.

[24] Mr. Drake states, that in the year 1604, the number of persons who died of the plague in York, was 3512. _Eborac.u.m_, p. 121. The parish of All Saints Pavement lost more than one-third of its population.

[25] _Pope Tract_, p. 31.

[26] See _Athenaeum_, Nov. 21, 1857.

[27] In his will dated 8th Dec. 1595, Thomas Buskell of York, Esquire, speaks of his "house wherein I do now dwell, which I purchased of Lancelot Turner of York gentleman."

[28] _Pope Tract_, p. 28.

[29] Corporation Archives.

[30] It appears that during the latter part of the reign of Queen Elizabeth, many of the Roman Catholics of York and the neighbourhood chose the city of Venice for their place of refuge. In the year 1581, a person named Richard Collinge or Cowling, and his brother Thomas, the sons of Ralph Cowling, a York tradesman, who was a Popish recusant, were sent over sea, and ultimately Richard Collinge found his way into Italy. Several years afterwards he returned to this country, and, apparently whilst he was visiting his friends and relatives in Yorks.h.i.+re, corresponded with a person abroad, whom he addresses thus:--_Al Molto Magnifico Signori il Signore Giulio Piccioli, a Venezia_. One of his letters to this person, supposed to have been written in the year 1599, which was intercepted by the Government of Elizabeth, and is now preserved in the State-Paper Office, contains the names of several persons connected with York and Yorks.h.i.+re. The most remarkable pa.s.sage relates to the arch-conspirator Guye Fawkes, who must have been sojourning at Venice at that time. "I entreat your favour and friends.h.i.+p for my cousin-germane Mr. Guydo Fawkes, who serveth Sir William, as I understand he is in great want, and your worde in his behalfe may stande him in greate steede. -- -- he hath lefte a prettie livinge here in this countrie, which his mother, being married to an unthrifty husband, since his departure I think hath wasted awaye, yet she and the rest of our friendes are in good health."

The writer's relations.h.i.+p to Fawkes was most probably through the Harringtons, of whom he also speaks:--"Let him tell my cousin Martin Harrington that I was at his brother Henry's house at the Mounte, but he was not then at home; he and his wife were all well, and have many pretty children." By "the Mounte" is meant Mount St. John, near Thirsk, where a branch of the family of Harrington was then resident, one of whom, William Harrington, a seminary priest, was executed at Tyburn, Feb. 18, 1594.

_Chaloner_, part i. p. 304. Mrs. Ellin Fawkes, the grandmother of Guye, was a Harrington. By her will in 1570, she bequeaths a gold ring to William Harrington, her brother Martin's son. Collinge names several other persons then at Venice to whom he is commissioned by their relatives in England to send messages; some of whom, one cannot doubt, had emigrated from that part of the kingdom to which he himself belonged. He makes special mention of D. Worthington, "whose brother hath sent a letter unto him;" and of D. Kellison, who he wishes to know that "his brother Valentine is in good health." Dr. Worthington, one of the translators of the Douay Bible, and Dr. Kellison, were successively presidents of the English College at Douay. The letter, which is without date, is subscribed "Yours in Christe, Richarde Collinge." I am indebted to my friend Mr. John Bruce, V.P.S.A., for acquainting me with the existence of this doc.u.ment, which Mr. Lemon, of the State-Paper Office, very obligingly allowed me to peruse.

Guye Fawkes was not the only native of York who was implicated in the Gunpowder Plot. Edward Oldcorne the Jesuit, who a.s.sumed the name of Hall, and was the companion of Father Garnett at Hendlip and in the Tower, was the son of John Oldcorne, a bricklayer at York. He was sent abroad about the year 1584, and was first placed at the College of Douay whilst it was stationed at Rheims. He was afterwards at Rome, where the General of the Jesuits admitted him into their society. _Chaloner_, part ii. p. 485. He was executed at Worcester, April 7, 1606, as a partaker in the Gunpowder Plot conspiracy. _Jardine_, p. 210. A name in Collinge's letter, partly obliterated, seems meant for Oldcorne, and renders it probable that he was then one of the English residents at Venice.

We may be sure that when Lancelot Turner despatched his youthful brother to Venice, he knew that he was not consigning him wholly into the hands of strangers.

In the list of the Romish Priests and Jesuits resident in and about London in 1624, the name of Turner occurs once.--MORGAN'S _Phoenix Britannicus_, p. 437.

[31] "On Monday next after Twelfth Day, 1620, he revoked nuncupatively the gift of the clock to Sir William Alford, saying, 'he forgets his old friends,' and gives it to his nephew, William Turner. To this were witnesses, Thomasine Newton, Henry Dent, and Alice Atkinson, who depose that William Turner reminded him that there had been much kindness between him and Sir William. This was a few days before his death."--_Pope Tract_, p. 30.

[32] _Collectanea Top. et Gen._, vol. iv. p. 178.

[33] Emanuel Lord Scrope, afterwards Earl of Sunderland.

[34] At Malton.

[35] _Parl. Hist._, vol. vii. p. 286.

[36] _Pope Tract_, p. 31.

[37] At a court held by the lords of the manor of Strensall, in April, 1622, William Turner was called as a copyholder of Towthorpe; and again in April, 1624.

Towthorpe is an insignificant and very secluded village, about four miles north of York, a little off the high road from thence to Sheriff-Hutton.

Nothing is now left of the old manor-house; but near to the spot where it may be supposed to have stood, a not uninteresting object still remains, to carry the mind back to the days when Lancelot Turner and his nephew William were the proprietors. This is a sort of pleasance upon a small scale--a quadrangular plot of ground, about fifty yards square, surrounded by a rather broad moat, and thickly planted with fruit-trees arranged with some approach to symmetry--two or three of the outer rows being nut or filbert trees, the rest apple, pear, and plum. The nut-trees are obviously of great age, their stems being strangely contorted, and having attained a thickness seldom seen in this part of the country. The other trees have a less aged appearance; and probably a temple or summer-house may have formerly been placed upon the centre of the little island. A building of this kind, with its accompanying moat, was a favourite ornament in the quaint pleasure-grounds of the Elizabethan mansion. The moat would doubtless form a useful _piscaria_, especially valuable to persons to whom fish was, at certain seasons, an indispensable article of diet. At present, instead of seeing carp and tench, as in former days, quietly gliding through its waters, on approaching the island our ears were greeted with the harsh croaking of innumerable frogs and toads, the sole inhabitants of the moat.