THE following imperfect attempt to bring together a few notes relating to the ancient aristocracy of England, is confined in the first place to the families now existing, and regularly established either as knightly or gentle houses before the commencement of the sixteenth century; secondly, no notice is taken of those families who may have assumed the name and arms of their ancestors in the female line: for the truth is, as it has been well observed,* "that, unless we take the male line as the general standard of genealogical rank, we shall find ourselves in a hopeless state of confusion;" thirdly, illegitimate descent is of course excluded; and, fourthly, where families have sold their original estates, they will be noticed in those counties where they are at present seated; if however they still possess the ancient estate of their family, though they may reside in another county, they will be mentioned for the most part under that county from whence they originally sprung.

In those cases where the whole landed estate of the family has been dissipated, although the male line still remains, all notice is omitted, such families having no longer any claim to be classed in any county. For, "ancient dignity was territorial rather than personal, the whole system was rooted in the land, and, even in the present day, though the land may have changed hands often, it has carried along with it some of that sentiment of regard attached to the lordship of it, as surely as its earth has the fresh smell which it gives when upturned by the husbandman."**

This list also, it must be remembered, does not profess to give an account of all those families whose descent may possibly be traced beyond the year 1500, but merely of those who were in the position of what we now call county families before that period. The line of demarcation indeed between the families who rose upon the ruins of the monastic system, and the more ancient aristocracy of England, is often very difficult to be traced, depending as it does on documentary evidence often inaccessible, and obscured by the fanciful and too favourable deductions of the heralds of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

With regard to the sources from whence the following memoranda have been taken, I have endeavoured as much as possible to rely upon the best county histories and MS. collections of authority, and carefully to eschew those modern accounts of family history, which, by ascribing the most absurd pretensions of ancient lineage to families who bore no real claim to that distinction, have done much to bring genealogy itself into contempt among that numerous class of readers who are but slightly acquainted with the subject.

I cannot conclude without recording my obligations to several gentlemen who have in the most liberal manner placed their genealogical collections at my service, and by so doing rendered less imperfect these notices of the noble and gentle houses of England: among that number I wish particularly to mention the names of the late Mr. Joseph Morris of Shrewsbury and Mr. Joseph Hunter, one of the Assistant Keepers of the Records, the learned and accurate historian of South Yorkshire.
E.P.S.

Lower Eatington, July 1, 1860.

ANOTHER edition of this little work having been called for, I have carefully revised and corrected what has been already written; I have also made some additions, the result of further investigation, and the information of many friends and correspondents, whose courtesy and kindness I here beg most gratefully to acknowledge.

Since the book was published in the year 1859, the male lines of three families, whose names were originally comprehended in it, have become extinct, viz.: Cotton of Landwade, in the county of Cambridge, Hornyold of Blackmore Park, and Hanford of Wollashill, both in Worcestershire. On the other hand, notices of eight "new peers?" will be found in the present volume, four of which also occurred in the second edition. I allude to Lovett of Liscombe, in the county of Buckingham, and Basset of Tehidy, in the county of Cornwall—very ancient families, whose landed property being until lately in female hands, could not, in accordance with the rules which I had laid down, be comprehended in the first edition; I have also added Huyshe of Sand, in Devonshire, Patten of Bank Hall, in Lincolnshire, Bertie of Uffington, Anderson of Brocklesby, and Massingberd of Wrangle, all in Lincolnshire, and, lastly, Upton of Ashton Court, in the county of Somerset. And here I must again beg to remind the reader, that the intention of this work is not to give an account of every family whose pedigree may be continued in the male line beyond the time which I have mentioned (the beginning of the sixteenth century), but of those only who were established as county families, "inheriting arms from their ancestors," at that period. It is no doubt in many cases very difficult to distinguish accurately the pretensions of many families who may possibly have a fair claim to this distinction, though, from the reasons to which I have formerly alluded, it is not easy to establish them. I can only say that as far as my information extends I have endeavoured fairly and honestly to draw the correct line, but whether I have succeeded must be left to the judgment of others.
E. P. S.

Lower Eatington, January 22, 1866.

THIS great and ancient Family, though not connected with this county before the reign of Henry VIII., yet, having been for a considerable time seated at Melchbourne, may with propriety be included among the Bedfordshire families, and indeed stands alone as the only one of knightly rank.* Descended in the direct male line from Hugh de Port mentioned in Domesday, in the twelfth century William son of Adam de Port took the name of St.John from the heiress of that great Norman family. Basing in Hampshire, Stanton St.John in Oxfordshire, Bletshoe in the county of Northampton, and Lydiard Tregoze in Wiltshire, both derived from the heiress of Beauchamp in the reign of Henry VI.—have successively been seats of the St.Johns, who have made themselves sufficiently remarkable both for their loyalty and disloyalty in the reign of Charles I., not to mention the ambition and ill-directed abilities of the great Lord Bolingbroke in that of Anne.

Younger Branch. St.John of Lydiard Tregoze, Viscount Bolingbroke 1712. Baronet 1611. Descended from Oliver, second son of Sir Oliver St.John and the heiress of Beauchamp.

See Leland's Itinerary, edition 1769, vol. vi. folio 27, p. 26. Brydges's Collins, vi. 42 and 741. For an account of Bletshoe, and the monuments there, see Gent. Mag. 1799, p. 745. For Lydiard Tregoze, and other monuments of the St.Johns, whose pedigree, by Sir R. St.George, is painted on folding-doors on the north side of the chancel, see the Topographer, i. 508.

Arms.—Argent, on a chief gules two mullets pierced or. William de St.John in the thirteenth century bore in his arms the addition of a bend gules, which was continued by his descendants till the reign of Elizabeth. (Gent. Mag. 1787, 681.) The present coat was borne by Sir John de St.John in the reign of Edward II.; at the same time other members of the family varied the field and charges thus: Sir Roger bore, Ermine, on a chief gules two mullets or; Sir Eymis, Argent, crusilly sable, on a chief gules two mullets or; Sir John de Layneham, Argent, on a chief gules two mullets or, a border indented sable. John, heir of John de St.John, differenced his arms with a label azure, according to the roll of Carlaverock. The roll of arms of the reign of Richard II. gives the mullets of six points pierced azure. Edward St.John at this period bore, Argent, on a chief dancetté gules two mullets of six points or, pierced vert. Rolls of the dates.

Present Representative, St.Andrew Beauchamp St.John, 14th Baron St.John.

This family is of ancient Kentish extraction, and is a branch of the Polhills or Polleys of Preston, in Shoreham, in that county, descended from John Polhill, eldest son of John Polhill and Alice de Buckland, the heiress of Preston, in the reign of Henry VI. The Rev. Richard Polwhele, the Historian of Cornwall, was of opinion that the Polhills of Kent were a branch of the Cornish Polwheles, which emigrated from the western into the eastern counties at a very early period; they were certainly seated at Detling in Hollingbourne, in Kent, at or previous to the reign of Edward III. In the time of Elizabeth, the Polhills were of Frenches, in the parish of Burwash, in Sussex. The immediate ancestor of the present family was Nathaniel Polhill, of Burwash and Howbury, an eminent merchant, who died in 1782.

See a very minute account of all the branches of this ancient family in the Topographer and Genealogist, i. pp. 180 and 577. See also Hasted's History of Kent, vol. i, p. 365, and vol. iii. p. 4.

Arms.—Or, on a bend gules three cross-crosslets of the first. It appears by the Roll of Arms of the reign of Richard II., that Monsr. Rauff Poley bore a coat nearly similar, viz, Argent, on a bend gules three crosses patée or.

Present Representative, Frederick Polhill, Esq.

It has been observed by old Fuller, "The Lands of Berkshire are very skittish, and are apt to cast their owners;" and again, "Of names which were in days of yore—few remain here of a great store." The ancient family of Eyston, and the succeeding one of Clarke, are indeed the only exceptions at the present day to this rule. The Eystons have been seated at East Hendred since the reign of Henry VI.; John Eiston, their ancestor, having at that period married "Isabel, daughter and heir of John Stow, of Burford, co. Oxford, whose wife was Maud, daughter and heir of Rawlin Arches, of East Henreth, whose great-grandmother was Amy, daughter and heir of Richard Turbervill, of East Henreth, Esq."

See the Visitation of Berks, 1566. Harl. MS. 1822, 26 b, and Harl. 1532, 19 b. See also Lysons's Berkshire, pp. 186, 292, and Clarke's Hundred of Wanting, 4to. 1824, p. 130.

Arms.—(Confirmed in 1566.) Sable, three lions rampant or.

Present Representative, Charles John Eyston, Esq.

The pedigree begins with John Clarke, of Basledon, in this county, living there the latter part of the fifteenth century. The family afterwards removed to Ardington, where they were established, according to Lysons, in the reign of Henry VII. The Visitations of 1566 and 1623 record five generations of the Clarkes before the year 1600.

See the Visitation of Berks, 1566. Harl. MS. 5822, 22 b, and Harl. 1532. See also Lysons's Berkshire, pp. 180, 186, and Clarke's Hundred of Wanting, p. 56.

Arms.—(Confirmed Oct. 22, 1600.) Argent, on a fess sable three plates between three crosses patée of the second. Sometimes the fess is placed between six crosses patée.

Present Representative, William Nelson Clarke, Esq.

This very ancient family is lineally descended from Robert de Thain, who held Chetwode under the Bishop of Baieux in the time of William the Conqueror, as appears by Domesday Book.

John de Chetwode having during the reign of Edward III. married the heiress of Oakeley, of Oakeley in Staffordshire, the family have mostly resided there, as well as at Ansley Hall in Warwickshire, derived from the heiress of Ludford in 1821.

Willis, writing in 1755, says—"This manor of Chetwode, as appears to me, has been in the possession and inheritance of the Chetwodes longer than any estate or manor in this county of Buckingham has continued the property of any other family now there existing."

See Willis's Buckingham, p. 172; Erdeswicke's Staffordshire, ed. 1844, p. 119; Wotton's Baronetage, iv. p. 82; and Lysons's Buckinghamshire, p. 172.

Arms.—Quarterly argent and gules, four crosses patée counterchanged.

Present Representative, Sir John Newdigate-Ludford-Chetwode, 5th Baronet.

A very ancient and honourable family of Norman descent, who came over with the Conqueror, and seated themselves at Lillingstone before the year 1200, Richard son of Elias Dayrell being seised of a message and half a knight's fee there in King Richard the First's time, or the beginning of King John's reign. Before 1306 the Dayrell became possessed of the fee of the manor, which has ever since continued in the family.

The Dayrell of Shudy Camps, in the county of Cambridge, are a younger branch of this family, sprung from Francis, second son of Paul Dayrell of Lillingstone, sheriff of Buckinghamshire 1579.*

See Willis's Buckingham, p. 213; Lysons, p. 595.

Arms.—Azure, a lion rampant or, crowned argent.

Present Representative, Edmund Francis Dayrell, Esq.

There is good reason to believe that this family, seated at Wotton from the reign of Henry I., is a collateral branch of the Grenvilles of the West. The manor of Wotton, among many others, was given by William I. to Walter Giffard, Earl of Buckingham. Isabel, daughter and coheir of Walter the second Earl, is said to have brought it in marriage, about the year 1097, to Richard de Grenville.

The consequence of this family in modern times is owing to matches with the heiresses of the great houses of Temple, Nugent, and Chandos.

See Brydges's Collins's Peerage, ii. p. 390, and Lysons, p. 673. See also Moule's Bibliotheca Herald, p. 563, for an account of the MS., formerly at Stowe, viz. The original Evidences of the Grenville Family, collected by Richard Grenville, of Wotton, Esq. during the civil wars of the seventeenth century.

Arms.—Vert, on a cross argent five torteauxes.

Present Representative, Richard Plantagenet Campbell Temple-Nugent-Brydges-Chandos-Grenville, 3rd Duke of Buckingham.

On the decease of the last Earl Harcourt, in 1830, the representation in the male line of the illustrious House of Harcourt devolved on this family, descended from a younger brother of Simon, first Viscount Harcourt, and the heiress of Lee. Stanton Harcourt, in the county of Oxford, was possessed by the ancestors of this great House in 1166, and continued in the family till the extinction of the elder line in 1830. The pedigree is traced to Robert de Harcourt, who married Joan, daughter of Robert Beaumont, Earl of Mellent, and who was grandson of Robert who attended William the Conqueror in his expedition to England in 1066.

See Brydges's Collins's Peerage, iv. p. 428; and Nichols's Leicestershire, iv. pt. 2. p. 519.*

Arms.—Gules, two bars or. This coat was borne by Sir John de Harcourt in the reign of Edward II. Thomas Harecourt, the reverse, in the reign of Richard II. Rolls of the period.

Present Representative, George Simon Harcourt, Esq.

Vitalis Lovett of Rushton, in the county of Northampton, who lived in the reign of Henry II., appears to be the first proved ancestor of this venerable family, said to be of Norman origin. William Lovett of Rushton, the son of Vitalis, held certain lands in Henwick, also in Northamptonshire, of Richard Engaine and his heirs by the service of finding two horsemen to follow the said Richard to hunt the wolf in any part of England. This service was remitted to John Lovet, son or grandson of William, in the reign of Edward I., and in lieu thereof an annual rent-charge of ten shillings was imposed. Soon after this period, viz: in 1304, (33 Edw. I.) Liscombe in the parish of Soulbury came into the family, being in the possession of Robert Lovett and Sarah his wife, daughter and heir of Sir Roger Turvile, from the second marriage of their son Thomas, descended the Lovetts of Astwell in Northamptonshire, since the reign of Elizabeth represented in the female line by the Shirleys Earls Ferrers. Liscombe has from the beginning of the fourteenth century remained the inheritance of the elder branch of the Lovetts, though the direct descent has been often interrupted. In 1781, Jonathan Lovett, the representative of the family, was created a baronet by King George III. His Majesty's remark on this occasion is preserved in Betham's Baronetage. "In the summer of 1781, the Earl of Chesterfield having been some time absent from court, was asked by the King where he had been so long? 'On a visit to Mr. Lovett of Buckinghamshire,' said the Earl. 'Ah,' said the King, 'is that Lovett of Liscombe? They are of the genuine old Norman breed, how happens it that they are not baronets? would they accept the title? Go tell him,' continued the King, 'is that the title is much at his service; they have ever stuck to the Crown at a pinch.'" The same work also gives a very curious, and to an antiquary very tantalizing, account of the ancient armour and documents once preserved at Liscombe, and describes their melancholy fate. Sir Jonathan Lovett having died without surviving male issue in 1812, the title of Baronet became extinct and the property descended to his daughters; on the decease of the survivor, Miss Eliza Lovett, in 1861, the ancient seat of this venerable family reverted by her will to the next male heir, the present representative of the family, descended from a younger brother of Sir Jonathan Lovett, baronet.

See Baker's Northamptonshire, i. p. 732; Lipscombe's Buckinghamshire, iii. p. 457; Stemmata Shirleiana, pr. pr., 1841, p. 58; Collectanea Topog. et Genealog. vi. p. 300, and Betham's Baronetage.

Arms.—Evidently allusive to the name, and to the service of hunting the wolf, Argent, three wolves passant in pale sable, armed and langued gules.

Present Representative, Jonathan Vaughan Lovett, Esq.

The name is local, from Bendish, in the parish of Radwinter, in Essex, where Peter Westley was seated at a very early period. His grandson was called Ralf of Westley, alias Bendishe, and from him this ancient family, one branch of which was long settled at Steeple Bumstead, in Essex, is descended. A manor in Barrington came from the heiress of Bradfield early in the fifteenth century, and had acquired the name of "The Manor of Bendyshe" so far back as the year 1493; it has ever since remained the inheritance of this the eldest line of the Bendyshe family, of whom a younger branch was of Topfield Hall, in Hadley, co. Suffolk, whose heiress married Doyley of Overbury, also of Steeple Bumstead before mentioned, created Baronet in 1611, extinct in 1717; and other branches again were of Hadley and Turvey in Bedfordshire.

See Lysons's Cambridgeshire, p. 86, and the Visitation of Essex 1612, Harl. MS. 6095, fol. 16, where is a good pedigree of Bendyshe, brought down to William Bendyshe, Esq. tenth in descent from Peter Westley.

Arms.—Argent, a chevron sable between three ram's heads erased azure.

Present Representative, John Bendyshe, Esq.

The Davenports claim precedence among the knightly families of Cheshire,—that "seed-plot of gentry," "the mother and the nurse of the gentility of England," and are traced directly to the Conquest. The elder line, which Leland terms "the best and first house of the Davenports at Devonport; a great old house covered with leade on the Ripe of Daven, three miles above Congleton," became extinct in 1674. The coheiresses married Davies and Davenport of Woodford. Ormus de Daumporte, living in the time of William I., is the first recorded ancestor of this family. To his son, Richard de Dauneporte, Hugh Earl of Chester gave the chief foresterships of the forests of Leek and Macclesfield about 1166, a feudal office still held by this house.

The present family are sprung from Nicholas, third son of Sir John or Jenkin Davenport, of Wheltrough and Henbury, who was himself a younger son of Thomas, second son of Sir Thomas Davenport of Davenport, the 13th of Edward II. Woodford was granted by John Stafford and Isabella his wife, about the time of Edward III., to John, third son of Thomas Davenport of Wheltrough, (an elder line not traced beyond 1677,) while the Davenports of Henbury were extinct before 1664. Davenport of Calveley, founded by Arthur, sixth son of Sir John Davenport of Davenport, killed at Shrewsbury in 1403, became extinct in 1771. The coheiresses married Bromley and Davenport of Woodford. Davenport of Bramhall, founded by the second son of Thomas Davenport of Wheltrough and the heiress of Bramhall, in the time of Edward III., survived till 1838. The Davenports of Davenport House, in the parish of Worfield, in Shropshire, are the only younger branch now remaining; they spring from the Davenports of Chorley and the heiress of Bromley of Hallon or Hawn, in the parish of Worfield. See Blakeway's Sheriffs of Salop, pp. 85, 143, 228.

For Davenport of Davenport and Woodford, see Ormerod's Cheshire, iii. 39, 346, 357; for those of Calveley, ib. ii. 153; Henbury, iii. 352; Bramhall, iii. 401; Chorley, iii. 312. See also Leland's Itin., vii. fol. 42, and Harl. MSS. 2119, for a good pedigree of the family drawn from original evidences.

Arms.—Argent, a chevron between three cross-crosslets fitchée sable. The crest of this family, a felon's head, souped proper, haltered or, alludes to the power of life and death within the Forests of Leek and Macclesfield, granted by Hugh Earl of Chester.

Present Representative, Arthur Henry Davenport, Esq.

Descended from Gilbert le Grosvenor, nephew of Hugh Lupus, Earl of Chester; the pedigree of this ancient family is, thanks to the famous controversy with the Scropes, well ascertained. The principal line of the Grosvenors was seated at Hulme, in this county, in the hundred of Northwich, and was extinct in the 22nd year of Henry VI. The Grosvenors of Eaton descend from Ralph second son of Sir Thomas Grosvenor of Hulme, who married Joan, sole daughter and heir of John Eaton, of Eton or Eaton, Esq. early in the fifteenth century. The match of Sir Thomas Grosvenor, Bart. in 1676, with Mary, sole daughter and heir of Alexander Davies, of Ebury, in the county of Middlesex, Esq. laid the foundation of the great wealth and consequent honours of this family.

Younger branches: the Earl of Wilton 1801; the Baron Ebury 1857.

See Ormerod, ii. 454, and iii. 87; Brydges's Collins, v. 239; and the Scrope and Grosvenor Roll passim.

Arms.—Azure, a garb or, used since the sentence of the Court in the cause of Sir Richard le Scrope and Sir Robert le Grosvenor in 1389, instead of Azure, a bend or, and allusive to his descent from the ancient Earls of Chester.

Present Representative, Richard Grosvenor, 2nd Marquess of Westminster, K.G.

This is the principal male branch of the great House of Egerton, formerly Earls and Dukes of Bridgewater and Earl of Wilton. The pedigree begins with Philip Goch, second son of David de Malpas, surnamed le Clerk, which David was lord of a moiety of the Barony of Malpas. The present family is descended from Sir Philip Egerton, third son of Sir Rowland Egerton, of Egerton and Oulton, Baronet, who died in 1698. The Baronetcy devolved on Sir John Egerton, uncle of the present Baronet, on the death of the Earl of Wilton, and extinction of the elder line, in 1814. Oulton came from the heiress of Hugh Done, anno 1498. It is thus mentioned in Leland's Itinerary: "The auncientest of the Egertons dwellith now at Oldeton, and Egerton buildith ther now." (Itin. vii. fol. 42.) Younger branch, Egerton-Warburton, of Warburton and Arley, in this county.

See Wotton's Baronetage, i. 271; Brydges's Collins, iii. 170, v. 528; Ormerod, ii. 118, 350; and for many curious particulars of the Bridgewater Egertons, see the Topographer, ii. 136, &c.

Arms.—Argent, a lion rampant gules between three pheons sable. The pheons were the ancient arms of Malpas; the lion was added by Uryan Egerton, about the middle of the fourteenth century; according to tradition, an augmentation granted as a reward for his services in the Scotch wars.

Present Representative, Sir Philip de Malpas Grey-Egerton, 10th Baronet, M. P. for S. Cheshire.

Descended with the Egertons from the Barons of Malpas, and immediately from Robert de Cholmondelegh, second son of William Belward, lord of a moiety of the Barony of Malpas, and younger brother of David the ancestor of the Egertons; which Robert was seated at Cholmondeley in the reign of King John.

Younger branches. Cholmeley of Whitby, in Yorkshire, Baronet 1641, extinct 1688; descended from Robert, younger son of Hugh Cholmondeley, temp. Edw. III. See the Memoirs of Sir Hugh Cholmeley, Knight and Baronet, a curious book privately printed in 1787.—Cholmeley of Brandsby, since the extinction of the Whitby family the only representative of the Cholmondeleys of Yorkshire.—Cholmeley of Easton, co. Lincoln, Baronet 1806, descended from Sir Henry Cholmeley, of Burton Coggles, co. Lincoln, who died in 1620.

Cholmondeley of Vale Royal in this county, Baron Delamere 1821, descended from Thomas, younger son of Sir Hugh Cholmondeley of Cholmondeley, who died in 1501.

See Ormerod, ii. 356, and for Cholmondeley of Vale Royal, ii. 78. Brydges's Collins, iv. 16.

Arms.—Gules, two helmets in chief argent, garnished or, and in base a garb of the third.

Present Representative, George Horatio Cholmondeley, 2nd Marquess of Cholmondeley.

Robert Tatton of Kenworthy, in Northenden, who married the heiress of William de Withenshaw, alias Massey, about the latter end of the reign of Edward III., is the first proved ancestor of this family, but there is reason to believe that he was descended from the much more ancient house of the name who were seated at Tatton in the twelfth century. Withenshaw, now the seat of the younger branch of this family, remained from the period above mentioned the inheritance and residence of the Tattons, until the decease of Samuel Egerton, Esq. in 1780, when the estate of Tatton, which is supposed to have given name to the family, devolved by his will on William Tatton of Withenshaw, Esq., who had married Hester, sister of Mr. Egerton. Tatton had passed to the Egertons through the families of Tatton, Massey, Stanley, and Brereton.

Younger branch, Tatton of Withenshaw, in this county. See Ormerod, iii. 315, and Gentleman's Magazine 1798, 930.

Arms.—Quarterly argent and gules, four crescents counterchanged. The arms are perhaps founded on the coat of Massey.

Present Representative, William Tatton Egerton, Baron Egerton of Tatton.