“Remember, Remember… the Fifth of November”

Among the many plots to assassinate the monarch, the Gunpowder Plot of 1605 was the closest to succeeding. Many of the descendants of Thomas Richards alias Fermor had a role. The following is excerpted and edited from the book, Thomas Fermor and the Sons of Witney.

King James I & VI

King James I & VI and Sir George Fermor

After the death of Queen Elizabeth on 24 March 1603, James VI of Scotland, her nearest relative, seemed most likely to inherit the throne. However, a statute dated 1351 prevented foreigners from being heirs to English land and Henry VIII’s will of 1547 forbade Scottish relations from inheriting the throne. Despite the uncertainty and complications, James VI of Scotland ascended the throne on 24 March as James I, King of England and Ireland, known as the Union of the Crowns.

On 25 June the king set out from Windsor, and on 27 June 1603 arrived at Sir George Fermor’s home at Easton Neston.[1] Meanwhile, the queen, Anne of Denmark, was travelling from Scotland toward London with their eldest son, the young Prince Henry, and her household.

The royal visit to Easton Neston may have had a more political motive. Sir George by marriage, acquaintance, and political connection was intimately aware of the persecution endured by Catholics during the forty-five year reign of Queen Elizabeth, as well as the ongoing recusant activities that continued to endanger the lives around him. Sir George, with his political experience in arbitrating disputes, may have played a leading part in voicing to the new sovereign the hopes in offering tolerance toward Catholics.

As the son of Mary Queen of Scots, James was baptized as a Catholic, but was raised as a Protestant while his mother was imprisoned. Hopes were high that James would implement a policy of religious toleration when he promised not to prosecute any “that will be quiet, and give but an outward obedience to the law, neither will I spare to advance any of them that will by good service worthily deserve it.”[2] As observed by a Catholic woman in Oxfordshire who said, “Now we have a king who is of our religion and will restore us to our rights.”[3]

Main Plot & Bye Plot

While Sir George was entertaining the new king and queen, a disagreement among Catholics led William Watson to conspire with Sir Griffin Markham, Sir George Brooke, and Anthony Copley to overthrow James and seat Lady Arabella Stuart[4] on 24 June. Fearing retribution if the “Bye Plot” should fail, George Blackwell and two Jesuit priests, John Gerrard and Henry Garnet, informed the authorities in June 1603, and the plot was foiled. During the investigation, another conspiracy led by Sir George’s brother, Henry Brooke, 11th Baron Cobham, was uncovered in July 1603, again to replace James with Lady Arabella Stuart, who was also Cobham’s cousin. Sir Griffin Markham and Sir Walter Raleigh were imprisoned in the Tower of London for their participation in the “Main Plot.”

While the Main and Bye Plots were relatively minor, James’ councilors pressed him on the grave political danger Catholics presented. All hopes of religious tolerance quickly disappeared on 19 February 1604 when the king denounced the Catholic Church and instructed that the recusancy fines be collected. Three days later, James banished all Jesuits and Catholic priests to leave the country. This prompted a call to action from a very displeased Robert Catesby of Ashby St. Ledger, Northamptonshire.

Robert Catesby

Robert Catesby

Robert Catesby invited Thomas Wintour and John Wright to his house in Lambeth to discuss a plan of re-establishing Catholicism in England. Their plan:  blow up the House of Lords during the state opening of Parliament next year on 05 November 1605.

Wintour, who had served for Lord Monteagle, and whose uncle, Father Francis Ingleby, was hanged, drawn, and quartered at York on 02 June 1586 for being a priest, then travelled to Flanders to inquire about Spanish support. While there, he sought out Guido “Guy” Fawkes, a committed Catholic who had served as a soldier, engineer, and gunpowder expert in southern Netherlands.

Wintour later recruited Thomas Percy, Robert Keyes (son of a Protestant rector), Thomas Bates, Robert Wintour (brother of Thomas Wintour), Christopher Wright (brother of John Wright), John Grant (who had married Dorothy Wintour, the sister of Thomas and Robert), Ambrose Rookwood, and Sir Everard Digby. On 14 October 1604, Catesby invited Francis Tresham.

All thirteen of them, with exception to Bates, were “gentlemen of name and blood.”[5]

Gunpowder Plot

The wives of the plotters became increasingly concerned by what they suspected was about to happen. On Saturday, 26 October 1605, Tresham’s brother-in-law, William Parker, 4th Baron Monteagle, received an anonymous letter.

The letter was shown to the king on Friday, 01 November, following his return to London. Upon reading it, James immediately seized upon the word “blow” and felt that it hinted at “some strategem of fire and powder.” This led to two searches of the newly leased cellar directly under the House of Lords.

Around midnight on 4/5 November, Fawkes, still using the alias John Johnson, was discovered in an undercroft, dressed in a cloak and hat, wearing boots and spurs, and carrying a lantern. He was arrested and a search revealed a pocket watch, several slow matches, and touchwood. Thirty-six barrels of gunpowder Fawkes had moved there by March 1605 were discovered hidden under piles of wood and coal.

Agnes (Fermor) Wenman

Sir Richard and Agnes (Fermor) Wenman

Sir George and Lady Mary Fermor happened “by accident” to stop at Harrowden on Wednesday, 06 November, and tell Elizabeth (Roper) Vaux what had happened in London. Sir George was there to inquire about a letter Vaux sent to his daughter Agnes Wenman around Easter (after the gunpowder had been collected and stored.)

The letter had been intercepted by Agnes’ mother-in-law, Lady Jane Tasburgh, who had given it to her son Sir Richard Wenman. Vaux’s comment to Agnes that “Tottenham would soon turn French” convinced many that Vaux knew about and supported the plot. Vaux confessed she wrote the letter, but of course, insisted she had no recollection of the letter’s contents, except the reference to turning French.

British School; Richard Wenman (1573-1640), 1st Viscount Wenman; Llyfrgell Genedlaethol Cymru / The National Library of Wales; http://www.artuk.org/artworks/richard-wenman-15731640-1st-viscount-wenman-120336

The authorities arrested Sir Richard and his wife Agnes, who were questioned separately in December 1605. Agnes was released after a short confinement in custody. On 03 December, Sir Richard testified that he “disliked their intercourse, because Mrs. Vaux tried to pervert his wife.” He also strongly disapproved of his wife’s company of friends, particularly John Gerard, who probably had some mutual animosity as he would describe Sir Richard in his 1609 autobiography as “a knight with a large estate, who hoped one day to become a baron, and is still hoping…”[6]

On 05 December, Chief Justice John Popham instructed Sir Richard to “send up the letters written to his wife by Mrs. Vaux and Lady Fermor, with a true account, from those who saw Mrs. Vaux’s letter, of its contents.”[7] By the end of the day, Sir Richard had complied. According to Agnes,

I. Examination of Agnes Lady Wenman. She kept Mrs. Vaux’s letter at first, to shew it to her husband, because she was angry with her mother-in-law, Lady Tasburgh, for opening it, but has lost or burnt it since; her mother [Lady Fermor] wrote to ask her to send it, or a copy of it, to Mrs. Vaux, who had heard that she was called in question for it, but she could not; it was chiefly about Lord Vaux’s marriage with Lady Suffolk’s daughter, and about the disgrace of the Catholics; adding, “Notwithstanding pray, for Tottenham may turne French.”

Relationship of the Gunpowder Plot conspirators and the descendants of Thomas Richards alias Fermor. Click to enlarge.

Elizabeth (Roper) Vaux

The 07 December examination of Elizabeth (Roper) Vaux and Sir George Fermor’s testimony at Easton Neston begins with Sir Edward Coke to the Earl of Salisbury,

The last declaration of Faukes is safe, and herewith I send it to you. I have observed out of Mrs. Vaux’s and Sir George Fearmor’s examinations such things as I think fit, which also I send unto you, because it may be you will think it fit that Sir George be re-examined and that the letter written to the Lady Weyneman (who lies now in child-bed) be sent for…

Endorsed:  1605. Mr. Attorney General, with observations concerning Mrs. Vaux and Sir George Farmour.

[Enclosure, endorsed in Coke’s handwriting] “My observations concerning Mrs. Vaux and Sir Geo. Fearmor”[8]

Elizabeth would testify that Sir George relayed reports that it should have been performed by five Scots. Sir George would testify that he was angry with Elizabeth for it was she who had sent for him that Wednesday to tend to her son Edward in London, but then changed her mind, and it was she who first told him about the news after hearing it from a servant.[9]

Sir George had requested a copy of the infamous letter, but it was “lost.”

My Lady Tasburgh being examined goes further that there was contained in that letter that Mrs. Vaux persuaded the Lady Wayneman to be of good comfort and not to destroy (sic), for ere it were long there should be a remedy or a toleration for religion, and that the Lady Tasburgh said there was treason in the letter; and that since Mrs. Vaux went to the Lady Weynman in Oxfordshire and willed her to keep the letter for both their discharges…[10]

Aftermath

The Gunpowder Plot of 1605 put a decisive end to further discussions of religious toleration and was the last real major plot by a radical Catholic faction.

Swayed by the threat of treason, the public applauded a policy of repression with penal laws against recusants enlarged to included women and then enforced with greater vigor. Catholics were forbidden to appear at Court, despite the fact that the queen, Anne of Denmark, had recently converted to Catholicism. They were banned from coming within ten miles of London and had to remain within five miles of their homes, unless granted a special license. They were excluded from many professions, including medicine and the law. All holders of public office were now required to take Communion annually according to the Anglican rite. The penalties for secret Catholic baptisms were increased by an additional £100 fine. It was also illegal for Catholics to hold the patronage of Anglican benefices, and Catholic landowners who had retained these ancient rights from pre-Reformation times found them divided between Oxford University and Cambridge University. The 1606 Oath of Allegiance contained a declaration that the Pope had no political authority in England, which most Catholics and the Archpriest of England agreed and signed, but as the wording could also be construed as rejecting the Pope’s spiritual authority, the Pope condemned it and replaced the Archpriest.[11]

It was assumed Catholics would become submissive and cease to be a problem to the authorities. In the years following the Gunpowder Plot recusants lost none of their resolve and unyieldingly adhered to their faith. For most recusants, they had no choice but to endure their persecution in silence and pay their recusancy fines without complaint or redress.[12] Sir George Fermor was observed on 09 April 1610 “at the sermon at Towcester.”[13] Although Sir Richard Wenman was cleared of any part in the plot, he was removed from the commission of the peace for many years.

Today, the “Guy Fawkes” mask is used worldwide during protests, particularly those where public opinion is swayed by the idea of government conspiracy or overreach of authority.

Philip Farmer is the author and publisher of “Thomas Fermor and the Sons of Witney” tracing the family history from 1420 to 1685, and “Edward Farmar and the Sons of Whitemarsh” following their 1685 arrival from Ireland into Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Virginia, Tennessee, and Harlan County, Kentucky.


[1] Baker, A Chronicle of the Kings of England (1733), p.403; Echard, The History of England, ed.3 (1720), p.378; Tighe et al, Annals of Windsor, vol.2 (1858), pp.48-49; Chester, Genealogical Memoirs of the Extinct Family of Chester of Chicheley (1878), p.111. Other accounts have Sir George Fermor entertaining King James and Queen Anne at Easton Neston 11 June 1603. The king and queen would visit with Sir George Fermor again in October 1604 to reunite with their son Prince Charles, Duke of Albany.

[2] Hankins, “Papists, Power, and Puritans:  Catholic Officeholding and the Rise of the ‘Puritan Faction’ in Early-Seventeenth-Century Essex,” The Catholic Historical Review, vol.95 no.4 (October 2009), p.697.

[3] Hadland, Thames Valley Papists, From Reformation to Emancipation, 1534-1829 (April 2004), p.82.

[4] Lady Arabella Stuart (1575-1615), the only child of Elizabeth Cavendish and Charles Stuart, 1st Earl of Lennox, secretly married William Seymour, 2nd Duke of Somerset, the son of Katherine Grey and Edward Seymour, 1st Duke of Hertford, the son of Anne Stanhope and Edward Seymour, 1st Duke of Somerset, who also had a daughter, Elizabeth Seymour, who married Sir Richard Knightley after the death of Mary Fermor, daughter of Anne Browne and Richard Fermor. Anthony Copley, son of Sir Thomas Copley, was brother to Margaret Copley who married Sir John Gage, and their son Sir Thomas Gage married a descendant of Thomas Richards alias Fermor… Mary Chamberlain, daughter of Sir John Chamberlain and Katherine Plowden.

[5] Spink, The Gunpowder Plot and Lord Mounteagle’s Letter (1902), p.21.

[6] Davidson et al, “Wenman, Sir Richard (c.1573-1640), of Thame Park, Oxon. and Twyford, Bucks,” The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1604-1629 (2010); Harding, “Wenman, Sir Richard (1573-1640), of Thame Park, Oxon. and Twyford, Bucks,” The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1558-1603 (1981).

[7] Green, Calendar of State Papers, Domestic Series, of the Reign of James I, 1603-1610 (1857), pp.265-277.

[8] Giuseppi, Calendar of the Cecil Papers in Hatfield House, vol.17 (1938), pp.554-570.

[9] Green, Calendar of State Papers, Domestic Series, of the Reign of James I, 1603-1610 (1857), pp.265-277; Giuseppi, Calendar of the Cecil Papers in Hatfield House, vol.17 (1938), pp.554-570. The latter stating, “All which is denied by [Sir George Fearmor struck out] Mrs. Vaux…”

[10] Giuseppi, Calendar of the Cecil Papers in Hatfield House, vol.17 (1938), pp.554-570.

[11] Hadland, Thames Valley Papists, From Reformation to Emancipation, 1534-1829 (April 2004), p.87.

[12] Owen, Calendar of the Manuscripts of the Most Honourable The Marquess of Salisbury Preserved at Hatfield House, Hertfordshire, pt.14 (1976), pp.vii-viii.

[13] Rowse, Sir Walter Rallegh, His Family and Private Life (1962), p.298.

“Sir Laurence Fermour de Richards”

A relatively recent article appeared in the February 2021 issue of “Who Do You Think You Are?”

On page 41, a contributor asks, “How can I prove that Sir Laurence Fermour de Richards is one of my ancestors?”

The reply contains a lot of guidance in researching English ancestors in the 1500s and concludes that today’s point-and-click genealogy is perpetuating errors.

Questions like this from other family historians as well as some really bad family trees out there is the reason I published “Thomas Fermor and the Sons of Witney” complete with source citations.

The article does a good job pointing out that Laurence would never have been referred as “Sir Laurence Fermour de Richards.” Research shows he clearly adopted the Fermor surname and its various spellings like Fermour or Farmor. There is no evidence he was a knight or clergy to have been referred as Sir Laurence.

Research also shows that Laurence was the son of Thomas Richards alias Fermor by his first wife Alice. When his father remarried to the widow Emmote (Hervey) Wenman, Laurence married Emmote’s daughter Elizabeth Wenman and had four children: William, Thomas, Johan (Joan), and Mary.

Philip Farmer is the author and publisher of “Thomas Fermor and the Sons of Witney” tracing the family history from 1420 to 1685, and “Edward Farmar and the Sons of Whitemarsh” following their 1685 arrival from Ireland into Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Virginia, Tennessee, and Harlan County, Kentucky.

Elizabeth Horne

This blog is part of a continuing series in which heraldic coat of arms, tombs, deeds, chancery records, and wills help piece together a medieval family tree.

Per his 11 September 1552 will, William Fermor – son of Thomas Richards alias Fermor by his second wife Emmote (Hervey) Wenman – bequeaths…

unto my good Aunte Elizabeth Horne wydowe one soveraigne of golde of xxs And to her sonne my Cosyne Edmund Horne Esquire one of my yonge horses of my owne brede of thage of three yeares and upwards[1]

Who is Elizabeth Horne and her son Edmund?

If Elizabeth Horne was an aunt by blood, then there were possibilities that may amend the family tree. One possibility was Elizabeth, known sister of Thomas Richards alias Fermor. The other possibility was an unidentified sister of either Thomas Richards alias Fermor’s second wife Emmote, or his first wife Alice, or perhaps the identify of an unknown wife.

After an exhaustive search, it has been determined and supported by evidence that Elizabeth (Delaford, Blount) Horne was an aunt by marriage to Elizabeth Norreys as described below.

Robert Horne and Joan Fabian

Robert Horne (b. ca. 1412), citizen and fishmonger merchant of London, was elected alderman of London on 27 July 1444.[2] Based on a chancery record of 11 November 1432 for a debt owed to John Shirley, Esquire, Robert was related – probably as brother – to Simon Horne and John Horne both of Daventry, Northamptonshire, and to Richard Horne, citizen and draper merchant of London.[3]

Per deed dated 03 July 1485, Robert and John Horne are parties to transactions in Great Norcroft and Losingrove, land given to the University College in the village of Hailey, Oxfordshire, once a parish of Witney. In that deed, “a headland of arable land in a field next to Crawley inside the tithing of Hayle” lies between Robert Horne to the west and Thomas Richards alias Fermor to the east.

In those same University College records, a William Horne of “Wyttney, Oxon., Rough Mason, and brother of John Horne of Bladon, Oxon., Husbandman” is also listed as a party to a 19 May 1509 deed witnessed by Richard Wenman, wool merchant and William Fermor’s step-brother. William Horne, “carpenter,” is also party to a 09 November 1523 deed.[4] Based on dates, William and John Horne are presumed to be nephews of Robert Horne.

Leigh, Roger (Clarenceux King of Arms). Robert Horn, Alderman (ca.1450). London Metropolitan Archives Main Print Collection; Record No. 32131, Catalogue No. k1306505. Watercolor on paper.

We know Robert Horne married Joan Fabian, daughter of Edward Fabian, evidenced by the heraldry displayed at Sarsden House described by Richard Lee in his 1574 Visitation of Oxfordshire.

IV. Arg. on a chevron engrailed Gu. between three unicorns’ heads erased Az. a crescent Or. [HORNE.]

V. Erm. three fleur-de-lys within a bordure engrailed Gu. [FABIAN OF ESSEX]

VIII. HORNE impaling FABIAN.

XXXIII. HORNE, as IV. impaling, FABIAN, as V[5]

[Prior to his marriage with Joan Fabian, Robert Horne may have married Agnes Wytham, daughter and heir of Richard de Wytham and Alice Daundency, and who was also the widow of William Browning. Agnes Wytham (d.1444) was the adopted daughter and heir of her cousin John Golafre of Sarsden House, the son of Thomas Golafre and Margaret Foxley. John Golafre was married three times and had no children. Evidence: 1) Baker’s History and Antiquities of the County of Northampton, Volume 2 (1844); 2) Page et al’s A History of the County of Berkshire, Volume 4 (1924); and 3) Turner’s Visitation of Oxfordshire (1571) in which the 1574 visitation describes “XXXVI quarterly 1. HORNE, 2. DELAFORD, 3. FABIAN, 4. GOLAFRE” as well as “XXXIV HORNE impaling GOLAFRE.”]

Robert and Joan had two sons and two daughters: John, Robert, Jane, and Anne.[6]

After Robert Horne’s death circa 1457, Joan (Fabian) Horne remarried to John Fettiplace, citizen and draper of London, and lord of the manor of East Shefford, Berkshire. They had four sons Anthony, Sir Thomas, Richard, and William Fettiplace, and a daughter, Margaret.[7]

After the death of John Fettiplace in August 1464, Joan (Fabian, Horne) Fettiplace remarried that year to John Estbury of Antwick’s Manor in Letcombe Regis, Berkshire.

Anne Horne, daughter of Robert Horne and Joan Fabian

Anne Horne (b. ca. 1455) first married Sir John Stanley of Elford, Tamworth, and Wigginton in Staffordshire, and of Aldford, Etchells, and Alderley in Cheshire. He was also King’s esquire, Sheriff of Staffordshire, and Knight of the Shire for Staffordshire.

Shaw, Stebbing. Elford Church – The Stanley Monument (nd). Engraving print.
Top right, “The 3 wives of Sir John Stanley (as suggested) taken from Elford Church windows anno 1537.” Upon closer inspection of the heraldic robes, the last wife to the right may be Anne Horne.

After Stanley’s death on 29 June 1476, Anne remarried before 31 January 1478 to Sir William Norreys, son of Sir John Norreys and Alice Merbrooke. Norreys was first married to Joan Vere, daughter of John Vere, 12th Earl of Oxford and secondly to Isabel Ingaldesthorpe (d.1476), widow of John Nevill, Marquess of Montagu. In 1479, William and Anne sued John Stanley, Esquire, for a third part of the manors of Clifton-Campville, Haunton, and Pipe in Staffordshire, which they claimed was Anne’s dower.[8]

To further confirm the Horne-Fettiplace-Norreys connections, in a record circa 1525, prayers were requested for the souls of various siblings of William Fettiplace (d. 26 December 1528), of East Shefford, Berkshire, including “Robert Horne, John Horne, Joan Horne, and Madam Ann Horn… brothers and sister by the mother’s side” and also for the soul of Sir William Norreys “husband of the said Madam Ann.”[9]

William and Anne (Horne, Stanley) Norreys had a daughter, Elizabeth, who married William Fermor as his fourth wife. We know this from the heraldic brasses on William and Elizabeth’s tomb, as well as the 1574 description of stained windows at Sarsden House, Oxfordshire.

Trotter, Thomas. Tomb of William Fermor and Elizabeth Norreys (1801). Watercolor.
Source: http://somertonoxon.co.uk/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/Somerton-Church-Booklet_P3.pdf
FERMOR, impaling RAVENSCROFT quartering, 1. HORNE, 2. FABIAN, 3. MOUNTFORT/MERBROOKE.

After Norreys’ death, Anne remarried to William Harcourt. She has often been confused as the wife to Sir John Harcourt who had married Anne Norreys, sister to William Norreys, Anne Horne’s husband. After the death of William Harcourt, Anne (Horne, Stanley, Norreys) Harcourt remarried John Grey, Esquire.

John Horne, son of Robert Horne and Joan Fabian

John Horne married Elizabeth Delaford, the sole daughter and heiress of Pernell Whitton (d.1493) and William Delaford of Iver, Buckinghamshire (d.1494).[10] Elizabeth was also the widow of Richard Blount (d. 31 November 1508), sheriff for Buckinghamshire and Bedfordshire in 1502, with whom she had Richard, Anne, and Elizabeth.[11]

In a chappell on ye south side of the Church of Adderbury are the following inscriptions… On a pillar at ye lower end of the church: Neare this font lyeth Elizabeth wife to Richard Blount & John Horne, Esquire, heir to Delaford & mother to Jane Bustard wch Elizab. Died an. Dom. 1554.

Sarsden House:
XXXII. Quarterly 1. HORNE, as IV. 2. A chevron between three pheons, 3. FABIAN, as V. 4. Paly of six (untinctured).

Bruerne Abbey, Mr. Bridges’ House
V. Quarterly 1. Arg. a chevron engrailed Gu. between three unicorns’ heads erased Az. [HORNE.] 2 Az. a chevron Gu. between three pheons Or. [DELAFORD] 3. Erm. three fleurs-de-lys within a bordure engrailed Gu. [FABIAN.] 4. Paly of six Arg. and Sa. [STRELLEY.]
[12]

As seen in the glass now installed at the University of Oxford’s Balliol College, Lee may have slightly erred in his description, with the quartering as “1. HORNE, 2. STRELLEY, 3. FABIAN, 4. DELAFORD.”

Balliol College, University of Oxford. Quarterly, 1. HORNE, 2. STRELLEY, 3. FABIAN, 4. DELAFORD/SPYCER.
Source: https://www.flickr.com/photos/balliolarchivist/6992603484/in/album-72157629955843265/

William Delaford’s father John had arms “sable, a pale argent” and the Delaford arms with the pheons described above is actually from William’s mother, Agnes Spycer.[13]

Elizabeth (Delaford, Blount) Horne died in 1554 and was buried at St. Mary’s Church, Adderbury.

John and Elizabeth (Delaford, Blount) Horne had at least one daughter, Jane, and one son, Edmund.

Jane Horne, daughter of John Horne and Elizabeth Delaford

Jane Horne married Anthony Bustard as can be seen by the Horne coat of arms quartered with the Bustards of Adderbury.

Argent, on a fess gules between three pellets as many bustards or, within a bordure engrailed azure [BUSTARD], impaling, Quarterly, 1 and 4. Argent, a chevron engrailed gules between three unicorns’ heads erased azure. [HORNE.] 2 and 3. Ermine, three fleurs-de-lys gules within a bordure engrailed of the last. [FABIAN.][14]

Edmund Horne, son of John Horne and Elizabeth Delaford.

File 1127, No. 75 (1544-1547) Edmund HORNE, esquire, son of Elizabeth Horne, v. Robert BEKINGHAM. Contempt of a decree concerning boundaries of pasture in Sarsden Heath and Lyneham and the manor of Merriscourt (in Lyneham) and Lyneham. See File 828, No. 9. Oxford.[15]

Edmund Horne married first to Elizabeth Tame, daughter of Jane Grevill and Thomas Tame.[16]

IV. Arg. a chevron engrailed Gu. between three unicorns’ heads erased Az. [HORNE OF SARSDEN], impaling. Quarterly: — 1 and 4. Arg. a griffin Vt. and a lion Az., both combatant. [THAME.] 2 and 3. Cheeky Or and Az., on a bend Gu. three lions passant Or.

XIX. HORNE, as IV., impaling, Quarterly 1 and 4. Arg. a griffin Vt. and a lion Az.  crowned Arg. combatant. [THAME.] 2 and 3. Cheeky Or and Az. on a bend Gu. three lions passant Or. [WARREIN.] Over it written, E.HORNE & E.TAME

Church of Shipton under Whichwood:
This picture presentith to yo’r reme’brance
the last symplytud of all yo’r bewtye & fame
also hyt sygnyfieth the mortall chance
of Elysabeth daughter and heir of Tho. Thame
Which somtyme was ye dear and loving wife
of Edmond horne esq. durynge all her lyfe
Whose mortall bodye now consumed to dust
was layd here in grve as by nature neds hit most
In the year of Chrsts his incarnacon’
a thowsande fyve hyndredth fortye eight
the fyftenth of august her v’tuus enclynacione
brought her to the place of ye eternall lyght.
[17]

Tomb of Elizabeth (Tame) Horne. Coat of arms shown with HORNE impaling quarterly 1 &4 TAME, 2 & 3 WARREIN.

Family relationships can also be inferred from chancery records, wills, and land deeds.

File 1131, No. 29 [1544-1547]. Edmund HORNE, esquire, and Elizabeth his wife, great-granddaughter and heir of John Tame, esquire, v. Thomas VARNEY, esquire, Elizabeth his wife, and others. Manor of Fairford and land there formerly in the guardianship of Edmund Tame, knight, deceased, younger son of the said John. Gloucester.[18]

File 1234, No. 32-35 [1547-1551]. Edmund HORNE, esquire, v. Walter BASKERFEELDE and Jane his wife, late the wife of Thomas Tame, esquire. Manor of Stowell, advowson of the church, and lands in Stowell, Yanworth, and Chadworth, all of the entail of Richard Conwaye, clerk. Gloucester.[19]

Additionally…

By 1470 Hampnett manor belonged, with Stowell manor, to Elizabeth, daughter of William Clifford, and her second husband Thomas Limerick (d.1486). It passed to Limerick’s daughter Agnes, wife successively of William Tame and Sir Robert Harcourt (d. by 1504), lord of Stanton Harcourt, Oxfordshire. Sir Robert’s heir Richard Harcourt also married Agnes and in 1508 feoffees settled the reversion of Hampnett on her heirs. Agnes died before Richard (d.1513), and her son Thomas Tame owned Hampnett together with Stowell in 1522. Thomas Tame evidently held it at his death ca.1545 and Edmund Horne, who married Thomas’ daughter Elizabeth, sold it in 1550 to [his-brother in-law] Anthony Bustard of Adderbury, Oxfordshire.[20]

Elizabeth (Tame) Horne died on 15 August 1548 and Edmund Horne married secondly to Amy Clarke, daughter of Valentine Clarke and Elizabeth Brydges.

XX. HORNE, as IV., impaling. Or, two bars Az. in chief three escallops, in fess a mullet Gu. [CLARKE.] Over it written, E.HORNE & AMYE CLARKE[21]

Edmund Horne died in 1553 with a will written 12 October 1553 and his inquisition post mortem conducted soon after.[22]

Philip Farmer is the author and publisher of “Thomas Fermor and the Sons of Witney” tracing the family history from 1420 to 1685, and “Edward Farmar and the Sons of Whitemarsh” following their 1685 arrival from Ireland into Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Virginia, Tennessee, and Harlan County, Kentucky.

Footnotes


[1] Hutchens, “Will of William Fermor of Somerton,” Oxfordshire Family History Society (OFHS.uk). nd. An abstract also found in Blomfield, History of the Present Deanery of Bicester, Oxon (1882), p.105.

[2] Beavan, The Alderman of the City of London, Temp. Henry III – 1912, vol.2 (1913), pp.9, 164. Robert Horne of Sarsden House, Oxfordshire, has been confused with other Robert Horne’s, primarily Robert Horne of Appledore, Kent, possibly a vintner, the son of Henry Horne, and husband to Isabel who he left a widow. Separating their biographical attributes requires more research, to include: a) imprisonment at Newgate in 1444 for his involvement in Jack Cade’s Rebellion, and by paying a large ransom of 500 marks, was spared his life; b) killed at the Battle of Towton on 29 March 1461 during the War of the Roses; c) Sheriff of London from 1446-1447; d) Sheriff of Kent from 1451-1452; e) Mayor of London (sic? William Horne, salter); and e) Member of Parliament for Kent in 1460. The Horne’s of Kent may have had a coat of arms described in simple terms as a “chevron between three bugle horns” of various tinctures and extra charges. Reference: 1) Woodger, “Horne, Henry, of Horne’s Place in Appledore, Kent,” The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1386-1421 (1993); 2) Harris, “The Longleat House Extracted Manuscript of Gower’s Confessio Amantis,” Middle English Poetry Texts and Traditions (2001), pp.80-81; 3) Robertson, “Chapel at Horne’s Place, Appledore,” Archaelogia Cantiana, vol.14 (1882), p.366; 4) Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem Preserved in the Public Record Office, vol.2 (1915), p.613; 5) Mercer, “Lancastrian Loyalism in Kent During the Wars of the Roses,” Archaeologia Cantiana, vol.119 (1999), p.228; 6) Andrews, “Ockholt, alias Ockwells Manor, and its Owners,” The Berks, Bucks & Oxon Archaeological Journal, vol.24 no.1(1918), p.21; 7) Armytage, A Visitation of the County of Kent, 1663-1668 (1906), p.96; and 8) Burke, The General Armory of England, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales (1884), pp.507-508.

[3] TNA C 241/225/52.

[4] UC:E6/1D/1; UC:E6/1D/2; UC:E6/1D/4; Darwall-Smith, “Early Records of University College, Oxford,” Oxford Historical Society, vol.46 (2015), pp.374-380.

[5] Turner, The Visitations of the County of Oxford Taken in the Years 1566, 1574, and in 1634 (1871), pp.8, 10. A John Horne, sheriff of Berkshire and Oxfordshire temp. Henry VII, had arms “Gules a chevron argent, twixt three escallops or.” Fuller, A history of the worthies of England… (1662), p.106.

[6] Thrupp, The Merchant Class of the Medieval London (1948), p.350; Collections Towards a Parochial History of Berkshire (1783), p.66.

[7] Andrews, “Ockholt, alias Ockwells Manor, and its Owners,” The Berks, Bucks & Oxon Archaeological Journal, vol.24 no.1 (1918), p.21.

[8] Wrottesley, “Extracts from the Plea Rools, Temp. Edward IV., Edward V. and Richard III,” Collections for a History of Staffordshire, ser.2 vol.6 pt.1 (1903), p.121.

[9] Collections Towards a Parochial History of Berkshire (1783), pp.68, 73. Page 73, of which there are two same numbered pages, has “John Horne, John Horne*…” footnoted as “Joan Horne…” Page 68 lists “John Horne, Joan Horne…”

[10] Page, A Victoria History of the County of Buckinghamshire, vol.3 (1925), pp.286-294; Burke, Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Commoners of Great Britain and Ireland, vol.2 (1835), p.167; Croke, The Genealogical History of the Croke Family, originally named Le Blount, vol.2 (1823), pp.255-256.

[11] Burke, A Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Commoners of Great Britain and Ireland, vol.3 (1836), p.167.

[12] Turner, The Visitations of the County of Oxford Taken in the Years 1566, 1574, and in 1634 (1871), pp.196-197, 19.

[13] Reference XVIII in Turner, The Visitations of the County of Oxford Taken in the Years 1566, 1574, and in 1634 (1871), p.9; Croke, The Genealogical History of the Croke Family, originally named Le Blount, vol.2 (1823), p.254/255. The latter has the arms described as “argent, a pale sable.”

[14] Turner, The Visitations of the County of Oxford Taken in the Years 1566, 1574, and in 1634 (1871), p.196.

[15] List of Early Chancery Proceedings Preserved in the Public Record Office, vol.9 (1963), p.57.

[16] Gibbs, “Palimpsest Brasses – Ancient Request to Aylesbury Church,” The Buckinghamshire Miscellany (1891), p.158; Maclean et al, The Visitation of Gloucestershire Taken in the Year 1623 (1885), p.260.

[17] Turner, The Visitations of the County of Oxford Taken in the Years 1566, 1574, and in 1634 (1871), pp.9, 83. Other sources for Thame coat of arms has “a dragon vert” (e.g. Maclean et al, The Visitation of Gloucestershire Taken in the Year 1623 (1885), p.260.)

[18] List of Early Chancery Proceedings Preserved in the Public Record Office, vol.9(1963), p.64. Elizabeth Tame, daughter of Thomas Tame, son of William Tame, son of John Tame and Alice Twiniho (Maclean et al, The Visitation of Gloucestershire Taken in the Year 1623 (1885), p.260.)

[19] List of Early Chancery Proceedings Preserved in the Public Record Office, vol.9(1963), p.232.

[20] Herbert, A History of the County of Gloucester, vol.9 (2001), pp.81-91.

[21] Turner, The Visitations of the County of Oxford Taken in the Years 1566, 1574, and in 1634 (1871), p.9.)

[22] TNA PROB 11/36/241; TNA E 150/820/1; TNA C 142/101/98.

William Fermor of Somerton

In an earlier blog, we examined how the answer to a brick wall can be found… on a brick wall. In this blog we again use heraldry and burial tombs combined with wills and deeds to verify the identity and marriage order of William Fermor’s four wives.

The Visitation of Northamptonshire claims…

“William Farmor of Somerton, co. Oxon, Esq., first son to Thomas [Richards alias Fermor] by his second wife [Emmote (Hervey) Wenman], mar[ried], to his first wife, the widow of … Marrow of co[unty] Midd[lesex], Esq[uire], and, to his second wife da[ughter] to … a merchant of London ; thirdly, he mar[ried] the da[ughter] of John Pawlet of Basing, co[unty] South[amp]ton, Esq[uire] ; and, fourthly, he mar[ried] Elizabeth, da[ughter] to Lyonnell Norrit of co[unty] Berks[hire], Esq[uire] [sic] by all the which four wives the said William Farmor had no issue, and so dyed without issue…”[1]

Other publications have William’s marriage order as Catherine Paulet, Joan “widow of Marrow”, third wife unknown, and Elizabeth Norris.[2]

William Fermor’s Last Will and Tomb

William Fermor died on 29 September 1552, having made his will eighteen days earlier.[3] His wife Elizabeth was appointed sole executrix and directed to “bear and pay all my funerals after a convenient degree and order and with no pomp or vainglory.” By the terms of William’s will, Elizabeth was to hold the Somerton estates for her life and she was still lady of the manor as late as 1568. By 1573 her nephew Thomas Fermor, the youngest son of William’s brother Richard Fermor and William’s heir, had succeeded her.

At the church in Somerton, William had lengthened and converted the east end of the south aisle into a burial chantry. He installed new windows, constructed a new entrance, and built a round-headed arch giving access to the aisle from the chancel. It is here we find William’s tomb in present St. James Church and use it to work backward into his life.

Burial brass of William Fermor.
Thomas Trotter’s 1801 watercolor of William Fermor’s tomb at St. James Church, Somerton.

Elizabeth Norreys

William’s fourth wife was Elizabeth Norreys, married from after 1510 to his death.

A brass with figures and shields of arms set into the top of William’s tomb chest records his burial there and that of “his last wife” Elizabeth Norreys.[4]

Here lyeth Mr. William Fermour Esq. whyche was lord of this towne and patrone of this churche and also clarke of ye Crowne in ye kings bench by King Henry ye 7th and King Henry ye 8th dayes whyche dyed ye 29th day of 7ber in ye year of our lord god MCCCCCLII and alsoe here lyeth Mestres. Ellsabeth Fermour his last wyffe which was ye daughter of Sr Willm Norrysee Kt. upon whose & all Christen soules Jesu have mercy.[5]

Brasses on tomb of William Fermor and Elizabeth Norreys.

The arms on the brass over Elizabeth’s head is documented as…

[FERMOR, on a fesse between 3 lyons heads rased. 3 anchors]… impaling a chevron between 3 ravens heads rased. q.
1. A chevron between 3 unicornes heads rased.
2. 3 de lis within a border ingrailed.
3. Bends of 8 within a border.
[6]

Upon closer inspection, the charges and tincture of her arms are best described as:  argent on a fess sable between three lions’ heads erased gules three anchors or [FERMOR] impaling argent a chevron sable between three ravens’ heads erased sable [RAVENSCROFT / NORREYS], quartering 1) argent a chevron gules between three unicorn heads erased azure [HORNE]; 2) argent three fleur-de-lis gules a bordure gules engrailed [FABIAN]; 3) a bend of ten or and azure a bordure gules [MOUNTFORT / MERBROOKE].[7]

The same descriptions were also provided by Anthony Wood on 28 February 1675 for a coat of arms displayed at Sarsden House, Oxfordshire, and arms at the Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Thame.

XXXVIII. On a fess between three lions’ heads erased three anchors (untinctured), [Fermor] impaling, Ravenscroft, quartering, Per fess Or, two bars Gu. within a bordure Az.[8]

NORRIS and FERMOR. 1 and 4, NORRIS, Quarterly argent and gules, in the 2nd and 3rd quarters a fret or, over all a bend azure. 2 and 3, FERMOR. Argent a chevron sable between three ravens’ heads erased of the last.[9]

Coat of arms for William Fermor impaling Elizabeth Norreys.

From her coat of arms, we are able to conclude that Elizabeth was the daughter of Sir William Norreys (d. 1507) and Anne Horne, the daughter of Joan Fabian and Robert Horne, fishmonger, alderman, and Sheriff of London. Sir William was the son of Alice Merbrooke and John Norreys, son of Christian Streche and William Norreys of Bray, son of Anne De Rivers and Roger Norreys, son of Millicent Ravenscroft and John Norreys of Bray. When John married Millicent, daughter and heir of Ravenscroft of Cotton, the line of Norreys assumed the Ravenscroft arms. Likewise, a line of the Merbrooke family adopted the Mountfort arms.[10]

William secured an annuity of £20 in 1539 for himself and Elizabeth who, by some sources, he had married that year. However, the 1535 will of his stepbrother Richard Wenman bequeathed to “Elizabeth, wife of my brother William Farmer, a juell of 10 marks.”[11]

Catherine Paulet

William’s third wife was Catherine Paulet, married from after 1508 to her death in 1510.

Catherine was the daughter of Sir John Paulet of Nunney by his wife Alice Poulett of Hinton St. George, Somersetshire. We know this from two sources.

First, a visual inspection of the brass over William’s head has an untinctured coat of arms signifying his marriage to Catherine.

on a fesse between 3 lyons heads rased. 3 anchors Impaling. 3 swords points meeting in brasse. q.
1. Fretty a canton.
2. 6 martletts.
3. A fesse between 3 de lis.
[12]

This brass and Thomas Trotter’s 1801 watercolor was then matched with known coat of arms, yielding a description most likely charged and tinctured as:  argent on a fess sable between three lions’ heads erased gules three anchors or [FERMOR] impaling sable three swords in pile, points in base argent pommels and hilts or [POULET], quartering 1) argent fretty gules a canton sable [IREBY]; 2) argent six martlets sable three, two, one [DELAMARE]; 3) azure a fess between three fleur-de-lis argent [SKELTON].[13]

Coat of arms for William Fermor impaling Catherine Paulet.

Second, Catherine passed away on 26 May 1510 and was buried at Hornchurch, Essex. Based on her coat of arms, the epitaph cast in stone partially reads in error as:

Here lyeth Katherine the daughter of Sir William Pawlet, Knight, [sic] wyf of William Fermour, Clerke of the Crown, who died May 26 the second of Henry the Eighte.[14]

Catherine’s brother, Sir William Paulet, was 1st Marquess of Winchester. The Paulet family will have other marital connections to the Fermor’s in later generations.

Joan Grove

William’s second wife was Joan Grove, married in 1508.

Joan was one of three daughters born to Joan ___ and Roger Grove, alderman and grocer of London.[15] Per 1508 land deeds of the manor of Grove Place, in Chalfont St. Giles, Buckinghamshire,

25 June 1508. Westminster, Buckinghamshire. Roger Grove, citizen and alderman of London, and Joan, his wife, deforciants… [grant] William Fermour and Joan, his wife, querents… the manor of Groue Plate and 70 acres of land, 10 acres of meadow, 30 acres of pasture, 6 acres of wood and 17 shillings and 4 pence of rent in Chalfount Sancti Egidij and Chalfount Sc’i Petri…[16]

12 November 1508. Westminster, Buckinghamshire. William [Fermour] and Joan, his wife, have acknowledged the manor and tenements to be the right of Roger, as those which Roger and Joan, his wife, have of their gift, and have remised and quitclaimed them from themselves and the heirs of Joan to Roger and Joan, his wife, and the heirs of Roger for ever. For this, Roger and Joan, his wife, have granted to William and Joan, his wife, the manor and tenements and have rendered them to them in the court, to hold to William and Joan, his wife, and the heirs of their bodies, of the chief lords for ever. In default of such heirs, remainder to the right heirs of William.[17]

Roger died in 1508. William’s second marriage was also short lived when Joan died at about the same time and was buried at Chalfont St. Giles. Her burial brass shows a woman standing in prayer. Above her is a well-worn coat of arms with three anchors visible in fess on the sinister impaling an unrecognizable dexter that may have been “ermine a chevron engrailed gules charged with three scallops or.”[18]

Burial brass of Joan Grove, second wife of William Fermor.
Grove coat of arms.

Joan Chedworth

William’s first wife was Joan Chedworth, married from around 1499 to around 1508.

Joan was the daughter of alderman William Chedworth of Stepney, and the widow of William Marrow V of Redfern, Warwickshire. Marrow was the son of Sir William Marrow IV, Mayor of London in 1455, and Katherine Rich, daughter of Richard Rich, mercer and sheriff of London. William and Katherine’s two other children, Joan and Katherine, respectively married Sir William Clopton and Sir Robert Throckmorton who will have family ties to the Fermor’s in later generations.

Marrow V’s will written on 26 February 1499 and probated on 30 October 1499 requested burial at St. Botolph’s without Bishopgate under his father’s tomb. By Joan, he left a son, Thomas (d. 1538); two minor daughters Elizabeth and Katherine; Anne who had married ___ Duckling; and Cecily who married Hugh Weldon by whom she had four sons.[19]

Thomas Marrow’s great grandson Sir Edward Marrow will marry Thomas Richards alias Fermor’s second great granddaughter Ursula Fiennes.

Philip Farmer is the author and publisher of “Thomas Fermor and the Sons of Witney” tracing the family history from 1420 to 1685, and “Edward Farmar and the Sons of Whitemarsh” following their 1685 arrival from Ireland into Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Virginia, Tennessee, and Harlan County, Kentucky.


Featured image and other pictures of William Fermor’s tomb:
https://www.1066.co.nz/Mosaic%20DVD/News/October%202017/Oct9/oct9.htm

[1] Metcalf, The Visitations of Northamptonshire Made in 1564 and 1618-19 (1887), p.19. Lyonell Norreys was Elizabeth’s brother.

[2] Coros, “Fermor, William (by 1580-1552), of Somerton, Oxon. and London,” The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1509-1558 (1982). The footnote also states that Metcalfe’s Visitations is in error, presumably “fourthly, he mar[ried] Elizabeth, da[ughter] to Lyonnell Norreys of co. Barks [Berkshire], Esq…”

[3] Hutchens, “Will of William Fermor of Somerton,” Oxfordshire Family History Society (OFHS.uk). nd. An abstract also found in Blomfield, History of the Present Deanery of Bicester, Oxon (1882), p.105.

[4] Ross, “Somerton, St James Church,” BritainExpress.com. nd; Coros, “Fermor, William (by 1480-1552), of Somerton, Oxon. and London,” The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1509-1558 (1982).

[5] Blomfield, History of the Present Deanery of Bicester, Oxon (1882), p.106; Collins, The Peerage of England, vol.5 (1768), p.49. Alternately, “Here lyeth buried Mr. Wylliam Fermour Esquyre which was Lord of this towne and patrone of this church, and also Clark of the crowne in the Kings Bench by Kyng Henry the vii. and Kyng Henry ye VIII. days, which dyed ye XXIX daye of September in ye yere of our Lord God MCCCCCLII. and also here lyeth Mestres Elisabeth Fermoure hys last wife, whyche was the dawghter of Syre Wylliam Norryshe Knyght. Upon whose souls and all christen souls Jesu have mercy (Davenport, Lords Lieutenant and High Sheriffs of Oxfordshire, 1086-1868 (1868), p.35; Gomme, The Gentleman’s Magazine Library, pt.9 (1897), p.211.)

[6] Blomfield, History of the Deanery of Bicester (1882), p.106; “Art. VII. Church Notes, etc. of Somerton, in Oxfordshire,” The Topographer, vol.3 no.2 (August 1790), p.91. A closer visual inspection contradicts “a bendy of eight” and “a bendy of ten.” A bendy of nine as shown on the brass is pictured.

[7] The seal of Richard de Mountfort circa 1365 was a bendy of ten a bordure (Birch, Catalogue of Seals in the Department of Manuscripts in the British Museum (1894), p.271). Burke’s General Armory describes one Mountfort arms as “bendy or and az. a bordure gu.” but does not define which line of Mountfort, and yet another line from Warwickshire as “bendy of six or and az. a border gu.” (Burke, The General Armory of England, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales (1884), p.712). The Horne arms in Sarsden House are “ar. on a chev. engr. gu. between three unicorn heads az. a crescent or.” (Burke, The General Armory of England, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales (1884), p.507).

[8] Turner, The Visitations of the County of Oxford (1871), p.10.

[9] Lee, History and Antiquities of the Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Thame (1883), p.171. Footnote states: “On the tomb the herald-painter has made some obvious mistakes. Fermor is incorrectly represented in the first and fourth quarters; and the arms of Norris in the second and third are altogether wrong…”

[10] Ravencroft, Some Ravenscrofts (1929), p.31.

[11] TNA PROB 11/25; Bloom, Wayman Wills and Administrations Preserved in the Prerogative Court of Canterbury, 1383-1821 (1922), pp.11-12; Moore, “Will of Richard Wenman of Witney,” Oxfordshire Family History Society (OFHS.uk). nd; Lee, History and Antiquities of the Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Thame (1883), p.442.

[12] Blomfield, History of the Deanery of Bicester (1882), p.106; “Art. VII. Church Notes, etc. of Somerton, in Oxfordshire,” The Topographer, vol.3 no.2 (August 1790), p.91.

[13] Paviour, “Catholicism in Somerton:  The Fermors and Catholicism in Somerton,” SomertonOxon.co.uk. 2015; Burke, The General Armory of England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales (1884), pp.275, 340, 817. The arms of Sir George Paulet, the second son of Sir John Paulet of Basing, and brother to William Paulet, the first Marquis of Winchester, had eight quarterings for Paulet – 1) Paulet; 2) Roos; 3) Poynings; 4) St. John; 5) Delamare of Hampshire; 6) Hussey; 7) Skelton; 8) Ireby; 9) Delamare – of which 1, 7, 8, & 9 are shown on the Fermor brass; however, Ireby is described as “argent, a fret sable, and a canton of the second” (Baignet et al, A Practical Manual of Heraldry, and of Heraldic Illumination (1864), pp.34-35).

[14] Blomfield, History of the Present Deanery of Bicester, Oxon (1882), p.105; Urban, “Topography of Somerton,” The Gentleman’s Magazine and Historical Chronicle, vol.97 pt.1 (February 1827), p.115. Another publication has the date of 1511 (Simpson, A List of the Sepulchral Brasses of England (1857), p.24).

[15] Page, A Victoria History of the County of Buckingham, vol.3 (1925), pp.184-193; Green, “The National Archives PROB 11/55/374,” The Oxford Authorship Site. 2009.

[16] Feet of Fines, CP 25/1/22/129, No.113.

[17] Feet of Fines, CP 25/1/22/129, No.116.

[18] “probably identifying the lady as Joan (Grove) wife of William Fermour, who died about 1525…” (Page, A Victoria History of the County of Buckingham, vol.3 (1925), pp.184-193.)

[19] Davis, The Ancestry of Mary Isaac (1955), pp.339-340; Green, “The National Archives PROB 11/5/139,” The Oxford Authorship Site. 2013; Green, “The National Archives PROB 11/12/372,” The Oxford Authorship Site. 2020; Green, “The National Archives PROB 11/12/390,” The Oxford Authorship Site. 2012. The latter source cites chancery record TNA C 1/88/21 to refute claims within the Visitations of Cornwall that Joan Chedworth was the daughter of Sir Thomas Catworth as well as the 1619 Visitations of Warwickshire of another Joan Chedworth, the daughter of John Chadworth, Mayor of London in 1402 (reference Vivian, The Visitations of Cornwall, Comprising the Heralds’ Visitations of 1530, 1573, & 1620 (1887), p.638; Fetherston, The Visitations of Warwickshire in the Year 1619 (1877), p.69.)

Farmer Coat of Arms

In an earlier blog, we highlighted the fascination that two characters from William Shakespeare’s play had with a coat of arms. Even today, there is a modern fascination with wanting to display family heraldry. You see it on family trees, or with companies selling you a certificate or coffee mug. Regrettably, some of these companies and genealogists are assigning the wrong coat of arms. This blog examines various Farmer family heraldry and how it can be used to build a good family tree.

When the Heralds convened their county visitations, they called “all persons that do pretend to bear arms or are styled Esquires or Gentlemen… to produce and show forth by what authority they do challenge and claim the same.”[1] Families or their agents arrived and provided documentation of their family pedigree. Additionally, the Heralds documented the arms displayed at the churches, universities, and other houses. Those persons who could not defend their claim or stole the arms were shamed in the market square and the wrongfully displayed arms were pulled down or defaced. When the Heralds visited Shropshire in 1623, Edward Farmer of Brome, John Farmer, and Roger Farmer were disclaimed.[2]

The visitations provide a good source of genealogical data; however, the Heralds’ abilities to take good notes, the abilities of families to document their family trees, and editorial mistakes have produced some errors. Some good examples include children listed as siblings, incorrect names, and omissions of entire generations. One slight issue is one heraldic description, with a multi-generational pedigree.

A descendant may have made at least two changes to have a new coat of arms granted. Therefore, as shown below, family heraldry is subject not only to geography – of Northamptonshire, or of Leicestershire – but also subject to a moment in time.

Richards

Henry Richards, of Welsh ancestry, was born in 1420. At the age of twenty-four, he met Agnes Fermor, born in 1426.[3] Sometime after their 1446 marriage, Henry took his wife’s surname, an indication that Agnes, the daughter and heiress of her father’s estate, was from a family of higher social distinction than the Richards. Henry Richards alias Fermor had a daughter, Elizabeth, and a son, Thomas.

We know this from the tomb of Thomas Richards alias Fermor’s great grandson Sir George Fermor in St. Mary’s Church at Easton Neston. The dexter spandril of the arch has the Fermor arms, and on the sinister spandril:

FERMOR, quartering 1. Azure a saltier between four eagles displayed or [RICARDS]; 2. Gules on bend argent three trefoils slipped vert [HERVEY]; 3. Per pale indented argent and or a chevron between three escallops gules [BROWNE].[4]

Fermor (top left) quartered with Richards (top right), Hervey (bottom left), and Browne (bottom right).

The Hervey arms signify the marriage of Thomas Richards alias Fermor to his second wife Emmote Hervey. The Browne arms signify the marriage of Thomas Richards alias Fermor’s son Richard to Anne Browne.

Fermor (ancient) & Wenman

When Thomas Richards alias Fermor married Emmote Hervey as his second wife, the expectation would be for the Richards arms on the dexter to impale Hervey on the sinister, with possible quarterings to signify Emmote’s first marriage to Henry Wenman. The Wenman coat of arms granted by Roger Machado, Clarenceux and King of Arms in London, is described as:

WENMAN:  on a fess between three anchors as many lions’ heads erased.[5]

Wenman Coat of Arms

However, Richard Lee, Portcullis and Pursuivant of Arms, in his 1574 visitation of Oxfordshire, records among the arms in Witney Church the following below the inscription “Thomas Ffarmor and Alice and Emote his wyfes.”

FARMER (ancient):  arg[ent] on a fess Sa[ble] between three lions’ heads erased Gu[les] three anchors Or.[6]

Fermor / Farmer Coat of Arms (ancient)

Interestingly, the Wenman and Fermor heraldry is very similar, signifying there may have been a family connection much earlier than Thomas and Emmote’s marriage.

The “anchors and lions” coat of arms remained with Thomas Richards alias Fermor’s line with his sons William and Richard, and then by Richard’s son Sir John Fermor. The arms were passed down to Sir John’s sons and daughters. For example, Mary Fermor married Thomas Lucas, son of John Lucas of London and Colchester by his first wife Mary Abell of Essex. Mary (Fermor) Lucas died on 05 July 1613, and the Lucas coat of arms on her tomb has three shields impaling Fermor.[7]

Fermor (modern)

Sir John Fermor’s son Sir George Fermor had the anchors removed in 1591 with approval from Clarenceux Robert Cooke and Richard Lee of Richmond.[8]

These arms were passed down to Sir George’s sons and daughters, as also seen on his tomb.

Fermor / Farmer Coat of Arms (modern)

I to VI:  FERMOR

VII:  Argent an eagle displayed sable collared or within a border sable Bezanty [KILLIGREW] impaling FERMOR. [Jane Fermor’s marriage to Sir John Killigrew.]

VIII. FERMOR ancient [sic?], impaling FERMOR modern. [Agnes Fermor’s marriage to Sir Richard Wenman?]

IX to XI:  FERMOR

XII:  Argent a fess between three blackbirds sable [HOBY] impaling FERMOR. [Katherine Fermor’s marriage to William Hoby.]

XIII. FERMOR impaling 1. Argent a chevron between three crosses flory sable [ANDERSON]; 2. Argent three cocks gules [COCKAYNE]. [Sir Hatton Fermor’s marriage to Elizabeth Anderson and Anne Cokayne.]

XIV:  1. Or a chevron gules canton ermine [STAFFORD OF BLATHERWICK]; 2. Gules an inescocheon argent between eight mullets in orle or [CHAMBERLAYNE], impaling FERMOR. [Elizabeth Fermor’s marriages to Sir William Stafford and Thomas Chamberlayne of Wickham.]

XV:  FERMOR

XVI:  1. Argent lion rampant azure [CRICHTON]; 2. Gules three lions passant in pale or [O’BRIEN], impaling FERMOR. [Mary Fermor’s marriages to Robert Crichton and Barnabas O’Brien.][9]

Burke’s A General Armory of England, Scotland, and Ireland (1884) has “lions and anchors” for the Farmers of London; of Somerton, Oxfordshire; and from Northamptonshire, Shropshire, and Worcestershire. For descendants who claim Sir George Fermor as an ancestor, “lion heads,” to include the descendants of Oxfordshire; Mount Pleasant, Sussex; Nonsuch Park, Surrey; Northumberland; and Clarvil, Sussex.

For the Irish descendants of Sir George’s son Robert Farmar, to include the Farmar’s of Bloomfield and Dunsinane, County Wexford, a crescent signifies the difference, with exception to Robert’s son Major Jasper Farmar.[10]

Farmer (other)

Descriptions of the heraldry for other Farmer families are as follows.

Farmer of Norfolk (1552)
Argent, on a saltire sable (sometimes sable), between four lions’ heads erased gules, a martlet between four bezants, on a chief azure an anchor between two pallets or.[11]

Farmer Coat of Arms, Norfolk

Farmer of Walsh, Sussex (1575)
gules, a chevron vaire between three lions rampant or.[12]

Farmer Coat of Arms, Walsh, Sussex

Farmer of Sussex
Ermine a chevron Sable between three roses Gules [Farmor].[13]

Farmer Coat of Arms, Sussex

Farmers of Worcestershire
argent, on a fesse sable between three lion’s heads erased gules, as many acorns slipped or.[14]

Farmer Coat of Arms, Worcestershire

Farmers of Leicestershire
sable, on a chevron between three lamps argent, flammant proper, a leopard’s face between two mullets gules.[15]

Farmer Coat of Arms, Leicestershire

Draper alias Farmer

At one time, the Fermor’s became Draper’s through the line of Thomas Richards alias Fermor’s son John, born to his first wife Alice ___, possibly Draper.

When examining the arms granted to Thomas Draper alias Farmer, the letters included in the Visitation of Berkshire are those of Thomas Draper of Lincoln’s Inn (ThomasA) whose arms granted in 1612 are identical to the arms of Thomas Draper of Great Marlow (ThomasB) granted in 1571.

Draper alias Farmer, 1571 & 1612

On a column within the Old St. Pancras Church near Islington are the same arms belonging to Richard Draper, Serjeant-at-Law, who died at Highgate in 1756 at the age of sixty-one (b. ca. 1695). The same arms are claimed by Richard Draper’s father Thomas Draper. When proof of descent was requested at the 1687 visitation of London, Thomas produced an untinctured steel seal.[16]

At another point in family history, the surname dropped the alias and simply became “Farmer.” The arms for John Farmer of Cookham, son of ThomasB, at his tomb in the north transept of the All Saints church in Great Marlow has the sinister showing the relationship of his father’s marriage to Agnes Barker,[17] while the dexter description is described as…

Langley, History of Buckinghamshire (1797)
Arms, Baron and femme. In chief, 3 fleurs de lys in base 3 bends [DRAPER] ; impaling quarterly, 1 and 4, a lion [BARKER] — 2 and 3, three spears [BURGHLEY].[18]

Lipscomb, History of Buckingham (1847)
On a Chief three fleur-de-lis: in base three bendlets: repeated on another shield. Quarterly, 1 and 4, party per chev. Engrailed, a lion ramp… counter charged; 2 and 3, a chief… surtout three spears in pale.[19]

Burke, General Armory (1884)
bendy of eight or and gu. on a chief ar. three fleurs-de-lis az. [20] [Most closely matches the untictured arms for Thomas William Farmer (1786-1837), a hop and seed merchant buried with his wife Mary Ann (1791-1838) at St. Saviour, Southwark.] [21]

Stephenson, Monumental Brasses (1903 & 1926)
(1). (Gu.). three bendlets (or), on a chief per fess (arg.) and ermine three fleur de lys in the upper part (sa.) DRAPER.
(2). Per chevron engrailed (or) and (sa.) a lion rampant counterchanged. BARKER. Quartering. Per chief (sa.) and (arg.) over all three tilting spears erect counterchanged. BURLEY.
[22]

John Farmer of Cookham, d.1631

The 1797 and 1847 description has led to speculation that Thomas Richards alias Fermor’s first wife Alice may have been related to John Norman, Lord Mayor of London in 1453 based on descriptions for his coat of arms.

Burke’s General Armory:
or, three bars gules; in the chief argent as many fleur-de-lis sable.[23]

Harleian MSS:
or, three bendlets gules, a chief per fess argent and ermine, charged in chief with three fleurs de lys sable.

Ferney

When Sir George Fermor changed his arms, the Fermor coat of arms became identical to Fiernye of Yt Ilk from Fife, Scotland. According to Robert Stodart in Scottish Arms, Being a Collection of Armorial Bearings, A.D. 1370-1678 (1881), the arms in Illuminated Heraldic Manuscript (ca. 1565) once owned by James Workman in 1623 are described as…

the fess is sable… with three anchors on the fess; anchors are the bearing of Ferme or Fairholme.[24]

Burke’s General Armory notation for Ferny in Scotland is slightly different, perhaps as a result of location and moment in time for the family:

Or. a fesse az. betw. three lions’ heads erased gu.[25]

Ferney Coat of Arms

Burke’s Ferney tinctures were used by Thomas Trotter for his 1801 watercolors of the Fermor family monuments at Somerset church,[26] including the arms above the monument to Sir George’s uncle Jerome and his wife Jane. Today, the tinctures on the monument are of the sable fess and lions gules impaling “sable, a bend between two leopards’ faces or.”

Jane (Isaacs?) Fermor Coat of Arms

As Jane’s identity is unknown, a study of arms and pedigrees may suggest that she descended from the Isaacs of Kent. The research is supported by multiple associations with the Fermors. The Isaacs family arms changed over time, including the tincture of the leopard faces changing from gules to or, and the sinister bend changing to dexter bend.

Philip Farmer is the author and publisher of “Thomas Fermor and the Sons of Witney” tracing the family history from 1420 to 1685, and “Edward Farmar and the Sons of Whitemarsh” following their 1685 arrival from Ireland into Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Virginia, Tennessee, and Harlan County, Kentucky.


Featured image: “St Mary’s Church, Easton Neston, Northamptonshire,” SeeAroundBritain.com. nd.

[1] Rylands, Disclaimers At The Heralds’ Visitations (1888), pp.iii-viii, 26.

[2] Rylands, Disclaimers At The Heralds’ Visitations (1888), pp.iii-viii, 26.

[3] Farmer, “Thomas Farmer, Jamestown Adventurer:  His History, Descendants, & Ancestors,” Pioneers Along Southern Trails, vol.3 (December 2009), p.212; Howard et al, Genealogical collections illustrating the history of Roman Catholic families of England (1887).

[4] Baker, History and Antiquities of the County of Northampton, vol.2 (1844), p.148.

[5] Blomfield, History of the Deanery of Bicester (1882), p.121.

[6] Blomfield, History of the Deanery of Bicester (1882), pp.103, 121; Turner, The Visitations of the County of Oxford (1871), p.46.

[7] Raven Visitation of 1612. Metcalfe, Visitations of Essex, p.235.

[8] Rylands, Grantees of Arms Named in Docquets and Patents to the End of the Sixteenth Century (1915), p 86.

[9] Baker, History and Antiquities of the County of Northampton, vol.2 (1844), p.148. Installed in 1609 on the east wall of the All Saints Church in Bisham is a window consisting of six panes, each pane with a shield on the top and a shield on the bottom. Presently, the bottom shield on the fifth pane from the left has Hoby impaling Fermor (modern). Also reference: Page, A Victoria History of the County of Berkshire, vol.3 (1923), pp.139-152.

[10] “Colonial Estates – Philadelphia, PA & Bucks County, PA,” Hobbs and Phillips Family Genealogy; Cook, “Farmar of Ardevalaine, County Tipperary, Ireland and of Whitemarsh, Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania,” The Pennsylvania Genealogical Magazine, vol.21, no.2 (1959), p.93; “Wills Proved at Philadelphia 1682-1692,” Publications of the Genealogical Society of Pennsylvania, vol.1, no.2 (1896), pp.58-59. Endorsed on reverse: Mary Farmers Will 1686 Prob**1 in forme of Law l: 5th month 1687 & registered Book A: fol: 45 #32. In America, the arms were used by: 1) Edward Farmar (Committee on Heraldry, New England Historic Genealogical Society. A Roll of Arms. 9 vols. Boston, 1928-1980; Jordan, Colonial and Revolutionary Families of Pennsylvania, vol.4 (1932), p.168/169); 2) Edward’s nephew Thomas Farmar (NEHGS aforementioned; Crozier, William Armstrong. Crozier’s General Armory (1904, reprint 1972)); and 3) Robert Adolph Farmar who was the son of Major Robert Farmer, the British Governor of Mobile (Crozier aforementioned; Matthews, John. Matthews’ American Armoury and Blue Book (1907, reprint 1962). An incorrect coat of arms of “a fess between three cocks’ heads” appears in Bean, History of Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, vol.2 (1884), p.1139.

[11] Rye, The Visitacion of Norffolk (1891), p.119; Rye, A List of Coat Armour Used in Norfolk Before the Date of the First Herald’s Visitation of 1563 (1917), p.23; Burke, The General Armory of England, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales (1884), p.340.

[12] Bannerman, The Visitations of the County of Sussex, Made and Taken in the Years 1530 (1905), p.113. “by patent dated the xth of November 1575 17 of Q. Elizebeth by Cla. Cooke.”

[13] Metcalfe, The Visitations of Suffolk Made by Hervey, Clarenceux, 1561, Cooke, Clarenceux 1577, and Raven, Richmond Herald, 1612 (1882), p.113.

[14] Grazebrook, The Heraldry of Worcestershire (1873).

[15] Fetherston, The Visitation of the County of Leicester in the Year 1619 (1870), p.179. Arms tricked for the descendants of Bartholomew Farmer and Margery ___ of Ratcliff. The coat of arms patented on 20 October 1663 by Sir Edward Walker to George Farmer of Holbeach, Lincolnshire, the fourth son of Bartholomew Farmer of Leicestershire and Ursula Mootus of Whitchurch, removed several charges as follows: “Sable, a chevron between 3 lamps Argent, flames Or.” (Ryley et al, The Visitation of Middlesex, Began in the Year 1663 (1820), p.50; Burke, The General Armory of England, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales (1884), p.340.)

[16] Woodcock, “Heraldry in Old St Pancras Church,” The Coat of Arms; Annual Journal of the Heraldry Society, ser.4 vol.1 no.235 (2018), pp.60-61. Thomas Woodcock, Garter Principal of Arms, writes, “As Thomas’ father Joshua Draper of Braintee [sic], Essex, died in 1686 aged 73, he must have been born in 1613, a year after the grant [to Thomas Draper of Stroud Green in Middlesex by William Camden, Clarenceux in 1612], so would not appear to be a descendant of Thomas Draper the grantee, particularly as his father is also recorded as another Joshua Draper of Braintree, who died in about 1630…” Woodcock also notes that its location as described in Lyson’s time was on the east wall of the chancel and had been relocated to the north wall of the nave (Lysons, The Environs of London, vol.3 (1795), pp.351-353).

[17] “[the] coats-of-arms for Barker and Burghley signify the marriage of William Barker and Anne Burghley, daughter and coheir of William Burghley who lived in Sonning… Who Thomas married though is unknown. John Barker of Wokingham and his wife Katherine Martin had two daughters, Anne and Bridgett, who are not shown in the visitations. All of the children of John Barker and Katherine were listed in John Barker’s will, dated 1551. Neither Ann nor Bridget were married at the time of his death. Both were given an inheritance, to be paid to them should or when they married… It is not clear how the coat-of-arms would have become attached to the Farmers…” (Farmer, “Thomas Farmer, Jamestown Adventurer:  His History, Descendants, & Ancestors,” Pioneers along Southern Trails, vol.3 (December 2009), p.234.) Per parish records, “1592. Dec. 19. Agnes ffarmer, wife of Thomas ffarmer alias Draper, gent., was buried…” (Stephenson, “Monumental Brasses Formerly In Great Marlow Church,” Records of Buckinghamshire, vol.8 (1903), p. 456.)

[18] Langley, The History and Antiquities of the Hundred of Desborough, and Deanery of Wycombe, in Buckinghamshire (1797), p.128.

[19] Lipsomb, The History and Antiquities of the County of Buckingham, vol.3 (1847), p.603.

[20] Burke, The General Armory of England, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales (1884), p.341.

[21] Bax, “On Some Armorial Ledgers in the Cathedral Church of St. Saviour, Southwark,” Surrey Archaeological Collections, vol.22 (1909), pp.23-24; Boumphrey, Surrey Coat of Arms (1983), p.123.

[22] Stephenson, “Monumental Brasses Formerly In Great Marlow Church,” Records of Buckinghamshire, vol.8 (1903), pp.454-455; Stephenson, A List of Monumental Brasses in the British Isles (1926), p.55. Based on a rubbing in the Society of Antiquaries. The 1673 Roll of Arms for Thomas Draper, Baronet, of Sonninghill Park will also omits the ermine as “656. Three bends, on a chief per fess and argent three fleurs-de-lis, badge of Ulster (Schomberg, “A Roll of Arms, 1673,” The Genealogist, vol.25 (1909), p.245.)

[23] Farmer, “Thomas Farmer, Jamestown Adventurer:  His History, Descendants, & Ancestors,” Pioneers along Southern Trails, vol.3 (December 2009), pp.215, 224-225; Burke, The General Armory of England, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales (1884), p.737.

[24] Blomfield, History of the Deanery of Bicester (1882), p.121; Stodart, Scottish Arms, Being a Collection of Armorial Bearings, A.D. 1370-1678 (1881), pp.168-169. “William de Ferny occurs in 1390; his descendants held the various Offices of keeper of Falkland forest, constable of Cupar, and mair of fee of Crail. Ferny was alienated early in the seventeenth century, and the heiress married Lovell of Ballumbie. The arms are cut in stone on a monument at Cupar of the fifteenth century. The coat given here is exactly that of Fermor, Earl of Pomfret, in England, and a family of Farmer, in England, bore the same, with three anchors or on the fess; anchors are the bearing of Ferme or Fairholme in Scotland, so it would seem that these southern families, with a surname certainly derived from an occupation, have wished to make out a Scottish descent…”

[25] Burke, The General Armory of England, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales (1884), p.341.

[26] CMD ID 19903, MS. Top. Oxon d., “Drawings of Somerton church and of the Fermor family monuments there,” Bodleian Library, Oxford.

Fermor Connection to Shakespeare

In “Merry Wives of Windsor,” did William Shakespeare satirize Sir Thomas Lucy, a great grandson of Thomas Richards alias Fermor?

Justice Shallow

Written sometime between 1596 and 1599, William Shakespeare’s Henry IV, Part 2, introduces the character of Robert Shallow, a tall, thin, elderly, and wealthy landowner and Justice of the Peace in Gloucestershire. As the story is told, Justice Shallow is raising a troop to fight against the rebellion in the north and meets with his old friend, Sir John Falstaff, a character introduced in Henry IV, Part 1. The scenes of the two gentlemen provide comedic relief to the drama.

Shallow reappears in Act I, Scene 1 of The Merry Wives of Windsor, and in the first twenty-four lines, Shallow, Slender, and Sir Hugh Evans discuss their coat of arms:

SHALLOW Sir Hugh, persuade me not. I will make a Star-Chamber matter of it. If he were twenty Sir John Falstaffs, he shall not abuse Robert Shallow, Esquire

SLENDER In the county of Gloucester, Justice of Peace and Coram.

SHALLOW Ay, Cousin Slender, and Custalorum.

SLENDER Ay, and Ratolorum too; and a gentleman born, Master Parson, who writes himself “Armigero” in any bill, warrant, quittance, or obligation— “Armigero!”

SHALLOW Ay, that I do, and have done any time these three hundred years.

SLENDER All his successors gone before him hath done ‘t, and all his ancestors that come after him may. They may give the dozen white luces in their coat.

SHALLOW It is an old coat.

SIR HUGH The dozen white louses do become an old coat well. It agrees well, passant. It is a familiar beast to man and signifies love.

SHALLOW The luce is the fresh fish. The salt fish is an old coat.[1]

Shallow then meets with Falstaff who accuses Shallow of killing his deer. With a story about stealing deer and the subsequent trial, threatened imprisonment, and a move to London, there is a belief that Shakespeare intentionally satirized Sir Thomas Lucy in the character of Justice Shallow. The opening conversation about the Lucy coat of arms, “three luces hauriant argent,” further reinforces the controversy.

Sir Thomas Lucy

Sir Thomas Lucy, the son of Sir William Lucy and Anne Fermor, with his long tenure in Warwickshire politics and as Justice of the Peace, may have had some association with the Shakespeares. William Underhill, who married as his second wife Dorothy Hatton, the sister of Sir Christopher Hatton, owned a house at Stratford-upon-Avon that became home of John Shakespeare, William’s father.

An indenture executed on 30 May 1568 has William Clopton, Esquire, of the first part, and Sir Robert Throckmorton, Sir Thomas Lucy, Edmund Plowden, Esquire, and William Underhill, Esquire of Newbold Revel, of the second part.[2] While Underhill was of no relation to the persons comprising the second party of the deed, Sir Lucy after this date would be distantly related to Throckmorton and Plowden. Sir Robert Throckmorton was the son of George Throckmorton and Catherine Vaux, the sister to Maud Vaux the wife Sir John Fermor. Sir Robert’s brother, Sir Nicholas Throckmorton, married Anne Carew, and their son, Sir Arthur Throckmorton, married Anne Lucas, the daughter of Sir Thomas Lucas and Mary Fermor, the daughter of Sir John Fermor and sister to Anne Fermor, Sir Thomas Lucy’s mother. Edmund Plowden was the father of Edmund Plowden and another son Francis Plowden who was married to Mary Fermor, the daughter of Bridget Bradshaw and Thomas Fermor of Somerton, the brother to Sir John Fermor. Clopton’s grandmother was Joyce Horde whose niece Frances Horde married Thomas Fermor of Somerton.[3]

It is likely that Sir Thomas was not a well-liked person, but he was respected. As justice, he was obligated to enforce a Parliamentary act in 1581 to keep citizens obedient to the state religion, with new penalties and instituting commissions very unpopular with Catholics. His association with and execution of orders from Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester, portrayed Sir Thomas as exceedingly harsh with recusants.

In 1591, John Shakespeare’s name was included in a list of recusants sent up to the Privy Council by Sir Thomas, with a second certificate signed on 25 September 1592. It has been argued if this “John Shakespeare” of Stratford-upon-Avon was the bard’s father. Evidence suggests that he was not, but rather another John Shakespeare who was a widower, Master of the Shoemaker’s Company, and who disappeared from town immediately after the list was submitted. As a widower, it would explain why the name of William’s mother was not listed on the recusant certificate.[4]

William Shakespeare: Poacher?

Perhaps the first mention that gives the “direct” association is from the early eighteenth century, and possibly earlier from the late seventeenth century. The story first related by Reverend Richard Davies, the rector of Saperton, Gloucestershire, and Archdeacon of Lichfield who died in 1708, was added to Reverend William Fulman’s biographical manuscript, and then documented in Nicholas Rowe’s The Dramatic Works of William Shakspeare (1710).

Egan, James. William Shakespeare before Sir Thomas Lucy for Shooting his Deer (1834). National Portrait Gallery, London: NPG D41662. Mezzotint.

Much given to all unluckinesse in stealing venison and rabbits, particularly from Sr ___ Lucy, who had him oft whipt and sometimes imprisoned, and at last made him fly his native country, to his great advancement: but his revenge was so great that he is his Justice Clodplate, and calls him a great man, and that in allusion to his name bore three louses rampart for his arms.[5]

He had, by a misfortune common enough to young fellows, fallen into ill company, and amongst them, some that made a frequent practice of deer-stealing, engaged him more than once in robbing a park that belonged to Sir Thomas Lucy, of Charlecote, near Stratford. For this be was prosecuted by that gentleman, as he thought, somewhat too severely ; and, in order to revenge that ill usage, he made a ballad upon him. This, probably, the first essay of his poetry, is said to have been so very bitter, that it redoubled the prosecution against him to that degree, that he was obliged to leave his business and family in Warwickshire, for some time, and shelter himself in London…[6]

Nothing is known of the ballad, but a few popular songs were attributed to Shakespeare. Joshua Barnes, an English scholar, heard an old woman singing a song during his stay at an inn sometime between 1687 and 1690. He paid the lady with a new gown, and she sang the first two stanzas, of which she could only remember from the song’s entirety.

Sir Thomas was so covetous
To covet so much deer
When horns enough upon his head
Most plainly did appear

Had not his worship one deer left?
What then? He had a wife
Took pains enough to find him horns
Should last him during life.[7]

The English Shakespearian critic, Edward Capell, came into the possession of another poem from a Mr. Jones who was born in 1613 near Stratford-upon-Avon and written in his old age, and Capell allegedly added the first two lines giving it more association to Sir Thomas.[8]

A parliament member, a justice of peace,
At home a poor scarecrow, at London an asse;
If lousie is Lucy, as some volke miscalle it,
Then Lucy is lousie whatever befall it.
He thinks himself greate,
Yet an asse in his state,
We allow by his ears, but with asses to mate.
If Lucy is lowsie, as volke miscalle it,
Sing lowsie Lucy, whatever befall it.[9]

That Shakespeare and Sir Thomas had some minor animosity with each other may be based on some truth, but the amount of speculation and embellishment has obscured what is fact, and what is fiction. While Sir Thomas did introduce a Parliamentary bill “for the better preservation of game and grain” in March 1585, his deer park was in Worcestershire on his wife’s inherited property, almost fifty miles away from Charlecote and Stratford. He never owned a deer park and no chancery record in Stratford, Warwick, or the Star Chamber chronicling Lucy’s prosecution of Shakespeare for deer poaching can be found, although a Star Chamber case was prosecuted by his son in July 1610 eight years after the play was written. In 1828, the owner of Charlecote told a story to Sir Walter Scott that the incident occurred at Sir Thomas’ deer park at Fulbroke, of which Sir Lucy did not own, although it was acquired by Sir Thomas’ grandson.[10]

Coat of Arms

Twice, the opening lines of The Merry Wives of Windsor has the number of fish on the coat of arms as twelve, which supposedly is the best evidentiary proof; however, the Lucy shield had three luces.

Source: https://archive.org/details/antiquitiesofwar00dugd/page/400/mode/2up

Other families, like Way and Geddes, also had a coat of arms with three luces, and the Company of Stock Fishmongers were of “two luces in saltire argent.” Shakespeare may have been humorously pointing out “partible differences” between a coat with two fish, three fish, or twelve fish, a phrase the heralds used when describing their objections when granting the coat of arms to John Shakespeare on 20 October 1596. The acting copy of The Merry Wives of Windsor is taken from the Folio Edition of 1623 and the dialog about the coat of arms may have been added as there is no mention in the publications from 1602 to 1619.[11]

Shakespearian scholars and critics generally argue and agree that William did not cast his “nemesis” as a caricature in two of his plays, and strongly suggest Justice Shallow is William Gardiner, a Member of Parliament on bad terms with Francis Langley, the proprietor of the new Swan Theater. Gardiner first married Frances Wayte, the widow of Edmund Wayte, whose son, William Wayte, “swore the peace” against Shakespeare and Langley to appear in court on 29 November 1596.[12]

Be it known that William Wayte craves sureties of the peace against William Shakspere, Francis Langley, Dorothy Soer wife of John Soer, and Anne Lee, for fear of death and so forth. [Writ of] attachment [directed] to the Sheriff of Surrey, returnable on the eighteenth of [St.] Martin.[13]

And the coat of arms? Frances Wayte was the daughter of Robert Lucy, Gentleman, whose coat of arms bearing three luces haurient was quartered on Gardiner’s shield.

Source: https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.501331/page/n109/mode/2up

Another compelling theory starts with the idea that William Shakespeare never wrote the play, and that the true playwright was Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford. Edward was the only son of John de Vere, 16th Earl of Oxford and Margery Golding. When John died in 1562, Edward at the age of two became a ward of Queen Elizabeth and was sent to live with Sir William Cecil whose daughter, Anne, became Edward’s first wife when she was fourteen. Anne had originally been pledged to poet, courtier, and scholar Philip Sidney two years earlier, until Sidney’s father, Sir Henry Sidney, backed out of the marriage negotiations. Sir Henry’s wife was Mary Dudley, daughter of John Dudley, 1st Duke of Northumberland, and they had another son, Robert Sidney. Robert and Edward were both quick-tempered members of Parliament and always at odds with each other, with one infamous argument occurring during a tennis match in full view of the French ambassadors. During the argument, Edward called Robert a “puppy,” and Robert retorted, “Puppies are gotten by dogs, and children by men.” As the argument escalated, Robert stormed off the court and challenged Edward to a duel. Queen Elizabeth intervened rebuking Robert of the “difference in degree between Earls and Gentlemen, the respect inferiors out to their superiors…” commanding him to call off the forbidden duel.[14] This incident may have been portrayed in Act 2, Scene 1 of Hamlet when Polonius references a “falling out at tennis.”

John Dudley’s lands had been attained for his role in preventing the ascension of Mary I. After losing the Duke of Northumberland title before his son could inherit it, Robert could not display his father’s earlier coat of arms consisting of twelve luces, the number of fish on the shield as mentioned in The Merry Wives of Windsor. This explanation would associate Shallow as Robert who replies, “It is an old coat.”[15]

Philip Farmer is the author and publisher of “Thomas Fermor and the Sons of Witney” tracing the family history from 1420 to 1685, and “Edward Farmar and the Sons of Whitemarsh” following their 1685 arrival from Ireland into Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Virginia, Tennessee, and Harlan County, Kentucky.


[1] Shakespeare, The Merry Wives of Windsor, Act I, Scene 1, Lines 1-24.

[2] Howard, Miscellanea Genealogica et Heraldica, vol.1 (1874), p.42.

[3] Hord, Genealogy of the Hord Family (1898), p.22. John Horde (-1594) and Alice Bulkeley’s daughter Joyce Horde married Sir Edward Grey (1472-1528) of Enville, Staffordshire; their daughter Elizabeth Grey married William Clopton (-1560) and had issue, William Clopton.

[4] Stopes, Shakespeare’s Warwickshire Contemporaries (1907), pp.31-32.

[5] White, The Works of William Shakespeare, vol.1 (1893), p.xxxvii.

[6] Rowe, Life of William Shakspeare (1832), p.3.

[7] Levi, The Life and Times of William Shakespeare (1988), p.35.

[8] “Thomas Lucy and Shakespeare’s Lost Ballad,” StrangeHistory.net. 09 September 2017.

[9] Campbell, The Dramatic Works of William Shakspeare (1838), p.xx.

[10] Lee, “Lucy, Thomas,” Dictionary of National Biography, vol.34 (1885), p.249; Stopes, Shakespeare’s Warwickshire Contemporaries (1907), p.41.

[11] Stopes, Shakespeare’s Warwickshire Contemporaries (1907), pp.38-39.

[12] Hannigan, “Shakespeare Versus Shallow,” The Shakespeare Association Bulletin, vol.7 no.4 (October 1932), pp.174-182.

[13] Hotson, Shakespeare versus Shallow (1931), p.9.

[14] Looney, “ ‘Shakespeare’ Identified (1920), pp.294-297; Ward, The Seventeenth Earl of Oxford, 1550-1604, From Contemporary Documents (1928), pp.165-177.

[15] “Unpacking Merry Wives of Windsor,” ShakespeareOxfordFellowship.org. 07 October 1999.

Bibliography & Footnotes

The marketing for the new book “Thomas Fermor and the Sons of Witney” includes a statement that a full bibliography and footnotes are included. Why is this important?

There are good publications defined by the excellent, well-researched data they provide. There are also some publications with extremely poor data, and some genealogical books that contain “data” invented by fraudsters.

Other than the prevention of plagiarism, here are other reasons why references are very important.

Interpretation of Source Records.

Frederick George Lee (1832-1902) wrote about the relationship between the Fermors and the Wenmans in his book History and Antiquities of the Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Thame (1883). Lee makes a special note that he is correcting past genealogical mistakes, which may be the greatest argument in accepting his pedigree. This assumes Lee did not falsify his “findings” to increase book sales, as has been known to occur in recent history.

However, known source documents for the Fermor and Wenman relationships, at least up to 1501, do not support Lee’s assertions. Without the original source documentation used by Lee, the pedigree may be correct, although it does make the family tree messy with several assumptions. As the veracity of the Lee pedigree is inconclusive, it was included in the book to give it a wider audience who may be able to prove its accuracy.

Likewise, my interpretation of the source records may differ from the reader, and the source reference is included so that others may verify or refute the conclusions. My book “Edward Farmar and the Sons of Whitemarsh” created a little controversy. For years, family historians believed John Farmer was the father of Stephen Farmer of Harlan County and a chapter refuted this belief… complete with all bibliography and footnotes. Those same folks who sent the hate mail wrote months later to apologize after reviewing the source documents.

Traceability.

Have you researched your family tree by looking at another person’s family tree? You know that feeling you get when you question the validity of that tree because there are no source documents? For many family genealogists, the hallmark of any great family tree or a genealogical book is its original source documentation and traceability.

John Burke’s publications are an excellent start for genealogical research. Because Burke obtained the information from the families, the reliability can vary, especially as families contributed to one edition or publication, but not another, or contributed false information. This practice is very common with today’s digital genealogy and “open source” websites. As families died off, or no longer contributed, or as paragraphs were reduced to add more persons of interest, the earliest editions of Burke’s series provide better, more descriptive information. Note that Burke very seldom includes the reference to the source document.

Fraud Prevention.

There are instances in which a multitude of history books are written solely on the basis of outright false information from one source. Such may be the case with Jane Fermor, the daughter of Sir George Fermor, in which much of her maligned life originates from a discredited, unpublished “history” manuscript of scandalous falsehoods, and from an author of a family memoir who may have used it as inspiration, yet the information has been repeated in practically every history book since 1737.

The claim that Lady Jane (Fermor) Killigrew was a pirate may have begun with William Hals’ unpublished Compleat History of Cornwall, first started in 1685 and continued until 1736, until Hals died in 1737. The second part of his work was published in 1750 as Complete History of Cornwall, Part II being the Parochial History whereas the first part contained so many scandalous details that prevented its publication. However, Hals’ work did form the basis of Davies’ Parochial History of Cornwall together with additional efforts from Thomas Tonkins.

“There appears to be but little doubt that Hals was rather a scandalmonger, and also seems to have had some private grudge against the Killigrews, and in fact almost every other Cornish family, and the story has therefore been discredited by subsequent historians…”[1]

Likewise, being so very closely the same and with almost the exact same wording as George Calvert’s final petition for his colony in present Maryland, historians have suggested that Sir Edmund Plowden’s final petition for his colony of New Albion in present Maryland was a forged copy. Other research and evidence, including its location on two 1651 maps by Virginia Farrer (pictured above) and her brother John Farrer, have proven that his patent was not a fraud.

Mistakes.

Barnabas O’Brien married Mary (Fermor) Crichton, the youngest daughter of Sir George Fermor and Mary Curzon. Maurice Lenihan in his book Limerick; Its History and Antiquities (1884) incorrectly states he married “Mary, youngest daughter of Sir James [sic] Fermor, Knight, lineal descendant [sic] of the Barons Lempster, Earls of Pomfret…”[2]

Additionally, the Heralds’ visitations offer significant data for building family trees of ancestors from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Supplementing their data with other documentation will sometimes show that even those pedigrees have errors or omissions. Have you noticed how some arguments in online genealogy chat forums originate from the use of one source without consideration that we’re all human and we all make mistakes?

The full bibliography and footnotes included in the book are tool and a key reminder for genealogists studying all pedigrees, family trees, and publications, to always verify… and then verify again.

Philip Farmer is the author and publisher of “Thomas Fermor and the Sons of Witney” a 790-page biographical history of the Fermors from 1420 to 1685. The sequel “Edward Farmar and the Sons of Whitemarsh,” follows the family immigration from Ireland into Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Virginia, Tennessee, and Harlan County, Kentucky.

Click here for more information



[1] Whitley, “Dame Killigrew and the Spanish Ship,” Journal of the Royal Institution of Cornwall, vol.7 no.27 (1883), p.283; Pearce, “Hals, William,” Dictionary of National Biography, vol.24 (1890), pp.123-124. For a reprint of Hals’ account, reference:  1) Whitley, “Dame Killigrew and the Spanish Ship,” Journal of the Royal Institution of Cornwall, vol.7 no.27 (1883), pp.282-283; & 2) Baring-Gould, Cornish Characters and Strange Events (1909), pp.135-137.

[2] Lenihan, Limerick; Its History and Antiquities (1884), p.157.

Barnabas O’Brien & Mary Fermor, Part 2

The O’Briens continued to live in Carlow Castle, but two years after moving into Bunratty Castle, they found themselves in the middle of a war in Ireland. Excerpted and edited from the new book Thomas Fermor and the Sons of Witney.”

On 17 July 1615, Barnabas “Barnaby” O’Brien married Mary (Fermor) Crichton, the youngest surviving daughter of Sir George Fermor, and the second great granddaughter of Thomas Richards alias Fermor.[1] George Carew in his letter dated 24 January 1616 to Sir Thomas Roe writes “August… Sir Brian Obrien, the Erle of Tomond’s second sonne, is married to the Ladie Sanquer.”[2] As Sir George had died on 01 December 1612 and was buried the next day, the widowed Mary (Curson) Fermor and her eldest son, Sir Hatton Fermor, arranged the marriage settlement.

Despite their home in the grand Carlow Castle, large estate, and beautiful Irish surroundings, Barnaby asked Sir Richard Boyle, Baron of Youghal (later first Earl of Cork), to meet him and Mary at Youghal so that “his wife think she is in England.”[3] In 1618, Barnaby and Mary were granted a license to operate several taverns in Carlow, as well as making and selling wine.[4] To Barnaby and Mary were born Henry and Penelope.

While intermarriage with English wives offered advantages to Irish nobles by increasing their social status, wealthy and well-connected English families were reluctant to send their daughters to a country associated with incivility, barbarism, rebellion, and popery. As a Catholic family, the main religion of Ireland would not have been a deterrent, and perhaps the firsthand accounts of life in Tipperary and Cork from Mary’s brother Robert were satisfactory. The marriages of English brides into the families of Irish nobles certainly facilitated family opposition to attempts by the government in the late 1630s to confiscate lands in Counties Kilkenny and Tipperary.[5]

After the 26 July 1639 death of Barnaby’s brother Henry O’Brien, 5th Earl of Thomond, Barnaby became the 6th Earl of Thomond and moved into Bunratty Castle, the Thomond family seat. The castle was “a noble ancient structure” and “the loveliest of any place of any kind [in Ireland]… worthy of a king” located on the banks of the River Shannon near Limerick. The large deer park allegedly held three thousand stags and the gardens were “the likes of which put Italy’s to shame.” The castle and its farm buildings were ordered and furnished, with two story stables holding up to sixty horses. The public rooms were furnished with great splendor. Eleven pairs of tapestries hung in the dining room, which could accommodate forty people seated around eight tables. A large Turkish carpet covered the floor. The master bedroom, dominated by a bed hung with dark orange velvet trimmed with gold and silver loops, and matching stools and cupboard cloths, also had rich Arras carpets and tapestries. The castle courtyard, with its kitchen, laundry and outhouses, was the hub of domestic activity.[6]

Shortly before Christmas 1641, a musket-wielding rebel force commanded by Sir Walter Bagenal and Sir Morgan Kavanagh besieged the town of Carlow. Almost four hundred Protestant English settlers sought refuge in Carlow Castle. After rejecting an offer of fair quarter and safe passage to the sea if they surrendered, they became virtual prisoners within the castle living a nightmare as the besieged began to starve. Edward Briscoe and his wife watched seven of their nine children die “by want of necessaries.” Some women slipping out to forage for food were captured and hanged in full view of their families. A servant girl sent to fetch water was shot. A flood hampered efforts to break the siege until shortly before Easter 1642 when James Butler,[7] Marquess of Ormond and commander of the Crown forces in Ireland, sent a force under the command of Sir Patrick Wemys to relieve Carlow. As Wemys approached, the Rebels burned Carlow and fled. By July 1643, the countryside was so scorched by war that nothing grew, and starvation was rife.[8]

Barnaby did not want to commit to any one side in Ireland and diplomatically played each side – Rebel, Roundheads, and Royalists – against each other to his advantage. Admiral William Penn, the father of the Quaker founder of Pennsylvania of the same name, was assigned to defend Bunratty Castle and its strategic location to the city of Limerick but surrendered and the castle fell to the rebels in July 1646. Thomas Farmer, a lieutenant under Sir John Bolles, now serving under Penn in a frigate protecting the castle, safely removed Barnaby and Mary from the castle to Youghal where Thomas was residing.[9] The O’Briens subsequently fled to England, abandoning Bunratty Castle. The Rebels removed many of the valuable household items, the livestock, and “thoroughbred horses” when they captured the castle.[10]

Philip Farmer is the author and publisher of “Thomas Fermor and the Sons of Witney” a 790-page biographical history of the Fermors from 1420 to 1685. The sequel “Edward Farmar and the Sons of Whitemarsh,” follows the family immigration from Ireland into Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Virginia, Tennessee, and Harlan County, Kentucky.

Click here for more information

[1] Lodge, The Peerage of Ireland (1754), p.262; Lenihan, Limerick; Its History and Antiquities (1884), p.157 incorrectly states he married “Mary, youngest daughter of Sir James [sic] Fermor, Knight, lineal descendant [sic] of the Barons Lempster, Earls of Pomfret…”

[2] Maclean, Letters From George Lord Carew to Sir Thomas Roe 1615-1617 (1860), p.15.

[3] Ohlmeyer, Making Ireland English:  The Irish Aristocracy in the Seventeenth Century (2012), p.185.

[4] Bunbury, “Carlow – The Castle & The County,” TurtleBunbury.com. 2000.

[5] Ohlmeyer, Making Ireland English:  The Irish Aristocracy in the Seventeenth Century (2012), pp.185-186.

[6] Ohlmeyer, Making Ireland English:  The Irish Aristocracy in the Seventeenth Century (2012), p.103. The description of the castle from an August 1639 inventory.

[7] First cousin-twice removed to Elizabeth Butler who was courted by Barnabas O’Brien, James Butler (1610-1688) was the son of Elizabeth Pointz and Thomas Butler (Viscount Thurles), the son of Walter Butler (11th Earl of Ormond), the son of John Butler of Kilcash, the son of James Butler (9th Earl of Ormond) whose son Thomas Butler (10th Earl of Ormond) was father to Elizabeth Butler who married Richard Preston, 1st Earl of Desmond.

[8] Bunbury, “Carlow – The Castle & The County,” TurtleBunbury.com. 2000.

[9] Bunbury, “Carlow – The Castle & The County,” TurtleBunbury.com. 2000.

[10] Ohlmeyer, Making Ireland English:  The Irish Aristocracy in the Seventeenth Century (2012), p.103.