TILSWORTH FAMILIES IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY by Joan Schneider Including: AUSTIN BUCKNAM CHESTER CRAWLEY ELLINGHAM FINCH GURNEY HAWKINS HONNOR JANES KING KINS PARTRIDGE PEDDER PEPPIT PRENTICE PURRAT QUINNY SMITH STANBRIDGE TEARLE THEEDE WELLS WHITE also FOWLER HOWES JACKSON LAW REASON ROAFE This is not a completed study of 17th century Tilsworth but a collection of information gathered over a number of years largely from BLARS (Bedford and Luton Archives Record Service) records at Bedford. I felt that it might be useful to anyone researching the history of the village or any of the local families, providing references to relevant documents, and saving them from repeating investigations that had already been made. I would like to express grateful thanks to the staff of the Record Office in Bedford for their patient assistance over many years. References: Dates of baptisms/births, marriages and burials/deaths are taken from the transcriptions of the Parish Registers of Tilsworth unless otherwise stated. The Tilsworth Register begins in 1602. There is a gap in the 1640s. During the Commonwealth period births and deaths were recorded rather than baptisms and burials. Wills are usually identified by the testator's name and the year of probate, followed by a distinguishing number. In BLARS most wills are prefixed ABP/W. Unfortunately few Bedfordshire probate inventories have survived. A large and valuable collection of documents relevant to Tilsworth was deposited by the Chester family and is listed in Bedford in the CH catalogue, but as the Chesters also owned land in Buckinghamshire, some documents which also concern Tilsworth are held at the Record Office in Aylesbury. The Hearth Tax information is contained in BHRS Vol. 16 (p.42). Joan Schneider 2008 AUSTIN/AUSTEN The Austins were owners at the beginning of the 17th century of one of the few small parcels of freehold property in Tilsworth: a cottage and 4 acres of land which can be traced back to 1472 (CH 2/1)when they belonged to Widow Coursy. There were Austins in the village in 1531 (CH2/1). "Thomas Awstyne of Tilsworth, Laborer" made a will (1607/32) in which he left his land and goods to his wife Elizabeth and after her to his son Gabriel. If Gabriel had no children, to his son Robert, who in fact was in possession at the time of the 1608 survey (CH 3/2). There were also two daughters, Elizabeth Johnson and Joan Dixson, the latter to receive a "tyllet"(?) next adjacent towards the "Northe parte of my Hawle" as long as she was living alone, and a "coppyd apple tree". Evidence later in the century (CH 193) places the cottage facing north west on to the lower green, and it was probably on the site of today's Thanet Cottage, perhaps even the same building that still stands there. Thomas's widow Elizabeth died shortly after her husband in May 1607. Their son Robert, "husbandman", made a will (1621/171) on 16th April 1621 and was buried on the 20th. He left his house and land in Tilsworth and œ20 to his eldest son Thomas when he was 21, and after him, if he died childless, to his son John. The only subsequent entry in the Parish Register for Austin is in 1657, when William, son of John was baptised. The land "formerly Austin" was occupied in 1660 (R94) by Elizabeth Prentis, presumably a widow, and in 1692 by Thomas Prentis. There is no record of a sale and it may have been passed on by marriage or inheritance. BUCKNAM or BUCKINGHAM The first appearance of this name in Tilsworth is in the will (1607/139) of John Bucknam, who was buried 6th Nov. 1607 (the Parish Register lists him incorrectly as "Thomas" Bucknam). Richard and Thomas Bucknam of Houghton Regis were to oversee the will and this may indicate where the family came from. John was a husbandman with a wife Alice and 6 children, William, Thomas, John, Edmund, Jane and Alice, all under 18. He willed that his wife and his eldest son William should "hold and occupy my farm wherein I now dwell". "Farm" is here used in its original meaning of a rented holding, as John did not own the land. The farm in question seems to have been the cottage on the bottom green with 4a, belonging to the Austins, and this would account for the absence of any Bucknams in the 1608 survey (CH3/2), which usually recorded only the freeholders and the direct tenants of Anthony Chester. There was cash in John's will to distribute; œ10 to the second son Thomas and 20 nobles (a noble=10s or 6s 8d) each to the two youngest sons and the two daughters. Interestingly, the daughters inherit at 16, but the sons must wait till they are 18 (in contrast to Richard Crawley's son Gabriel in 1582 who received his legacy at 16, while his sisters had to wait till they were 20, unless they married earlier). John also distributed his household goods: the cupboard in the hall (living room) to his wife, a table and benches to William. Each of the other boys received a pair of the best hempen sheets, and the girls the finer quality flaxen (linen) sheets, while all the children received pillow cases. John, the third son, was to have a heifer or "if he mislike the heifer" 30 shillings. The testator then considered the domestic arrangements which should follow his death: widow Alice and son William should live together "so long as both of them remain" unmarried and they were to share equally the bringing up of the rest of the family, but if either of them married, or they did not "confine" together and one departed so that they didn't share the farm, William was either to give his mother half the moveables, or œ30 and she "shall go her ways with the two youngest children." The provisions of the will do not suggest wealth, but John left his family adequately provided for. Just over two months after he died Alice Bucknam, presumably his widow, (though it could have been one of the young daughters) married the Tilsworth farmer Thomas Buckmaster. The only member of this Bucknam household to appear again in Tilsworth records was John junior ("John II"). He married Joan Prentice and had a son John III in 1627, followed by another, Gabriel, in 1631 and several daughters, including Jane and Joan, though their baptisms are not recorded in Tilsworth. He was tenant in 1638 of a messuage and 30 acres (CH 102). His son Gabriel's progress can be followed up to his death at the end of the century. John III married in 1654 and had at least two children, Elizabeth in 1656 and Joseph in 1657, though the latter was apparently not baptised until many years later. It is possible that some of the family lived in Sewell. Around this time the Bucknams were involved in an unfortunate case of "riotous trespass" and battery (Sessions held at Bedford 9.7.1655). Elizabeth, wife of John Bucknam, yeoman, and Jane Bucknam, spinster, were fined 30s for attacking Richard Partridge, a Tilsworth yeoman, in the summer of 1655. Partridge and his friends were fined 12d apiece for trespassing on John Bucknam's house and close and attacking his wife Elizabeth. The house and close were probably the ones by the bottom green. John II seems to have died before this date, so this was John III and his wife. Spinster Jane was probably the sister of John III and Gabriel. It is frustrating that we know no details of the affair, but the court seems to have treated the two women as bearing the most guilt. Had they set upon Partridge when he was alone, so that he gathered some supporters to avenge the attack? The Bucknams appear in the will (1656/30) of Edward Prentice, written the next year, 1656. Joan, the widow of John II, was Prentice's sister and as well as œ10 to her he left œ20 each to his nieces Jane and Joan Bucknam at marriage, or in six years. John III and his brother Gabriel, his nephews, were appointed executors and he bequeathed them a house and land in Wingfield and the residue of his property - he had no wife or children of his own. The Prentices were a step higher on the financial ladder than the Bucknams, and these legacies must have made a difference to the standing of the beneficiaries, though the inventory of Edward Prentice's property amounted to only œ13 4s 4d, so perhaps the reality was less than the expectation. The next news of the family appears in the will (1669/26) of the widow of John II, Joan Bucknam (n‚e Prentice) in 1669. Her daughters Jane and Joan were still unmarried and were left œ10 and a coffer each and quantities of bedding. Her son John (III) was to have œ2 and her other son Gabriel was the executor. Three men, not apparently resident in Tilsworth, were remembered in the will, as also in that of Edward Prentice, and they were the husbands of other Bucknam (or Prentice) daughters: William Tilcock, Thomas Spriggins and John Poulten. Soon after the death of Widow Bucknam the assessment was made for the 1671 Hearth Tax, and Gabriel had to pay on one hearth. No other Bucknam was paying Hearth Tax, and it looks as if Gabriel was now occupying the cottage by the green. In the 1680s four Bucknams were married in Tilsworth: Richard 1683, Thomas and Ruth in 1685 and Joseph in 1689. It is not clear where they came from, and only Joseph is heard of again. He may have been a son of John III, and it was certainly he who took up the succession in Tilsworth, where he was recorded in 1705 as the blacksmith (Bucks R.O. D/C/4/1). Soon after his marriage to Sara Morgan a son Joseph was born, who died two weeks later, but after that the couple went on to have eleven further children, the last of them baptised in 1709. By 1660 ownership of the cottage and 4 acres by the green had passed from the Austins to the Prentices and in 1698 they mortgaged it. The document (CH 193) refers to the "cottage where Joseph Bucknam dwells." Gabriel was still alive, but another document (CH 197) throws light on where he may now have been living: it is the lease in 1700 by Sir John Chester of a messuage, 90a arable land with closes and common rights, which farm had been "late occupied" by Gabriel Bucknam. Gabriel died in 1699, but for an unknown period before that he had held this substantial farm on the Chester estate. It may have been the farmhouse known today as "Tudor House" and "Tudor Cottage" together with its strips at that time scattered throughout the common fields. Our last contact with Gabriel is through his will (CH 1699/29), written on 11th June 1699, when he was nearly 68 years old, "sick and weak". He was buried on June 18th. His sister and her husband William Tilcock of Brickhill, carpenter, were the main legatees, but other sisters and their families were remembered - Sprigings and Poulter. There was no mention of brother John, nor of sisters Jane and Joan; probably they had all died. Joseph Bucknam was a witness to the will. It is evident that Gabriel had no wife or children of his own; he had a housekeeper: "Judith Smith, servant maid" and he left her the bedstead, featherbed, feather bolster, two blankets a pair of sheets and a mat "now standing and being in the room over the hall". If it was just Gabriel and Judith in the great farmhouse there must have been much spare space, perhaps for living-in farm workers and servants, but of course he could have sub-let rooms in the house. Gabriel was buried on January 18th 1699/1700. In the 18th century, as well as the baptisms of five daughters of Joseph and Sara Bucknam, the Parish Register records a baptism in 1712 of "Joseph Bucknam of Sewell aged 55, son of John Bucknam". This is the man I have taken to be son of John III, husband of Sara Morgan, and father of the many children recorded in the register. He was also the Tilsworth blacksmith (Bucks. R.O.D/C/4/1), who in 1705 was paying œ1 5s 0d for the smith's forge, which seems to have been in the position it still occupied in the early 20th century, on what had been the edge of the green between Yellow Farm and Tudor House. His three sons Ben (13), John and Luke (7) took part in the beating of the bounds along the boundary with Stanbridge, Eggington and Hockliffe on 14th May 1708, together with young William Tuckey, son of the farmer at the manor and "most of the Parishioners", also Sir John Chester's agent. This is the only record of beating the bounds in Tilsworth. It was customary on these occasions to include young boys in the party so that knowledge of the parish boundary would be remembered and passed on in later years. Joseph Bucknam's burial is recorded in 1713. His daughter Mary (born 1703) married Sam Parker, a Tilsworth labourer, in 1723. In 1727 Joseph's son Benjamin Bucknam signed his full name as witness to the will (1727/53) of Thomas Prentice, and a document of 1730 (CH 198) notes that Ben Bucknam is the occupant of the cottage where his great-great-grandfather, John I, had lived 120 years before. After this, though married daughters may have carried on the line in Tilsworth, the Bucknams are no longer traceable in the village. CHESTER The new century coincided with great changes in Tilsworth. In 1600 the Lord of the Manor, Richard Fowler and his lady had been involved in a sensational clash before the court of the Star Chamber, and shortly afterwards Fowler cut his connection with the village by selling his house and land there, as well as his property in Stanbridge, so breaking a family link which went back through Fowlers and Chamberlains to the Mortaines who held the manor in the 13th century. The Tudor age had ended when Queen Elizabeth died in 1603, and James I had succeeded her by the time a new owner acquired Tilsworth in 1604. He was Anthony Chester, from a Buckinghamshire family whose main seat was Chicheley, near Newport Pagnell. According to a note in his accounts Tilsworth cost him œ6522 10s, and it comprised about 700 acres of land as well as the Manor House where the Fowlers had lived. In 1619 Chester was created a baronet. It is doubtful if Sir Anthony resided for long spells in Tilsworth, but he took an interest in the management of the land and in 1608 (CH 3/2) he had organized the first detailed survey of the arable fields and of the tenants in his manor. This survey is a useful starting point for research into both the land and the people of 17th century Tilsworth. There are marginal notes by either Sir Anthony or his son Henry relating to the reorganisation of the arable land. Sir Anthony was later involved in an annoying dispute with another landowner (as described under "Wells"). There was at least one member of the Fowler family who had not forgotten Tilsworth, and who marked her connection with generous gifts. Richard Fowler's eldest sister married Robert Willoughby of Oakley, Bucks. She was widowed by 1624 and used some of the wealth she inherited to erect a memorial to her father Gabriel Fowler in the church and also to provide for the payment of œ5 a year for ever towards the maintenance of a "preaching minister", who was to preach a sermon there on the first Sunday of every month. Mrs Willoughby approached Sir Anthony (CH 101), who was "very willing to further the said godly and pious work", and for a payment to him of œ50, an annuity was to be paid from the rent of "the Brach 16 acres", (the field between the Manor House and the boundary with Stanbridge). The œ5 pension was to "such viccars or curates... as shalbee preaching ministers". This arrangement tells us something of Mrs Willoughby's religious standpoint and perhaps also of Sir Anthony's, since he was willing to support her purpose. After a period of comparative religious peace under Elizabeth I, differences between two main factions in the church were becoming more marked: on the one hand there were the protestants and puritans who emphasised the importance of Bible-reading and preaching. A church ordinance was passed in 1603/4 that every parish church should have a pulpit from which sermons should be preached. This is why so many church guide books mention a "Jacobean pulpit", and Tilsworth's is a handsome example. It is very possible that either Mrs Willoughby or Anthony Chester (or both) contributed towards its cost. The other main party in the English church favoured the observance of traditional rituals and the wearing of special vestments by the clergy, It was at this period that feelings ran high locally between the religious factions. Fourteen years after the gift for the benefit of a preacher, Mrs Willoughby (who had not followed the usual practice of remarrying) again showed her goodwill to Tilsworth (CH 102). By this time, 1638, Henry Chester was Lord of the Manor and he agreed, in consideration of œ100 paid by Mrs Willoughby, to pay from the rent of 30 acres of land tenanted by John Bucknam an annuity of œ6 for the "benefit and behoof" of six men, six women and six children being of the poorer sort of the inhabitants of Tilsworth. It was to be "employed and layed forth by the Churchwardens and overseers of the poore... in Coates, Gownes or other apparrell at their discretions." Perhaps it was the churchwardens who caused to be carved the crude inscription on a wooden board fixed to the wall behind the pulpit which records that "MEMORANDUM Mrs MARY WILL OWBI HATH GIVEN 6 POUND A YEARE TO THE PORE OF THIS PARRISH FOR EVER" The whole village would thus be aware "for ever" of the generosity of their benefactress, and the entitlement of their poor folk. The œ6 is now part of the Tilsworth charities which are still disbursed each year. Sir Anthony Chester was Sheriff of Bedfordshire in 1628. In the next year he acquired Lidlington and settled Tilsworth on his third and favourite son Henry, now thirty years old, who was getting married. The Chesters had begun to buy other pieces of property in Tilsworth: in 1627 nine acres from Robert Pedder (CH 158), and in 1634 the farmhouse "Dynes" and adjacent land from the same owner (CH 176). The Tilsworth Parish Register records the burial on 19th October 1630 of Ann, "daughter of the Right Worshipful Sr Anthony Chester knight and Baronet", showing that some of the family were resident or visiting at that time. It is probable that Henry made Tilsworth Manor his main residence for a while. In 1631 he wrote out and witnessed a will for one of his tenant farmers, Gabriel Crawley, and this suggests a sympathetic relationship with his fellow residents. In 1635 Sir Anthony died and it was Henry who erected a monument to his father in Chicheley church. Henry's eldest brother, Anthony, became the second baronet. In 1636 Henry Chester served his turn as Sheriff of Bedfordshire, and so became personally involved in the collection of "Ship Money" (Beds.Hist.Rec.Soc. Vol.65 p.31). This controversial tax was extended by Charles I to inland counties, and Bedfordshire was assessed at œ3000, to pay for a ship of 300 tons. The sheriff was responsible for overseeing its collection from all the townships in the county. It was assessed on the property of landowners, so the greater part of Tilsworth's contribution must have been due from Chester himself. He had great difficulty in collecting the quota for the county, and received instructions from Whitehall to seize and sell the goods of defaulters to recover the required amount, but the discrepancy was never made up, and Tilsworth itself remained in arrears by œ3 lls 4d. The levying of Ship Money was one of the grievances held against the king in the build-up towards the confrontation with Parliament and the resulting civil war. Bedfordshire was in the part of the country which largely supported Parliament, but Henry remained uninvolved in the conflict. Sir Anthony, however, was an active Royalist and fought for the king at Naseby in 1642. Following the parliamentary victory the Chesters' chief residence at Chicheley was demolished by the parliamentary forces from the nearby garrison at Newport Pagnell, and Sir Anthony went into exile in Holland. He left his homeless family in the care of his brother Henry at Tilsworth. In 1650 he paid a fine to the Commonwealth government and was allowed to return, but died two years later. Henry, when writing his will in 1664 and revising it in 1666, recalled that he had known himself "in those times" (that is the wars and the protectorate) "in danger of sequestration or worse" and "in danger of surprisall both as to life and estate." He settled some of his land in Buckinghamshire on his younger brother John, who had been left only œ50 a year by their father (CH 126 and 127). Despite his fears he was unmolested by the government and was sheriff of Buckinghamshire in 1658-60 (in respect of his properties there). He had only one son, Robert, who died and was buried at Tilsworth in 1659. When Charles II was restored to the throne in 1660 Henry was made a Knight of the Bath. The restoration of the monarchy brought the re-instatement of much that had been swept out in the Cromwellian period, such as bishops and the Book of Common Prayer, and the puritan writer John Bunyan found himself forbidden to preach and was imprisoned when he refused to comply with the new restrictions. There is an account (quoted by Vivienne Evans in John Bunyan, his Life and Times ) of the attempts made by his young wife to secure his release. She approached the justices assembled at the Swan Inn in Bedford where the assizes were to be held. One of the judges was inclined to be sympathetic, but Sir Henry Chester, present in his capacity as a magistrate, barred her way, saying that Bunyan had been convicted and was "a hot spirited fellow." When next day she attempted again to put her case, Chester stated, "My Lord, he was lawfully convicted." "It is false," she protested. "But it is recorded, woman, it is recorded," said Chester. "If it be, it is false." she cried. "My Lord," said Chester, "he is a pestilent fellow, there is not such a fellow in the country again." He warned of the harm Bunyan would do if released. The reason for his imprisonment had been his refusal to say that he would preach no more. It is plain that Sir Henry had strong feelings against the non-conformists and their teachings. He was described as "of Lidlington", so it would seem that he had now made this his main residence. The Chester house there had fourteen hearths in 1671 while Tilsworth Manor had only half that number. In 1663 (CH 186-7) Sir Henry bought more property in Tilsworth, the house and land next to Hockliffe (and transferred to that parish in the 20th century) which had belonged to the Wells family, and became "The Rose and Crown" inn. Sir Henry was the last Lord of the Manor to live in Tilsworth, and by 1666 the Manor House was occupied by a tenant farmer, John Quinney. Sir Henry asked in his will to be "decently buried in the Chancel of Tillsworth" where his son Robert and his first wife had been buried before him. His second wife had been a widow and his nephew Sir Anthony married her daughter. Henry himself had no children surviving, but he made careful financial provision for the family of Sir Anthony, who was his main heir. Henry's wife Mary, living at Lidlington Park, received his coach and coach horses, with grazing land to keep them. There were thoughtful bequests to household servants, each of whom was to receive an extra half-year's pay, and they were to have "the liberty to dispose of themselves" for three months "(behaving themselves Civilly and orderly)". This sounds like a holiday. An annuity of œ30 was to be paid out of the Red Lion and its lands in Hockliffe to Mrs Mary Stubbs, perhaps his housekeeper. John Quinney, at Tilsworth Manor Farm, "my old servant", was to receive œ8 per annum and œ5 to his son Daniel out of the house and lands held by William Smith - that is the Rose and Crown on Watling Street. Provision was made to raise the vicar's stipend by an additional œ6-15s per year. Its previous value, including Mrs Willoughby's œ5, had been only œ13-5s. Sir Henry died in 1666 and was buried, as requested, in Tilsworth church on 1st August. The monument with kneeling effigies of him, his wife and his son, was erected by his grateful heir, Sir Anthony, who also had a memorial tablet inscribed to John Quinney who died in 1669. Sir Anthony was succeeded by his son John in 1698, and the family continued in possession of Tilsworth throughout the 18th century. CRAWLEY, CROWLEY Richard Crawley had leased a substantial farm, probably the demesne of the manor, in 1565 (CH 145), and held it until his death in 1582. Since his children were all then under age, they did not reappear in the records for some years, but one of them, Ursula, may have married, before 1607, the John Wells who was empire building in Tilsworth in the early 17th century. Her brother Gabriel was listed among the homage in 1605 (CH 2/1) but then vanished again and appeared nowhere on the survey of 1608, but sometime during this period he married Agnes and they had a daughter Mary. A Thomas Crawley (relationship uncertain) married Ann Fensham, who was probably the widow, or perhaps daughter, of Richard Fensham, who had owned "Pygotts", a house with c. 13 acres of land. The marriage may have taken place in 1617, as a daughter was born to Thomas Crawley and his wife in 1618. In 1617 (CH 155-6) Ann Fensham was in possession of the Pygotts property, but in 1623 (CH 157) it passed from Thomas and Ann Crawley to John Peppit. The year after Thomas Crawley sold Pygotts was a sad one for the family: not only Thomas but four other Crawleys died (out of a total of seven Tilsworth deaths in 1624). One of them was Gabriel's wife Agnes, or "Annis", the other three, Elizabeth, Richard and William, cannot be identified more closely. Gabriel survived and re-married (Mary) and a son John was born in 1627 and a daughter Elizabeth in 1629. There is an undated rental list (CH 3/5) from about this time which shows "Gabrell Croley" paying œ15 10s half yearly for a farm, plus œ4 10s for his tithes, making him one of the six main tenants on the Chester estate, and one of only two with a surname going back more than forty years in the parish. On 8th September 1631 Gabriel Crowley, "being sicke of body" made his will (1631/170), with the help of his landlord Henry Chester, who wrote it down for him. His youngest children were only four and two years old. He had no land to leave them, so left œ5 towards binding John apprentice when he was old enough, as well as œ5 to his mother to cover his upbringing. There was also œ5 for his sister Elizabeth "to be employed for her use till she come to yeares of discretion or mariage." Gabriel's older daughter Mary, from his first marriage, received œ10, "ye childe-bed linen and wearing apparell" and other items which had belonged to her mother Annis. The rest of his property Gabriel left to his second wife. He signed the will with a mark, as did the witness John Gerney, a fellow-farmer. It is interesting that the Lord of the Manor, who had come to Tilsworth some three years before, took the trouble to help a tenant with his will in this way. After this the Crawleys again became invisible until John C., presumably Gabriel's son born 1627, was married in June 1657 (the register does not give his wife's name). They had daughters Sara (1658), Mary (1661) and Jane (1665), and then in 1667 John died. The "Widow Crawley" who paid tax on two hearths in 1671 was probably his former wife. She was not excused payment on account of poverty, so the family were still adequately provided for. If she was the "Sara Crawley, widow" who was buried in 1695 she was by then probably in her 60s. In the Parish Register for 1660 it is stated that the Churchwarden was "James Crawly" and he signs with the initials "I C". "James Crawley" is not recorded elsewhere, and this could be an error for "John". There are no further Crawley records in the Parish Register after 1695. The Crawleys seem to represent an average Tilsworth farming family in the 17th century, owning no house or land, but holding their own in the community and able to save a few pounds from their income to pass on to the next generation. ELLINGHAM Robert Ellingham was first recorded in the Parish Register in 1627, when his daughter Jane was baptised, followed a year later by her brother Thomas. Nothing further is heard of the family until the next generation in 1651, when baptisms began again, with a Robert, then further children in '52, '53, '55 and '56, the children of Robert senior's son Thomas, born in 1628. Robert's wife Alice died in 1658. No Ellinghams were named among Chester's tenants in 1637 (CH 3/1), but around this period (CH 3/5) a Robert Ellingham was renting land from Henry Chester for œ11-6-8 plus œ2-20 per half year (CH 3/5). A William Ellingham was witness to the will of Edward Prentice in 1656. However, no Ellingham was a householder in 1671 (Hearth tax) and it is believed that some time after 1663 Thomas moved to Toddington, where a Thomas Ellingham was assessed for three hearths in 1671. Robert made a will in 1657 (1657/258) and his death was recorded on August 23rd. His son William had died on June 19th. His son Thomas was executor and inherited the bulk of his property. His wife was given œ10 a year for life, a heiffer, "the bed and bedding in the Chamber and what brass and Pewter she needeth and two Cheares which she pleaseth, and what Linen she pleaseth", a table and its frame, two chairs, two stools, a hog and six bushels of beans and a coverlet. There were bequests to members of the Bur family of Eaton Bray, and to the Robardes family of Slapton, Bucks. Robert's own grandchildren, (Thomas's family), Robert, Thomas, Judith and John were to receive 20 shillings apiece when twenty one. The will, which he signed with his mark, was witnessed by William Ellingham, John Quinney and Thomas Earle. This was the Commonwealth period and it was proved in London in the name of Oliver Lord Protector on 12th November 1657. Unusually among the wills in Tilsworth, the sum of the inventory of his property was added at the bottom: this appears to be œ418 - 9s 10d, a surprisingly large amount. In 1652 (CH 284) William Dyne of Thorn had sold to Thomas Ellingham and his son Robert of Tilsworth some land in Chalgrave. By the time they resold it in 1673 (CH 294) they were living in Toddington. Jonas Smallbones of Tilsworth made a will (1675/47) in which he described Thomas Ellingham as his cousin. Thomas owed him money, at least œ19, and Jonas specified that from this money legacies should be paid to the Ellingham children: to Judith (born 1653) œ5 on marriage, Thomas (1652) and John (1655) œ10 between them, and œ4 to the other four children (only Robert (1651), William (1661) and Elizabeth (1663) appear in the register). One more Ellingham baptism was recorded before the end of the century: Robert in 1686, son of Robert, but it was the mid 18th century before Ellinghams appeared again in the Tilsworth register. FINCH, FYNSHE From the 1570s this name appeared regularly in Manor Court rolls as one of the homage, showing that they were working the land in Tilsworth as tenants, not merely labourers. In 1588 Thomas Fynch, like four other smallholders, had the right to keep three cattle on the common grazing. In 1605 John Finshe brought the "apology for absence" of a small non-resident freeholder, Richard Dyne, to the court and was probably a tenant of his 1« acres of arable land. The 1608 survey (CH3/2) lists Joseph Fynch as tenant of "butts" - short strips - about 5 acres in all belonging to the Lord of the Manor, together with arable strips, probably not all listed, belonging to Richard Fensham, part of the property called "Pygotts". Thomas Fynch also occupied at least a half acre and a butt of the lord's land. This shows that the Finches had only a small stake in the arable land of Tilsworth and may have worked in addition as labourers or as craftsmen for their fellow-farmers to support the family. The Parish Register shows that there were two John Finches in Tilsworth at this time, senior and junior, and both were fathering children between 1603 and 1613 (eight in all.) In 1623 a Thomas Finch was married and a year later a daughter was born, but after that there are no further records of the family in the register until 1666 when a Thomas, perhaps the same one, was buried. It would seem that two Francis Finches, a Joseph and a Walter left the village at some time, as their burials are not recorded. In the summary of the Chester possessions in Tilsworth in 1637 (CH 3/1) John Finch and Robert Finch occupied cottages but rented no land. No-one in the family left a will or was mentioned in a will, and in the 1671 hearth tax none was a householder. For roughly a century the Finches occupied a place in Tilsworth just above "labourer" and may just have qualified as "husbandman" but then they moved elsewhere. GURNEY, GERNEY In 1608 (CH3/2) Joseph Gurney was renting some, perhaps all, of Sir John Dyve's "Bellmakers" farm which had been occupied by the Pedders for most of the 16th Century, and was later taken over by the Partridges. The first appearance of a Gurney in the Tilsworth Parish Register is the baptism of Daniel, son of John Gurney, in April 1609. In August of the same year the recently widowed Gabriel Pedder married Alice Gurney. John Gurney held office in some capacity, perhaps constable in 1629, when he was named in the Manor Court record (CH 3/1). By about 1630 (CH 3/5) John Gurney was renting land on the Chester estate, including a share of the demesne, and Joseph Gurney was paying tithes on a small property. John was a witness in 1631 to the will (1631/70) drawn up by Henry Chester for Gabriel Crawley. In the 1650s a family was being born to a John Gurney which included Edmund (or Edward) and Daniel as well as older sisters Katherine and Judith, though they were not recorded in the Parish Register. These relationships are confirmed by the wills of both John "Gurnish" (Gurney) in 1670 and Edward G. in 1688 (1688/60). Richard Pedder's will (CH 124) in 1658 records John Gurney (possibly a step-relation) as the tenant of his house and farm "Courses" (Yellow Farm) which he bequeathed to his nephew William Cook, who in 1663 married Judith Gurney, John's daughter, a convenient arrangement. In 1665 Daniel G., probably the one born in 1609, was the Tilsworth Constable responsible for assessing the hearth tax that year. He died in 1666. At the time of the hearth tax assessment for 1671 the Gurneys were at the peak of their prominence in Tilsworth: John Gurney senior and John Gurney junior each occupied a house with two hearths, and Widow Gurney had a single hearth, probably having moved to a cottage on her own after her husband died. The assessment must have been made before July 1670, as John senior, yeoman, made his will (1670/54) on 28th (signed with a feeble squiggle) and was buried on 1st August. He had a wife Mary still living, so the widow Joan, or Joanna, whose son John G. junior, farmer of Tilsworth, was granted administration of her estate on 8th August (AR 1f 90d 140d), had not been his wife. Her estate was valued at œ12 15s 0d. It is puzzling that the Parish Register does not record her burial until 16th September 1670. She was probably the widow of Daniel Gurney (died 1665) and her son John junior was the nephew of John senior. John senior's heirs in 1670 were his two young sons Edward and Daniel. In 1687 (1688/77) Edward was appointed overseer to the provisions of the will of John White, the blacksmith, and he also witnessed the will (1688/49) of Richard Partridge in the same year, though his signature was, for some reason, crossed out. John Gurney junior's wife Rebecca died in 1672. John Gurney junior was executor to the will of Jonas Smallbones (1675/47) and his then wife Mary Gurney was a legatee. John Gurney senior's son Edward was only 34 years old when he realised in 1688 (1688/60) that he was dying and felt he should make provision for his dependents, so giving us an insight into his personal circumstances. He had one child, Ann, a little girl of seven, who had lost her mother when she was only four. Edward had remarried, and he was also looking after his orphaned niece, Katherine Man. The care with which he outlined his wishes for his daughter is touching. He listed in detail the items she was to have, many of which had belonged to her dead mother: "One Booke being a Bible of her mothers & also all her sd mothers wearinge apparill whatsoever Lynnen & wollen And her trunke & her Best Gould ringe & silver Thimble & One Silver Bodkin & 1 Silver Spoune which was my Owne And my Other trunke And my Joynde bedsted now at Egginton with my Brother in Law John Man And the Trucklebedd now in my House 1 fether Bedd & 1 flockbedd. 1 Strawbedd 1 Fether Bolster 1 flockbolster 2 Fether pillowes 1 Flexen & 1 Holland pillow beare 1 green Blankett 3 flexen Sheets 1 Halfe of a Holland Sheet & 14 Flexen table napkins 1 Board Cloth 1 dyaper Cradle Cloth & her owne mothers Childbedd Lynen & all her sd. mothers single money containing abt 12/-. 1 table 1 stoul Table 1 Joyned Stoule 1 Great Chest & the Coffer Called my Coffer & my Best Chear & my Brass pottage pott as was her mothers & My [illegible] & 1 of my Best Eaws [ewes] & her lambe....Also I give my sd. dau. 1 Cobbord as was her mothers & all other her goods." The testator perhaps felt it was necessary to specify each item to prevent anything from disappearing before Ann was old enough to claim it. She was also to receive œ80 at the age of 21. Arrangements for her maintenance until that time were made, and were to be the responsibility of Edward's brother Daniel, executor and inheritor of the residue of the property. He was to be Ann's guardian, if she was willing. Elizabeth "my deare & wellbeloved wife" was not given charge of her step-child, but she received œ60 and also "my best Coverlit & my Coffer in my Chamber below Stayers." To the three children of his sister and of his deceased brother-in-law William Man he gave œ20, i.e. "œ10 to Katherine Man who liveth with me & the other œ10 equally between the other 2." This will is the only one made in Tilsworth in the 17th century to mention a book (Ann's mother's bible) and, even more interesting, Edward Gurney's desire was that Ann be "set to Scoul & have good Educac'on if she please to stay wt. my sd Exec." Where would that school have been? Edward himself was one of the few testators in Tilsworth able to sign his name. Ann's mother had presumably also been literate and able to read her bible. This will is one of the five drawn up between 1670 and 1688 by William Peirson, all with a Calvinistic religious preamble, discussed in "Partridge". The subsequent fortunes of little Ann Gurney are not known. Daniel Gurney, probably Edward's brother and heir, had three children in the 1690s and two more in 1707 and 1709, though these last two did not live long. When Daniel died in 1716, aged 59 or 60, he was described as "labourer". It must be remembered that the Gurneys owned no house or land: the farm occupied by Edward in 1688 could have been leased after his death by Chester to another man, leaving Daniel to earn a living as best he could. No Gurney appears in the Chester rental of 1705 (Bucks R.O. D/C/4/1). Did Daniel find it difficult, or impossible, to pay for his niece's schooling and to find her legacy of œ80 when it became due in 1702? John Gurney, labourer, perhaps a son of Daniel, was buried in 1719. The Gurney family, first appearing in Tilsworth soon after 1600, had sunk from the prominent position it held in the mid-century, and faded altogether from the Tilsworth records by the mid 18th century. HAWKINS This name was prominent in Tilsworth among the farmers in the late 15th century and continued so through the 16th century, though less so towards the end. There were no Hawkins on the Manor Court roll in 1605 (CH 2/1), nor in the survey of 1608 (CH 3/2). The name re-appeared with the will of Henry Hawkins (1619-20/233), described as "husbandman". He owned a house and land in Tebworth and Wingfield which he left to his son Richard. He owned no property in Tilsworth but he may have been renting from Sir Anthony Chester. There were bequests to three married daughters. One of these, Elizabeth, had married Richard Purrat who was appointed overseer of the will. By the 1630s (CH 3/5) Richard Hawkins was renting from the Chesters the largest farm in Tilsworth for œ17 a half year, plus œ3-6-8 for "the nether deane", a pasture, and 16 shillings for "the feelde medowe". He also, like five other farmers, rented a part of the demesne lands for œ2-4-3 and paid tithes on all this land of œ1-7-6. He therefore paid in all œ58-8-10 per annum. In the list of Sir Anthony Chester's property in Tilsworth in 1637 (CH 3/5) Richard Hawkins held a farm (no details given). Richard Hawkins, yeoman, made a will (1649/57). No wife or children were mentioned and he made his sister's son Henry Purrat his heir, though there were still Hawkinses around: William Hawkins' son Richard (relationship to Richard senior uncertain) was to receive 10s and a white calf. No Hawkins was a householder at the time of the 1671 hearth tax, though a Mary, daughter of Thomas Hawkins, was baptised in that year and two marriages, in 1668 and 1671 were recorded for William Hawkins, to Jane Newman and Judith Watts/Wates. The second union produced Judith in 1674, William, 1675 Mary 1678 and Ann 1680 before William senior died in 1682. There are no further Tilsworth records of the name Hawkins in the 17th century. HONNOR (HONER) Although it had appeared in the Manor Court records (CH 2/1) in the late 15th century, this name is not prominent in the 17th century records in Tilsworth, but the existence of a will makes it of interest. The first occurrence is the burial of Agnes Honer in 1631, but she may not have been a resident of the village. There is nothing further in the Parish Register until the burial in 1667 of Henry Honnor on 2nd November. He had made his will (1668/131) two weeks previously on 20th October. He was described in it as "husbandman" of Tilsworth, so was cultivating some rented land. He did not employ an expert writer to draw up his will. The signature of Henery Honnor as a witness suggests that the scribe was a relative, a little more literate than the testator himself, who signed with a mark. The rules of spelling were not strict at that period, but it is nevertheless possible to deduce lack of much education in the form of this will: "I do gife to my datter Annis Lay fife shillins... I do gife to all my granchildren Twelpenes apeece... Sealed & delefard". Henry the testator cannot have been a young man, as he had an adult son, two married daughters and several grandchildren. There is no further evidence of this family in Tilsworth in the Parish Register before the 19th century. JANES "Janes" first appears in the Tilsworth records in 1671 in the person of James Janes, a prominent resident: he inhabited the largest of the farmhouses, after the Manor, with three hearths (the other three-hearth dwelling was an inn), and he was the parish constable. A clue to a previous link with the village is the mention in the will of Thomas Janes (1695/10) of Thomas Prentice as a kinsman. James Janes and Thomas Jackson "yeomen of Tilsworth" are recorded as witnesses in a case of theft tried at the assizes in 1671 (W41-3), probably because they were office-holders in the village. John Janes and Frances Janes married each other in 1676. A Thomas Janes made a will on March 27th 1695. He owned land in Wingfield which he left to Thomas Prentice. No other relative is mentioned apart from his wife Hester. No burial is recorded in Tilsworth. James Janes, yeoman, presumably the same who had been constable in 1671, died in 1699 and was buried on 22nd April. This was the last recorded Janes in the Tilsworth register before the 19th century. KING There is no mention of a King in the village before 1671. Jonas King seems to have settled there too late to be liable for the 1671 hearth tax, but on November 12th that year his son John was baptised and in the next 15 years five more boys and three girls were added to the family. In 1692 Jonas' wife Rebecca died and Jonas himself followed her in 1696. The next record of a King in the Parish Register was when a girl Sara was baptised in 1711, daughter of Jonas and Sara King. This Jonas was probably the son born to Jonas sen. in 1674. In 1712 he signed his mark as witness to the will of William Man (1711-12/103). The will of Thomas Prentice (1727/53) left a substantial legacy to widow Sarah King, his "kinswoman". The only other entry in the register for a King at this period was the burial of "Jonas King of London, porter", in 1726. Perhaps this was the same man, and as no burials are recorded for any of the other children baptised in the 1670s and '80s the whole family had probably left Tilsworth, possibly, like Jonas, for London. KINS, AND OTHER VICARS At the start of the century William Lawson was vicar of Tilsworth (incorrectly called "John" in the church guide). He witnessed the will of Thomas Austin (1607/32) and was buried 12th May in the next year. He was followed, according to the church guide, by Thomas Houghton and in 1631 by John Turner. Neither of these has left any trace in the village records. Turner was there only a year before Francis Kins arrived in 1632. There is a record of Francis Kins marrying Anne Whittimore in Soulbury, Bucks. on 25th January 1631/2. Perhaps the offer of a living in Tilsworth made it possible for him to marry. A Prudence Kinnes, probably a relative of the new vicar, married William Rogers in Tilsworth in 1632. The parish register records children of Francis Kins, daughters Elizabeth baptised in 1640 and Mary in 1654 and a son Caesar in 1659. He was vicar of the parish through troubled times. It is believed he was ejected from his post during the Commonwealth period because he would not renounce the forms of worship of the Anglican church, but the evidence of the baptism of his children and his presence at deathbeds shows that he continued to live in Tilsworth. The church land and the vicarage or "parsonage house" were part of the Chester property. The Chesters had acquired the right to choose the vicar when they purchased the estate and it seems probable that Henry Chester continued to support the vicar during this period. Kins could also earn something by acting as scribe for documents such as wills for his neighbours. He would not officially be permitted to teach without a licence. His name appeared on a number of wills (Mistleton 1649/75, Partridge 1651/61, Prentice 1656/130, Bucknam 1669/26) made in the village and for one of them at least he seems to have been the writer (1649). At the Restoration he no doubt took up his church duties once more. The last will witnessed by him was in 1669, by which time he had been vicar for 37 years. There is no further evidence for his presence after this date, nor for his replacement by another incumbent. Kins did not appear on the 1671 hearth tax list, so perhaps his death occurred just before the assessment was made. The church guide dates the arrival of the next vicar, Valentine Creasey, to "c.1700" PARTRIDGE The Partridge family first appeared in Tilsworth records with the baptism of Alice, daughter of Thomas Partridge, in 1629, followed by Daniel in 1633: they seem to have been his youngest children, their older brothers and sisters being born elsewhere. Thomas was probably the tenant of "Bellmakers", the farm belonging to the Dyve family of Bromham. During the 16th century the Pedders had rented this land, but at some time in the early 17th century the Partridges moved in. In a lease dated 24.3.1641/2 (R94 Box 203) Sir Lewis Dyve granted to Thomas Partridge "that messuage in his occupation" together with buildings and lands appertaining to it (c. 50 acres) for œ24 a year and "two good fat and sweet capons yearly at the feast of Easter" rising to œ26 after 3 years for the remaining 21 years of the lease. If at any time Dyve made an agreement with Henry Chester "late of Tilsworth" to sell to him or to enclose and redistribute the land, then the lease would be void and Partridge would give up his rights. It was laid down who was entitled to make use of various classes of wood and timber. This was at the beginning of the Civil War, in which Sir Lewis fought for the King, and as a result his lands were confiscated after the Parliamentary victory and Partridge found himself paying his rent (BHRS 65 p.125) to the Parliamentary authorities. It was in the middle of the Commonwealth period of rule that Thomas Partridge came to make his will (1651/16), on 30th April 1651. It is interesting that, judging from the handwriting and signature, he drew up the will himself. Very few Tilsworth farmers could even sign their names, let alone compose a document, so he was unusually well educated. Two sons benefitted from the will: the oldest son Thomas would receive œ1 a year to provide for his father's widow, presumably in the family home, but if she decided to leave she received œ30 over 3 years. If Thomas didn't like the arrangement and left, he received œ40. The residue went to the other son, Richard. The vicar, Francis Kins, who had probably been deprived of his living by the Commonwealth government, witnessed the will. His presence suggests the family's support for the episcopal church. Four years after taking over his father's farm in 1651 Richard was involved with fellow-yeomen Henry Purratt and Robert Pedder, and the labourer Abraham Paul, in a scuffle with the Bucknam family (q.v.), but in 1658 he married and settled down to raise a family. He became a respected member of the community and was asked by Henry Purratt to oversee the provisions of his will in 1667 (1667/90), and if need be, along with John Prentice, to act as guardian to Purratt's children. He witnessed the will of Robert Paul, labourer, in 1676 (1675-6/123), but, unlike his father, he was illiterate and signed only with a mark "R". When Sir Lewis Dyve returned to reclaim his estates in 1660 (R94-5 373, Bundle 28) after the Restoration of Charles II he decided to sell Bellmakers, along with much other land in South Bedfordshire and it was bought by Henry Brandreth of Houghton Regis. The document of the sale gives details of the Tilsworth property and its location and describes it as "now or late tenanted by Richard Partridge". A messuage, yard, barns, stable, garden plot and a close of pasture, all lying between the Warren on the west and the street (Blackhill Lane) on the east, 5« acres in all, together with arable, meadow and pasture. By the end of the 18th century this farmhouse and yard had all disappeared from the map, (AD 54/4 sale catalogue and map) the house apparently demolished and the land being absorbed by then into the Chester estate. Despite the sale, the Partridges continued in occupation and in 1671 (BHRS 16 p.42) Richard Partridge occupied a house with two hearths. The baptisms of his children Thomas (1659), Richard (1661), John (1665), Sarah (1667) and William (1678) were duly recorded, (he seems to have been widowed and re-married between 1667 and 1678). Richard's father-in-law Thomas Stanbridge, a carpenter, died in 1680 (1680-81/93), leaving him the residue of his possessions, but we don't know what this amounted to, or if it included any land, nor is it clear if this was the father of his first or his second wife. The children appeared in Partridge's will (1688/49), made on 6.11.1687, where he was described as "Richard Partridge the Elder of Tilsworth" (his son Richard was then about 26). His was one of six Tilsworth wills drawn up and witnessed by William Peirson between 1675 and 1688. Peirson does not appear to be a Tilsworth man himself and was evidently experienced in this sort of work, which was being increasingly undertaken by lawyers at this period. What distinguishes Peirson's wills is the long religious preamble, almost identical in each one, and significantly containing the words " to Enjoy life Everlasting in the kingdom of Heaven with the Elect and chosen people of god." This form of expression shows strong Puritan beliefs, following the teachings of Calvin, and would not have been used by an orthodox member of the established church. Calvinists believed that only certain people were "chosen and elect" to be "saved" and their entry into "life everlasting" depended on this pre-ordained selection, not on their own lives and actions. This meant that they formed exclusive churches, separated from the Church of England. It seems clear that William Peirson held such beliefs, but were all those who asked him to draw up their wills also fellow-members of his sect? It seems improbable that he would have included testators among the "elect" unless they belonged to the same group as himself. So far no evidence has come to light of such a group in Tilsworth. In 1666 only one inhabitant (Ann, wife of Robert Pedder) was reported to the archdeacon as a dissenter and in the early 18th century only two were known to the vicar. The others who had their wills drawn up by Peirson were Jonas Smallbones 1675, Thomas Stanbridge (Richard Partridge's father-in-law) 1680, Luce Pale/Paul 1682, Edward Gurney and John White, both 1688. The later will of Joyce Woodstock, 1696, also contained the phrase "elect and chosen people of God." Richard Partridge seems to have been a wealthier man than his father Thomas. In the 36 years since his father's death he had acquired enough to leave money amounting to œ456.10s, as compared with his father's c.œ100. The provisions of the will were mainly concerned with property in Tilsworth, but he left "all leased land in Cranfield" to his eldest son Thomas. Twenty shillings were for the poor of Tilsworth and ten shillings for the poor of Eaton Bray, where his wife and son John were to distribute it - perhaps it was her native village. Richard junior was evidently to carry on farming Bellmakers in Tilsworth. He was left all the stock of crops, animals and implements except for the best cart, the third best horse and all oaken timber, which went to John. Richard also received œ40 on condition he gave a home to his father's widow in the farmhouse, or else paid her 40s a year. Special provision was made for young William, aged 10, and half brother to the others: he was to receive œ250 when 21, the interest meanwhile going to his mother to help put him apprentice "if he will take a trade." Widow Partridge did not remarry, and lived on till 1712, when Thomas, John, Sarah and William were all still alive. A nice touch was that Richard left "to my several children their several sheep and lambs as are theirs and go and are called theirs and in their names." In 1695 ((ABP/W 1695/10) Richard Partridge junior attended the deathbed of fellow Tilsworth yeoman Thomas Janes, probably the son of James Janes who in 1671 lived in the largest farmhouse there, assessed for three hearths. Richard was not only a witness to Janes's will but he also wrote it out, in an educated, decorative hand with many loops and flourishes (Janes could sign only with a mark). Richard's own father had been unable to sign his name. The Eaton Bray Parish Register shows that Richard Partridge of Tilsworth married Elizabeth Cook(e) of that parish on December 9th 1697. Only 7 months later he was making his own will (ABP/W 1698/100), a week before he was buried on July 22nd 1698, at the age of 36. He employed a professional to write it, on a large parchment sheet in full legal language, but with only a short religious preamble. It provided for possible children of the testator, who evidently hoped that his wife might be pregnant, but no child seems to have been born. Richard's father had benefitted financially from his father-in-law's will and it seems probable that Richard junior also made a profitable marriage. His Tilsworth farm or farms were leasehold, but he owned 60 acres of arable land, meadow and pasture in Sewell, Houghton Regis, Dunstable and Totternhoe, his wife Elizabeth's "jointure" - that is, settled on her for life. At her death, this was to go to his brother John. He also held other land, freehold and leasehold, in Edlesborough and Northall, and after Elizabeth's death, this went to brother William. The residue, which included the rented land in Tilsworth, also went to William, (the youngest, now 20 and soon due to inherit œ250 left him by his father) who had evidently declined to be apprenticed to a trade (as his father had suggested) and had devoted himself to farming. By 1705 (Bucks. R.O. D/C/4/1) William held two farms in Tilsworth (Bellmakers and one on the Chester estate) and when he died in 1740 he had achieved the rare distinction of being designated "Mr" William Partridge in the Parish Register. It seems to have been a close family of brothers and sister. Sarah was 31 at the time of her brother's death in 1698. Richard had no high opinion of her husband, for he left œ50 in trust for her with brothers Thomas and William for "the sole and separate maintenance of Sarah Fowler my sister (now wife of Richard Fowler of Dunstable) so that her husband shall not or may not intermeddle with the same or any part thereof" and after her it was to go to her daughter Mary Fowler when 21. The will concluded with a bequest to Richard's wife Elizabeth of the "cow called her cow now at Eaton also all the goods which she brought with her" and also "all the linen which she hath spun." Having no children must have given her time for this domestic task, presumably using flax from their own fields. A witness to the will was Richard Purret (another farmer who could sign his name), showing a continuing association of the two families. The seal bore the image of a bird, presumably intended for a partridge. The Partridges were moving steadily upwards and they continued to be prominent in the village into the early 19th century, when they occupied what is now known as "Bury Farm", so it is possible that this was the Chester farm leased to the Partridge family by the end of the 1600s, with a house on the site of the present one but arable land then scattered in strips throughout the fields of Tilsworth. PEDDER FAMILY IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY The suicide of Richard Pedder, head of the family, had marked the end of the sixteenth century, and the confiscation of his crops and household effects had left his widow in poverty. She died in 1603. Nevertheless, the period that followed was one of prosperity for the Pedders. The part of Richard's property made over to his son Gabriel and his wife in 1591 (CH 120) was not seized, and the houses and land were not forfeit. When the 17th century began the family owned two homes in Tilsworth; the larger of them, called "Courses", stood where the house now known as "Yellow Farm" stands, and was probably the same building. At that time the Green extended past the east end of the house. There were 25« acres of freehold land in the arable fields which went with Courses. The other property, "Dynes", stood where the "Piggeries" were in the 20th century, also called "Leys Farm" facing what was in the 17th century called "East End Lane", where it bent sharply northwards at "Piggery Corner." It was probably there that Richard had drowned himself in the well (National Archives KB9/702 Pt.2 p.214). Freehold arable belonging to Dynes was about 18 acres. In the early 17th century Gabriel and his wife Elizabeth were in possession of both Courses and Dynes, and were adding regularly to their young family. Richard, Robert, Penelope, Alice and Katherine, and perhaps William, seem to have been born before 1602 (when the register begins). A son Gabriel was born in 1603 and a daughter Elizabeth in 1606. In 1605 Gabriel Pedder senior was recorded (CH 2/1) as owning two houses, three pightles (paddocks) and 43« acres of land and meadow, owing 9s a year to the Lord (all of which agrees with the property settled on him and his new wife by his father Richard in 1591). Gabriel apparently had no brothers or sisters, and he was now the leading yeoman in Tilsworth. When the 1608 survey (CH 3/2) of Tilsworth fields was made, Gabriel Pedder was the only freeholder listed as taking part in the measuring and recording of the holdings (the others were not resident in the parish), and after Anthony Chester himself and the heirs of Sir John Dyve of Bromham, Pedder was the largest landowner, with 35 acres of arable land. It is difficult to identify individual strips in the survey with ridges visible on the ground, but one of the few where this is possible is "Gabraell Pedders headland" in Edeway Furlong. Throughout most of the 16th century the Pedders had farmed "Bellmakers", belonging to the Dyves of Bromham, but it is not apparent in 1608 who was tenant of this land, and from at least 1641 it was leased to the Partridge family. At some time Gabriel had acquired property in Wingfield, as appears from his will, so he was not dependent for income wholely on his Tilsworth lands. On the day after the 1608 Michaelmas survey began, Gabriel's wife Elizabeth was buried. Their two youngest children were aged 5 and 2 and it is not surprising that Gabriel soon married again - Alice Gerney in August 1609. They had one child, Joan, in 1611. Gabriel was churchwarden in 1624 at the time of Mrs Willoughby's gift of an annuity (CH 101) for a preaching minister in the church. Gabriel died in 1625, but some time before this "being in perfect health" he made a will (1625/219). The final digit of the date is illegible, but since it acknowledges his grandson Gabriel, baptised 2nd December 1619, it must have been after this - probably 15.2.1619, (that is 1620 by modern reckoning: until 1752 the new year began on 25th March). Before making any bequests he explains "I gladly woulde establish peacable living betweene Alice my wife and my Children, after my decease." Perhaps he remembered his own father's settling the property on him after his (Richard's) second marriage. In any case it was obviously sensible to make clear to all parties what they would inherit, and avoid dispute after his death. Alice his wife was to have for life the house Dynes, together with two strips of grass leys next to it and 4« acres (which are described) in the arable fields. His sons Richard and Robert "uppon my Fatherlie blessing" were to "plowe, Ayre, Tyll, dresse, doung, Harrowe, and Role" this land during her widowhood and to bring the crop to her barn, she providing seed and dung and giving them a day's warning (similar stipulations to those made by Richard Pedder in 1591 when settling the property on his son.) Gabriel awarded to Robert, his second son, "that messuage wherein I doo now dwell knowen by the name of Courses, ... until such time as my oldest sonne Richard Pedder shall release unto the said Robert Pedder all his interests in Dynes", when Courses will go to Richard. Perhaps Richard was living in Dynes at this time, though he was not yet married. As well as Courses, Richard was to receive 1 cupboard and "an olde Chest (perhaps the one bequeathed in 1538 by John to his son Richard?)...another Chest in the loft and the safes standing in the walle" and all the lands belonging to Courses. Robert was to receive Dynes and its lands in exchange. The third son, Gabriel, was to receive lands in Wingfield, and another son William, of whom we know nothing further, was to receive œ40. Penelope, Gabriel's eldest daughter, married Richard Fowler in 1612, and she was given 5s 8d, her son Gabriel 10s and her other children 5s 8d apiece. Gabriel senior's four other daughters, not yet married, receive œ20 and 2 pairs of sheets each. Personal goods distributed between the daughters included brass pans and "kittles", the "yron Treyfoot" [trivet], various pewter utensils and "one young cowe heifer" to his youngest daughter Joan. His wife, as well as house and lands, received "the best bedsteede, with one whole sute of bedding of the best to furnish the same", 2 pairs of sheets, one tablecloth, 6 table napkins, 2 barrels, 1 tub, 4 pewter platters, 1 brass pot, 2 brass candlesticks, the best milch cow, "all my Hives of Bees", 2 coffers, "1 cupboard the best she will chuse of all these, and the 2 worste brasse kyttles." All this suggests, if not wealth, a comfortably-off household. Were the Pedders living in that timber-framed house which has survived, at least in part, till today, and is now called "Yellow Farm"? The general style of the structure, with irregular-sized panels and studs set fairly wide apart suggests a date not earlier than the late 16th century. This was a period of prosperity when many farmhouses were rebuilt and Gabriel Pedder, who had no brothers or sisters that we know of, probably acquired sufficient means to follow fashion and build an improved farmstead, fitting his position as leading yeoman in Tilsworth. It is however possible that it was built in the time of his father Richard. When Gabriel died in 1625 the arrangements outlined in his will presumably came into effect. Assured of their inheritance both the older boys felt ready to marry, Robert probably in 1625 and Richard in 1626. A year later documents were drawn up in which Richard gave up Dynes and land to his brother Robert, and Robert gave up Courses and land to Richard, (CH 121-2) as foreseen in Gabriel's will. From this point the histories of the two properties diverge. Robert started a family: Alice (1626), Jane (1627) and Robert (1630). Gabriel's widow Alice remarried in 1628, and was living in Dynes with her husband Henry Inward when Robert sold it in 1634 to Henry Chester. The Robert Pedder who paid tax for 1 hearth in 1671 was probably the son of the first Robert (died 1658) and grandson of Gabriel. Gabriel junior married Judith Hawkins in 1638 in Houghton Regis. Richard and his wife probably had no children - none are recorded in the parish register or in his will. Farmland in Tilsworth in 1660 was still described as Richard Pedder's, but Richard Pedder, "formerly of Tilsworth", died in 1658 at Wing (CH 124), leaving Courses to his wife "Em" for her lifetime, and then to his nephew William Cook, the son of his youngest sister, Elizabeth. The house is described as the messuage in Tilsworth in which he formerly dwelt and now in the occupation of John Gurney. At this period, then, Courses was inhabited by a John Gurney, perhaps the son or other relative of Gabriel's second wife, Alice Gerney. At the time of the 1671 Hearth Tax John Gurney sen. was paying for 2 hearths, but so was William Cooke, so we cannot tell which of them was then living at Courses. We learn from Richard's will that all his brothers and sisters, the children of Gabriel Pedder, were still alive. He left a small annuity to his oldest sister Penelope Fowler and small sums to her children, an annuity to sister Elizabeth Cooke (William's mother) and cash to her children and to his sister Joan Stevens and her son. His two brothers Robert and Gabriel (the latter of whom had inherited land in Wingfield) were remembered with a shilling each and sister Katherine Wisson received 5 shillings. Some years before (1630) Katherine had had a baby while still unmarried. Richard expected to be buried in Wing and left 10 shillings to be distributed there to the poor at his funeral, and 20 shillings for the poor of Tilsworth on the same day. The wills of the two brothers show that Richard was more prosperous than Robert, and more concerned for his brothers and sisters. The Chester family had been acquiring land during the 17th century in Tilsworth and elsewhere, and a rental survives of Chester land in Tilsworth in 1705 (Bucks R.O. D/C/4/1). Courses was not part of the Chester estate and was still in the ownership of William Cook, Gabriel Pedder's grandson. By the time William Cooke died in 1709 he was certainly living in Courses, because he named it in his will (CH 125) and said it was where he now dwelt. It went to his son-in-law John Balls for life, but then to his grandson John Balls, so that it was still owned by a direct descendant of Gabriel Pedder. Returning to the other Pedder property in Tilsworth, Dynes, owned by Gabriel's second son Robert, he married a Joan c.1625. They started a family: Alice, Jane and Robert were baptised in 1626, 1628 and 1630. The family did not live in Dynes, because that was occupied by Robert's step-mother Alice, who had a life interest in it, and her new husband Henry Inward. Robert and Joan decided to turn this asset into cash and in 1627, as soon as his brother had signed over interest in Dynes, they sold 9 acres (CH 158) of the land (that is about half of it) to Henry Chester. A rent list soon after this shows Robert Pedder renting 9 a, presumably his own former property, from Chester for œ2-5-0. In 1634 they sold the house Dynes (CH 176) and some adjacent land to Henry Chester for œ130, with the Inwards as sitting tenants. Robert signed the document with his mark, an "R", but his wife signed "Johane". Robert retained a dwelling house and c.10 acres land in Tilsworth and continued to live and farm there, but his father Gabriel's inherited two houses and 45 acres held in the parish at the beginning of the century, had begun to slip away. Richard and Robert were churchwardens in 1638 (CH 102). Robert Pedder, yeoman, was, in 1655, one of the parties in the disgraceful incident involving assault and trespass at the home of the Bucknams, (q.v.) but it is not clear whether this was the landowner himself, now in his mid fifties, or his 25-year-old son. Robert Pedder senior made a will (1660-61/183)before he died in the summer of 1658 (he was buried on 6th August). He left to his wife half the house and lands, which were to go to his son Robert II, now 28, after her death. Two "sons-in-law" are named, Richard Davis and Matthew Davis. These may have been what we would now call "step sons" from his wife's former marriage, or his daughters may have married brothers. The daughters themselves were not mentioned. His wife was to have all the best bed-linen, but son Robert received four pairs of sheets and the residue of his estate. There were four shillings for the poor of Tilsworth. Perhaps it was Robert's sickness that prompted his brother Richard to make a will in May 1658, for he claimed that he himself was "in good health of body and of sound and perfect mind". The previous year had been noted as a "year of mortality" in the register of Lidlington parish, but the five deaths reported in Tilsworth are not an unusual number. Robert did not live to receive his shilling legacy, but despite his "good health" Richard, too, died within a year, and his nephew William Cooke duly inherited Courses and its lands. He perhaps moved in when he married Judith Gurney, probably the daughter of the sitting tenant, in 1663. At the time of the 1671 Hearth Tax Cooke paid for two hearths (which are still there in "Yellow Farm"). Robert Pedder II paid for one hearth, but we cannot say where he was living; Dynes had been sold by his father many years before. He and his wife Ann had children, Mary (1662) Hannah 1665 and Robert III (1666) before Ann died in 1667. She must have been a woman of strong and independent opinions, as she is the only person in Tilsworth to be reported to the archdeacon's court as a dissenter, refusing to attend the parish church. Puzzlingly her son Robert III seems to have been baptised twice: once in 1666 and again at the age of 22 in 1689. A "Widow Pedder" died in 1672 and she may have been Robert II's mother. Robert II himself lived till 1686, when he in turn made a will (1686/32). He signed it shakily, and all the witnesses were able to sign their names: J. Janes, R Sares, R. Purret, H Fowler and R. Partridge. Robert must have remarried, as he makes bequests to his "well beeloved wife." The house and land went to Robert. Among the witnesses, Henry Fowler may have been a cousin, descended from Gabriel's daughter Penelope. Robt II had witnessed the will of Henry's father Richard Fowler in 1657. Robert II or his father took part in the trespass on the Bucknams in 1655 and the list of witnesses to his will show that the association with Purratt and Partridge families continued. The last we hear of the surname Pedder in Tilsworth is in 1698 when Robert Pedder III, now a coachman in London (CH 194-5) sold his house and what was left of his inherited lands (two closes and 10 acres 1 rood of arable) to Thomas Prentiss of Tilsworth. Robert was able to sign his name in full. The property Courses with the 25« acres of land which had belonged to it since at least 1531 was still intact and in the hands of Gabriel Pedder's grandson William Cooke. Surnames come and go in a village community, but the story of the Pedders demonstrates how continuity may be maintained through direct female descendants. This can be traced only when such documents as wills exist, as they do in this case. PEPPIT (PEPPEATT, PEPYTE, PETYTE etc.) Surnames in a village seldom persist for more than a century. Peppit, though it flourished and multiplied for a while, lasted an even shorter time than that in Tilsworth. The first appearance of "Petytt" in the manor Court records was in 1605 (CH 2/1), when Robert P. was among the new tenants. In the 1608 survey (CH 3/2) Philip P. was farming 57 acres of the manor lands, and at some later date meadow of both Phillip and John P. was added to the record. Between 1605 and 1626 the baptisms of nineteen children were recorded to five Peppit fathers: Robert, Philip, Francis, John and Thomas. These were probably all brothers, as the will of Thomas P, yeoman, 1616 (1616/7), mentions sons with these names, as well as two married daughters. After bequests to his brothers and sisters, Philip inherited the residue. He benefitted again in 1623 under the will (1622/3) of his father-in-law Thomas Croker (yeoman), receiving the residue of his property. A note added to the 1608 survey in 1624 recorded that Phillip Peppit occupied the 180« acres of the demesne lands. The brothers must all have settled in Tilsworth, since their children were baptised there. They may have been introduced as tenants by the new Lord of the Manor, Anthony Chester, around 1604. In 1611 (CH 154) there was a clause in the lease of manor lands to Thomas Everett permitting him to sublet 30 acres to Francis Peppit. In 1612 Francis married Winifred Attwell in Stanbridge and they started a family. In 1623 (CH 157) John P. acquired the freehold of the messuage and 15 acres known as Pygotts, perhaps by inheritance, and a deed of 1627 (CH 158) shows that he owned freehold strips in the fields. There is an undated document (CH 3/5) in the Chester archive noting rents and tithes which must (judging from the names of the tenants) refer to the period around 1630. It records Thomas Peppit paying rent of œ41 15s 6d per annum, but mentions no other Peppits. In 1649 Thomas P. witnessed the will (1649/57) of Richard Hawkins (one of the family had married a Hawkins). Around Easter 1623 Alice P. was present when Robert Roberts made his will (1623/118) by word of mouth, leaving everything to his widow. Perhaps Alice was tending the dying man. She must subsequently have married one of the testator's family, for in 1659 (CH 185) Alice Roberts of Slapton, daughter of John Peppiott of Tilsworth, sold a half part of a messuage with 15 acres in the fields ("Pygotts") to Richard Burre of Eaton Bray. There is no record of her father John being buried in Tilsworth, and in fact there is no entry in the Parish Register for the Pepitt family, numerous as they were, after the baptism of Thomas son of Thomas Pepiot in 1626, and they do not appear in the Hearth Tax list in 1671. Joyce Woodstock of "Hockliff Street in the parish of Tilsworth", who made her will (1696-7/55) in 1696, named John Pepiatt of Hemel Hempstead, cooper, as one of her debtors, but he may not have been related to the Tilsworth family. The Peppits seem to have left Tilsworth as suddenly as they arrived. PRENTICE (PRENTIS) The Prentice family first appeared in the Tilsworth records soon after 1600, and by 1605 (CH 2/1) Edmond Prentice was a tenant farmer on the Chester lands, cultivating 27 acres in the 1608 survey (CH 3/2). By c.1630 (CH 3/5) Edmond had disappeared, but Thomas Prentice (possibly his son) was paying œ56-3-2 per year for lands, and Thomas's brother Edward was renting a cottage. The will (1656/30) of this Edward, who died shortly before Thomas, in 1656, throws light on his generation of the family: he had no children himself, and his main bequests were to his sister Joan Bucknam and her children. Another will (1649/75), Silvester Mistleton (or Missenden), outlined another generation of Prentices, since he married an Agnes Prentice in 1633 and the overseer of the will was his "brother" Thomas Prentice "of Houghton Regis", and he also referred to his "father" Thomas Prentice of Tilsworth, who may be the one who rented land there, and died in 1656. There was an excessive number of Thomas Prentices, in Stanbridge where the family proliferated in the 17th century, as well as in Tilsworth. This makes it difficult to distinguish particular individuals in the records. However, it seems to have been a Thomas Prentice born son of Thomas Prentice in Tilsworth in 1654 who made his mark in the village in the later years of the century, when he set about acquiring land and houses there. The Thomas Prentice buried in 1707 under a tomb at the west end of Tilsworth church, second only to the Fowler and Chester monuments in pomp and size, seems to be a red herring: the helpful inscription tells us that he was born in Stanbridge 55 years previously (he appears there in the Parish Register, baptised in 1653) and that he was "of St Clement Danes, London". It is something of a mystery how he came to be buried in Tilsworth (an event also recorded in the Parish Register). His will, proved at Canterbury (PROB 11/496 Poley Quire Nos. 178-225) describes him as "wharfinger" (connected in some capacity with a wharf). At some time after 1621 and probably before 1630 the Prentice family seems to have acquired the cottage on the lower green, with its closes and 4 acres of arable land, probably by inheritance or marriage. In 1660 (R 94) it was in the possession of Elizabeth Prentice, no doubt a widow, and perhaps the mother of 6-year-old Thomas. A Thomas Prentice witnessed the will (1629/26) of Joan Bucknam (n‚e Prentice) in 1669, but when the 1671 Hearth Tax assessment was made there was no householder in the village called Prentice. A witness to the will (1688/49) of Richard Partridge in 1688 was Thomas Prentice, who signed with a "T" as his mark. In 1692 Thomas Prentice appears again, as a yeoman, now aged 38, in a document (CH 190) relating to the cottage and 4 acres. In 1695 he inherited (1695/10) a cottage and lands in Wingfield from his kinsman Thomas Janes, and in 1696 he and his wife Elizabeth bought the ancient holding once known as "Pygotts" (CH 193) from the blacksmith John White. It comprised a house and 14 acres and had changed hands several times since 1600. This did not satisfy his ambitions as a landowner: in 1698 (CH 193) he mortgaged the cottage with its 4 acres and also the cottage in Wingfield and purchased the land which the last of the Tilsworth Pedders was now selling which amounted to 10 acres 1 rood ley and meadow and there was a house occupied by John Knight. After this transaction Thomas Prentice was the owner of around 30 acres of land and three houses and cottages in Tilsworth as well as property elsewhere and he held them until his death in 1727, probably all farmed by tenants. A list of tenants of Sir John Chester with their lands and rents (Bucks. R.O. D/C/4/1) in about 1705, shows that Prentice held 90« acres of arable land, together with the farmhouse and buildings, meadows and closes, for an annual rent of œ50-17-6 and two capons at Christmas (a little less than in 1630?). There were eight other farmers sharing the Chester land. It is not known how long Prentice had held this farm, and it is difficult to link the still existing or recorded farmhouses to a particular occupier, but there is some evidence that Prentice may have lived at what became known as "Green Farm". Thomas's wife Elizabeth died in January 1724 and in September that year he married Mary Tuckey, spinster (Tuckey was the tenant of the Manor Farm). On 2nd August 1727, a month before his death at the age of 73, Thomas Prentice made his will (1727/53), from which it appeared he had no surviving descendants. He died a month later. He left all his houses, lands and buildings in Tilsworth, Wingfield, Dunstable and elswhere in Bedfordshire to his wife Mary, and after her death to his kinsfolk Sarah King and Robert Ellingham. PURRAT (PARROT, PERROT etc.) The bequest by Richard Hawkins (1649/133) to his nephew Henry Purrat probably accounts for the first appearance of the Purrat family in Tilsworth. Although the Hawkins owned no house or land in the village, Purrat may have taken over the tenancy of their farm there. Richard Purrat occupied a farm in 1705 (Bucks R.O.D/C/4/1). A hundred years later, when the Chester property in Tilsworth was put up for sale (AD 534/4) a Purrat was occupying what is today known as Greenhill Farm, and the family's tenancy there had been continuous since at least 1749 and probably before that. We must remember that until 1768 the arable land of each farm in Tilsworth was still divided into scattered strips throughout the parish, which could be transferred between holdings, though the farmhouses were all situated along the roads. We can speculate that Henry Purrat took over a house from Richard Hawkins on the site of Greenhill Farm. The present building dates to the late 19th century. The Parish Register witnesses to the establishing of a family by Henry Purrat and his wife Mary. Their first-born Henry was not recorded, perhaps born elsewhere, or else during the period around 1650 when there were gaps in the register. A son Richard was born in 1655 and a William in 1657, but the baby died a week later and there were no more children. Henry Purrat was one of the yeomen taking part in the affray in 1655, (see "Bucknam") in company with Partridge and Pedder, suggesting a connection between the families. Henry's wife Mary died in 1665 and he himself was taken ill in 1667 and on November 20th he made his will (1667/90). This revealed that the family owned a house and close in Leagrave, which was bequeathed to the eldest son Henry, along with half his father's goods. His brother Richard had the other half, and the residue was divided between the two sons, both still very young. It is interesting that among the minor bequests there were items of clothing: Henry's brother Richard received his "best pair of boots, a dublet and pair of breeches and coat and hat my best garments" , and his brother-in -law Sam Poynton was given "that Coat which was my wedding coat." The testator gave much thought to his funeral arrangements: he wrote "I would have œ3 to be laid out in bread for my funeral and a quarter of a year after the poor of Tilsworth 20 shillings to be given amongst them at the discretion of my overseers. And whereas I have a Cowe in feeding I will that she be kept on till Chrismas next and then I give a quarter to Henry Purrut of Chalgrave and quarter to John Prentice of Sewell and a quarter to Richard Partridge of Tilsworth for their Care in overseeing this will for I desire them to be the Overseers thereof and gardians to my sons if need require. The Other quarter of the fatted Cowe I will to have it spent in the house at Chrismas and the Laide [?] I give to Sam. Poynton ye younger of Laiton [Buzzard]." He added his signature "Henery Purret" with a shaky hand, and a seal with a shield bearing three crescents stamped on it. Henry Purrat junior took over the farm in Tilsworth and paid tax on two hearths in 1671. He witnessed the wills of Thomas Stanbridge (1680-81/93) and Robert Pedder (1686/32), but after this his name did not appear again. There is no evidence that he married or had children and he may have died or moved out of the village, for in 1705 it was his brother Richard who was renting the farm from the Chesters (Bucks.R.O.D/C/4/1). Richard had first married a Mary, but he lost her and their baby in 1698. He married again, Alice Mann of Tilsworth, in 1705. Their only child was born in 1710, but died before he was a year old. Richard's holding in Tilsworth comprised a messuage, garden orchard, barns, stables and other buildings. On the backside of the house was a close called the Home Close of about 3 acres. A pightle called Paretree Pightle, a close called the Deane, 6 leys and 120 acres of arable land, 40 acres in each of the three fields. Also a number of areas of meadow land. His rent was œ62-4-4 per annum and two capons at Christmas. He was permitted to keep 94 sheep, 11 cows and 2 horses on the common grazing land. After the Manor Farm this was the largest holding in Tilsworth. At the same time Daniel Purrat occupied a cottage, yard etc on East End Lane. "The Deane" which still exists on the slope behind the church, had been attached to the Hawkins' farm and was part of the Purrats' farm (Greenhill) in 1804. Richard died in 1721 (1721/17), aged 65, and this is recorded on a memorial slab in the floor of the church, as is also the death in 1710 of his young son Richard, included on the memorial to the child's aunt, Catherine Mann. The existence of these gravestones suggests increasing affluence in the family; perhaps some money came from the Manns. Richard's widow Alice died in 1743. By 1746 a Henry Purrat was paying œ64 annual rent to the Chester estate. QUINNY, QUINNEY The Quinny family came to Tilsworth with Henry Chester when the estate there came into his possession in 1628. John Quinny had been born in 1597 and his memorial, 1669, in the church describes him as "servant" to Sir Henry for 56 years, so from a young age. His son John was baptised in Tilsworth in 1629 and he had another son Daniel, and a daughter Mary, who married the Tilsworth farmer Thomas Tearle. Their mother must have died and their father married again, because the wife Jane (Wakelyn), next to whom he was buried, was not born till 1629. John Quinny was witness to the will of Robert Ellingham in 1657. In what capacity he served Sir Henry is not stated, but it was probably in the cultivation of his land, since he lived at Tilsworth manor and rented its farm after Sir Henry settled in Lidlington, probably in the early 1660s. A will made by Sir Henry in 1664 excused John Quinny œ50 of his rent, presumably for Manor Farm. There is, however, an entry in Chester's accounts "To John Quinney of Tilsworth for 12 paire of shoose for the children 18s-0d" (CH938 date?) so he may also have been a shoemaker. He was certainly valued and respected, since he was not only commemorated with an inscription after his death by Sir Henry's nephew Sir Anthony, who as a child living at the manor in the care of his uncle must have known him well, but he was also left an annuity (œ8) in the the will of Sir Henry himself. John Quinny's son John started a family in 1664 with a daughter "Emm". Hers is the oldest surviving gravestone in the churchyard, near the church porch (Em Tuckey, died 1709). John Quinny junior had two other daughters, Mary (1668) and Elizabeth (1672) but no surviving sons. John Quinny senior died in 1669, aged 72. The memorial inscription now in the church vestry was probably originally on an outside wall near his burial place and it has been damaged by the weather. The lettering is in the same slightly unusual style as that on the monument to Sir Henry Chester who had died three years earlier. The same craftsman was evidently employed on both, perhaps at the same date. At the time of the Hearth Tax, 1671, (where his name is given as "Quincey") the John Quinny occupying the Manor (7 hearths) must have been John junior. His brother Daniel (who had also been left an annuity by Sir Henry, and who seems to have had no family of his own) died in 1680. The tenancy of the Manor Farm passed to Emm and her husband William Tuckey, who were there at the beginning of the 18th century. The surname Quinny occurs only once more, rather mysteriously, in the Tilsworth record, though only in the bishop's transcript, not in the parish register itself, in 1722/23: John Quinney, husbandman, was buried on January 18th. If this was John junior he was then 92 years old. SMITH, SMYTH and WOODSTOCK The name Smith was not a common one in Tilsworth. A "Smyth" was on the list of men liable for military service in 1539 and a William Smyth/Smeth was one of the homage during the reign of Heny VIII, but the name did not recur in the local records for over 100 years. In 1649 the first of a number of children of William Smith was baptised, John, followed by William (1651), Thomas (1655) and James (1654). It appears from the will of William Smith their father (1678) that he and his wife Ellin had at least two other children, Henry and Alice. Henry was probably the eldest, and he and Alice were very likely born before the family came to Tilsworth. This gives us a date for their arrival just before 1649. Their story follows on from that of the Wells family, who consolidated their landholding in the northern corner of Tilsworth parish and built a house (still standing today) in 1634, by Watling Street, on the edge of Hockliffe. The occupier, Cheyney, was given a 14 year lease which would have run out in 1647 (CH 178-181). Perhaps the Smiths then took over. At some point this property became an inn known as the Rose, or Rose and Crown, (known by the 19th century as the Bull) as well as a farm. It was always more part of the community of Hockliffe than of Tilsworth, so it is not surprising that William Smith did not appear as a witness to any of the wills made in Tilsworth. At the time of the 1671 hearth tax William Smith paid for three hearths, one of the larger houses. In 1678 on 21st July he made his will (1678/105) and was described as "innholder". He was buried five days later. He left everything to his wife Ellin for life. Their daughter Alice was to receive œ60 after her mother's death, the rest of the property to be divided between their four sons (two of them were John, 1649 and William, 1651, the other two not recorded in the Register). It was Henry, the eldest, who took over as landlord. In the year following his father's death he bought land in Chalgrave from John Hebbes of Hockliffe (CH 296). He had married Joyce Jennings and they had two surviving sons: Joseph (baptism not recorded) and William, born 1683. Ellin died in 1686, and her son Joseph died unmarried in 1705. Information about the family comes from the twice-widowed Joyce Woodstock, mother of Henry's wife Joyce. The widow made her carefully considered will in 1696 "being aged and weak in body but "desireing to settle things in order". Her abode is given as "Hockliff Street in the parish of Tilsworth" which places it near to the "Rose and Crown". She leaves "all my cottage and tenement in Hockliff with its yards, outbuildings and a close of pasture ground" to her grandson Joseph Smith. This cannot be the inn, which belonged to Sir John Chester. A condition was placed on this bequest: Joseph and his father Henry must pay œ30 to two trustees who would "put it to interest" for the benefit of Joyce's daughter Martha, married to John Lucy of Milton Bryant, yeoman. This husband was, in Widow Woodstock's opinion, untrustworthy, for she stipulated that he "shall in no wise have any benefit or profit by the œ30 or the interest....thereof". The testatrix had evidently used her money to lend at interest, as widows often did. She listed six sums totalling œ67 lent to individuals in various villages in Bucks. Herts. and Beds. The trustees were to employ these also for the use of Martha Lucy. Henry Smith had also borrowed œ20 from his mother-in-law and this and the interest was to be used for the maintenance of her grandson Joseph Smith till he was 21, when he would inherit outright. Joyce Woodstock evidently had more faith in Henry Smith than in her other son-in-law John Lucy, and he and Joseph were responsible for paying further legacies out of the property in Hockliffe to two daughters "of my daughter Weatherhead". Her household goods and clothes were to be shared between daughters Joyce Smith and Martha Lucy, who each also received "one broad piece of broad old Gold" [cloth?] and a ring. Her second Smith grandson, William (13 when she made her will) was to have œ5, which she had lent his father, when 21. Her son Joseph Jennings had already died and his two daughters were left œ10 between them when 21. The untrustworthy son-in-law John Lucy was left half a crown to buy gloves (it was customary to give gloves to mourners at a funeral). As an afterthought to the will, perhaps relentintg a little, she directed that if he survived Martha he should receive the interest on her legacy for his life "and no longer". The residue of her estate went to Henry and Joseph Smith. Widow Woodstock asked to be buried by her former husband Jennings at Little Brickhill. It is perhaps surprising that such an organised business woman was unable to sign her name. She died towards the end of the following year, 1697, and her daughter Joyce Smith died the year after. Henry Smith was still in occupation of the inn in 1705, and the Chester rent list (D/C/4/1) describes it as "the House" with 8 closes but no land in the common arable fields. Henry's death is not recorded in Tilsworth unless he is the Henry Smith, labourer, who was buried in 1725, by which time the former innkeeper would have been about 80 years old. In 1718 Henry's younger son was described as "victualler" (i.e. innkeeper). The older son Joseph may have occupied his grandmother's nearby property. STANBRIDGE, STAMBURGE This name, no doubt originating with someone from the neighbouring village, occurred in Tilsworth only in the late 17th century, though it survives in modern times in South Bedfordshire. It did not appear anywhere in the farming records, nor in the 1671 hearth tax list. There are just two entries in the Parish Register: the burial of Thomas "Stamburge" on 12th January 1680-81 and the marriage of Thomas Stambridge, probably his son, to Sarah Turpine on 1st November 1686. The family is worth including here because Thomas senior's will (1680-1/93), made 10th November 1680, described him as "carpinter", the only mention of this trade in Tilsworth. It also reveals the probable reason for his appearance in the village: his daughter was married to Richard Partridge, a yeoman there. Thomas Stanbridge sen. had two sons, Thomas and John, as well as at least one daughter. John had borrowed sums of money from his father in 1659 and these debts were written off to provide his legacy, together with furniture already in his possession. Thomas was to receive œ40, but the residue of the estate went to his son-in-law Richard Partridge, who was also executor. The will was one of those drawn up by William Peirson which commenced with a long "Calvinist" preamble. Thomas signed it with a mark. The spelling "Stamburge" in the Tilsworth burial register, together with "Stamberghe" on Thomas Prentice's tomb (1707) in the church, suggests the local pronunciation at the time, though the name is spelt in the modern way in Thomas's will. TEARLE The Tearles have lived in Bedfordshire for several centuries and John Tearle has published a book Tearle, a Bedfordshire Surname, from which some of the information used here is taken. It shows that although they were present in Stanbridge, (where there are big gaps in the parish registers) their association with Tilsworth lasted for only about half a century. In the 1630s (CH 3/5) John Tearle, born 1610, was renting three closes from Henry Chester, paying œ10 10s half yearly, and in 1637 (CH 3/1) he was tenant of 57 acres (?) of pasture closes. He was not necessarily living in Tilsworth. His son Thomas (born 1632) married Mary Smallbones from West Farndon, Northamptonshire, in 1653 and their children were baptised in Tilsworth: John (1654), Thomas (1655), William (1656) and Elizabeth (1659). John senior died in 1654, leaving Thomas as his heir. Mary died in 1659, when Elizabeth was only a few months old, and in 1660 Thomas, with four children under seven years old, married again; Mary Quinney, presumably the daughter of John Quinney, tenant of the Manor Farm. She became mother of several more children (Mary, 1665, Alice, 1668, twin daughters who soon died in 1673 and Joseph, 1676, and there may have been others). Thomas Tearle filled the post of constable for Tilsworth in 1668 and 1669 and in 1671 he paid tax on two hearths. He was evidently one of the more substantial and respected members of the community. Jonas Smallbones, husbandman, made a will (1675/47) and was buried on 26th May, the only occurrence of this surname in Tilsworth, and he was no doubt a close relative, perhaps the father, of Thomas Tearle's first wife Mary Smallbones. He remembered all Tearle's children with bequests, including œ4 to William (19 years old at the time) to apprentice him to a trade. The will suggests Smallbones had a sideline as a money-lender: not only Tearle but also Smallbones' "cozen" Thomas Ellingham had money in his hands which was owed to Smallbones, and out of which the legacies to their children were to be paid. John Quinney was also described as a "kinsman", though not as a debtor. After this date there is no further record of Tearles in Tilsworth, but they continued to thrive in Stanbridge and elsewhere. THEEDE, THEIDE Richard Theide first appeared on the homage at the Manor Court of April 1596 (CH 2/1). It is not certain who was tenant of the Manor lands at the end of the 16th century, though it may have been John Knight, who held two farms then and was the largest land-holder in the parish. However, one of the last acts of Richard Fowler before he sold Tilsworth was to sign a six year lease (CH 100) with Richard Theede of the lands attached to the Manor house. Dated 27.2.1603/4 it also granted part of the "parsonage house" with its garden, orchard and outbuildings. This was the old vicarage which stood near the Manor until the 1930s, across the road from the church. The Fowlers had acquired it along with the lands that once belonged to the Priory of Flamstead. Presumably the vicar lived in the part not leased to Theede. The lease included the 30 acre pasture "Englands" and 180a of arable, meadow and pasture land, for an annual rent of œ59. There is a warning against ploughing any of the "swerde" (grass) ground without the consent of Richard Fowler. Theede headed the list of the men who carried out the survey (CH3/2) of the arable land in 1608, when he occupied 91a, so another 90a must have been pasture etc. The arable acreages rented to other farmers varied between 27a and 90a. Theede, then, was living in the old vicarage with his wife Ellen. The first entry in the earliest Tilsworth Parish Register records the baptism of their son John on 2nd January 1603/4. They may have had other children already, and no more appear subsequently in the register. The year before, he had witnessed the will (1607/32) of Thomas Austin, signing his name on the document, which not many in the village were capable of doing at that time: usually they made their mark. Theede must have been a trusted member of the community, for he was appointed overseer to the arrangements in the will (1615/144) of William Baulducke in 1615 and in 1617 he was executor to the will (1617/111) of James Fincher (or Fensham?), who had no children and made Richard Theede heir to what remained after legacies to Fincher's relations. Two other Theedes, John and Robert, were overseers of this will but there is no other record of them - they may not have lived in Tilsworth. It is unlikely to have been Richard's son John, baptised 15 years previously. When Robert Austin died in 1621 he, like his father in 1607, made Richard Theede overseer to his will (1621/171). Richard's wife Ellen died in 1618 and the following year he married again, Elizabeth Collens. There is no record of any Theedes in Tilsworth after 1621. It is not recorded that Richard died; he and his family probably left the village. After 25 years as a prominent local figure he vanished from the scene. A note dated 1624 (CH3/2) at the end of the survey of the fields gives Philip Pepit, one of the other tenants in 1608, as being in possession of the 180a of demesne. WELLS, AND DEVELOPMENTS IN THE NORTHERN CORNER OF TILSWORTH A new name and a man with ambition appeared in the Tilsworth records as the 17th century began: John Wells of Hockliffe. He was not among those owning or renting land in Tilsworth in 1596 (CH2/1). In 1602 (Coleman Hockliffe) he acquired the second manor of Hockliffe, which included land in Leighton Buzzard, Battlesden, Stanbridge and Chalgrave. In 1603 (CH 149) he bought 6« acres (17 ridges) in Tilsworth from a fellow yeoman of Hockliffe, Robert Fowler and in the Manor Court record for 1605 (CH 2/1) he owned 16 acres. In 1607 (CH 151) he added to this the Tilsworth dwelling house called "Braintons" with the buildings and adjacent ground and a sitting tenant William Paul, paying œ84 to William Grome. His wife was called Ursula, who may have been the daughter mentioned in the will (1582-3/70) of the Tilsworth husbandman Richard Crawley in 1582. When the survey of the arable land was made in 1608 (CH 3/2) John Wells owned 11 acres freehold in the common fields of Tilsworth. He was probably a churchwarden in 1624 (CH 101) when he, along with Gabriel Pedder, represented the village in the transaction by which Mary Willoughby endowed a preaching minister there. By the late 1620s he was said to have about 30 acres arable and meadow land in Tilsworth and it was at this time that a dispute (CH 22) surfaced between Wells and Sir Anthony Chester. Chester petitioned the Lord Keeper of the Private Seal, complaining that Wells had gone back on an agreement made between them, and had moreover tried to cheat him. Wells was, he said, in possession of "divers parcels of arable land, ley and meadow ground" in the common fields of Tilsworth, and had often approached Chester to suggest they exchange some of their strips, so that Wells "might have all his land and meadow lie together." At last, so Chester said, he agreed, for the sake of the quiet of his tenants and in order to spare trouble and annoyance, for he found Wells "somewhat froward" and inclined to trouble his neighbours and threaten them with fines. (So long as lands were intermingled, disputes could easily crop up.) An exchange had therefore been arranged, to take place at Michaelmas 1628, a payment being made to Chester. Now, however, Chester claimed that, although Wells had taken over the land, he repudiated the agreement "made as aforesaid in all fair and friendly manner"; he now refused to perform his part (presumably the payment) and maintained "most falsely and untruly" that there was never any such bargain, and that Chester had no proof of it. The document recording Chester's complaint is very difficult to read, being only the lawyer's draft of the case, but he was obviously very angry. He alleged further that Wells and his surveyor "Cornelious" White, had conspired to defraud Chester. White had measured the "heads" (the ends of strips where the plough was turned) and the "balks" (the uncultivated access to the arable land), "pretending the same to be meadow ground and mowable ground". Meadow land was valuable, producing the hay crop for winter fodder. The surveyor had then "measured and marked forth so much of the meadow" of Sir Anthony, claiming it in exchange for the inferior land of the heads and baulks. Not only that, Wells and White, Sir Anthony claimed, "of purpose to deceive ... and wrongfully to gain ... more land and meadow in quantity" than they were entitled to, "measured the land ley and meadow of Wells to be much more in quantity than the same in truth is," and Chester's land "to be much less than the same is in truth... And the said White to the end his falsehood herein might not be examined hath refused although often thereunto [by Chester] requested to deliver to [Chester] the particulars of his survey." Sir Anthony was evidently furious about the whole transaction. It was at this time (1628) that he made over the Tilsworth estate to his third son Henry. The dispute with Wells must have been sorted out, because in 1630 (CH 163) an exchange of lands did in fact take place between John Wells and the Chesters, father and son. They had learned the wisdom of getting an agreement in writing, with each portion of land surveyed and measured in acres, roods and perches, presumably by a surveyor approved by all parties. All the pieces acquired by Wells were in the northern corner of Tilsworth parish, next to Hockliffe, where Wells already owned land. As Sir Anthony had described it in his complaint, it was "to lie along and adjoining Watling Street way, being towards Hockly town's end". In exchange, Wells relinquished land elsewhere in Tilsworth. On 21st October 1631 "Urseley Welles", John's wife, was buried at Tilsworth. That year John made a gift (CH 165) of the Braintons property to his nephew, also John Wells (suggesting John and Ursula had no children of their own). By 1633 (CH 175) Wells senior had moved to London (Soho, in the parish of St Martin in the Fields), but his nephew, John Wells, was now described as "yeoman of Tilsworth", and together they approached Thomas Impey of Turvey who owned land in Tilsworth formerly belonging to the Hospital of St John in Hockliffe, and negotiated another exchange of land. In the 1608 survey (CH 3/2) all this corner of the parish had remained part of the common fields, though "Tilsworth Leys" at the north end was down to grass. By 1633 Impey had enclosed his 2« acres of leys as pasture, and Wells had also put ditches on each side of blocks of strips acquired in the exchange with Chester three years before. Matching the documents of the two exchanges shows that Wells and nephew now had a consolidated block of land which could be fenced off from the rest of the fields of Tilsworth. Wells had been involved in a similar process in Hockliffe, where the open fields were being enclosed around this time (Coleman), but this was the first farm in Tilsworth to be enclosed (apart from the Manor itself, which had closes of meadow and pasture, though not ploughland). It was now possible to build a house on this land and for a short while John Wells junior and his wife Joan lived there, but by 1634 he had moved to Outwell in Norfolk, and the "new erected" house with its adjoining 30 acres of land, was tenanted by John Cheyney of Hockliffe, paying œ23-2-6 and œ16-10-1 and a peppercorn per annum. It was now mortgaged and leased (CH 178-181) for œ60 to Henry Tilcocke of Slapton. The house, newly built in 1634, must be the oldest part of Bull Farm, the part nearest the road. It is the only old building in Tilsworth which can be accurately dated. The farm and its land were transferred to Hockliffe parish in the 20th century.Separately from this freehold land, Wells was renting from Henry Chester in 1637 (CH 3/1) 24 acres pasture, 4 closes of arable and pasture and one meadow on an 80 year lease for œ170 per annum. The land from the arable fields acquired by John Wells near his house (CH 830) was divided into five "closes" (fenced-off fields), 2-4 acres each and of irregular shape, which suggests that he was rearing stock there, rather than growing crops. Under the turf today, although the small closes have been amalgamated into a larger field, their ditched boundaries with a few old trees can still be detected, overlying the ridge and furrow of the even older arable strips, unploughed since 1633. Modern boundaries are superimposed, so that behind Bull Farm three field patterns of different ages are visible at the same time. When the farm was let to Henry Tilcocke in 1634, the elder John Wells was living in Soho, London and the younger at Outwell, Norfolk, both being described as "yeoman". By 1637/8 John Wells junior was in Downham, Cambridgeshire (CH 830). We do not know why he left Tilsworth, but this was the period when the Earl of Bedford was organising the great draining of the fens and Outwell and Downham were both in the area where drainage works were in progress. Investors in the scheme were called "adventurers". The ambitious Wells family might well have been tempted to look for opportunities in this new development. In 1638 (CH 178-181) Henry Chester took over the lease and mortgage of the Tilsworth property of Wells senior and junior and in 1663 (CH 186-7) he bought it outright. In 1671 the house was occupied by H. Smith, who paid tax for 3 hearths and Ogilby's road map of the 1670s marks it as "The Rose", so it had become an inn as well as a farm. Road traffic was increasing at this time (hence the need for road maps) and a number of inns existed in Hockliffe to cater for travellers and drovers. The northern corner of Tilsworth was closely linked to Hockliffe and "The Rose" had a prime position as the first hostelry the traveller saw on entering Hockliffe from the south. By the 1660s there was a busy trade in cattle between Wales and London, and there is evidence of Welsh drovers stopping in the inns of Hockliffe (the Hockliffe Parish Register shows that at least two of them died there before 1700). It is very probable that the Rose profited from the cattle droving, and its paddocks were well placed to pasture the animals overnight. This trade continued until the late 19th century. WHITE The first appearance of the Whites in the record was with the baptism of John in October 1670, eldest son of John White. By the time John senior made his will in 1687 he was the owner of a cottage and land in Stanbridge, and his family may have come from there. He was exempted tax in Tilsworth on two hearths in 1671on account of poverty, which is surprising, as he was the blacksmith. One of the hearths may have been his forge. He and his wife Elizabeth had more children in the next few years: Francis (1671/2), Mary (1673/4) and Thomas (1675) who died at the age of 6 months.The entry for another Thomas in the transcript of the Parish Register in 1677 should probably be "Tomasin", a daughter mentioned in her father's will in 1687. Another son Thomas (no baptism recorded) was buried in July 1685 and his mother joined him inFebruary 1685/6. It was in 1685 that John White, described as "blacksmith", of Tilsworth, bought the house and 15 acres called "Pygotts" from Richard Burre of Eaton Bray and John Burre of Stanbridge. John White made his will on 26th October 1687 (1688/77). He had not remarried and his property was divided between his two sons and two daughters. He owned a cottage and some land in Stanbridge which he left to his younger son Francis, together with two half acre strips on "Wickham Hill", above Tilsworth church, and œ5 "to help put him apprentis". The older son John received the residue of land, including the rest of Pygotts, but with a condition to deter him from "molesting" Francis in his Stanbridge land. The boys were aged 17 and 16. Mary (13) and Tomasin (10) received legacies of œ60 and œ50 and bullocks. The testator was able to sign his name and appointed Richard Partridge junior and Edward Gurney overseers of the will. He was buried on the 10th November 1687. Although White was described as "blacksmith" in his will there is no mention of his forge or tools in its provisions, but they were presumably included in the residue inherited by John. John junior continued to live in Tilsworth, but whether he maintained the smithy or lived by working his land is not known. He must have married by 1694, when his son John was baptised, followed by Thomas in 1696/7. In 1696 John White, yeoman, and his wife Sarah sold Pygotts to Thomas and Elizabeth Prentice "Elizabeth White" was buried in 1698, but her relationship to the others is not known, and there are no further records of the family in Tilsworth. By 1705 (Bucks R.O.D/C/4/1) the blacksmith in Tilsworth was Joseph Bucknam. A Richard White had been blacksmith in Hockliffe in 1626 (CH 273). SUMMARY OF FAMILIES IN 1671, NOT DESCRIBED ELSEWHERE BURRE, HOWES/HOUSE, SIBLEY, FOWLER, PAUL/PALE, LAW/LOW/LEW, JACKSON, REASON, ROAFE/ROASE The Hearth Tax assessment for 1671 divides the occupiers of houses in Tilsworth into those who could afford to pay (16 in all) and those who were excused on the grounds of poverty (9, including 1 pauper "in receipt of constant alms", whose name was not recorded). The names in the first group are familiar from documents concerning farming, and some also from wills. Two of them owned land and most of them were tenant farmers of the Chester estate and the Bellmakers farm, now owned by Brandreth of Houghton Regis. The number of hearths is a rough guide to the size of farmhouse and therefore probably to the wealth of the occupant. John Quinney (who appears on the list as "Quincey") farmed the Manor lands and lived in the Manor House, with seven hearths. William Smith was landlord of the inn next Hockliffe on Watling Street, which had three hearths. The only other three-hearth house was that of James Janes, who was constable that year, but probably a relatively new arrival in Tilsworth. If we consider the surviving old farmhouses in the village, the largest would seem to be the one now divided into "Tudor House" and "Tudor Cottage", and it is possible that this was occupied by Janes, but Wood Farm was also a large building. The two-hearth farmers were Richard Partridge (Bellmakers), Thomas Tearle, Henry Purratt (probably "Greenhill"). Widow Crawley, John Gurney sen., John Gurney jun., Richard Burre (Pygotts) and William Cook (successor to the Pedders, Yellow Farm). In 1659 (CH 185) Richard BURRE "of Eaton Bray" had purchased Pygotts from Alice Roberts of Slapton, daughter of John Peppiatt. It seems he was living there in 1671, but when he and John Burr sold it in 1685 (CH 188-9) they were described as of Eaton Bray and Stanbridge. This leaves five houses paying tax on a single hearth: Gabriel Bucknam with a cottage facing the bottom green (possibly "Thanet Cottage"), Robert Pedder, who still owned part of the land belonging to "Dynes" and may still have lived in the house on East End Lane, although he had sold it; Widow Gurney, related to the farming family but head of her own household; John Howes and Henry Sibley. The name HOWES (HOUSE) occurs occasionally in Tilsworth records as far back as 1474 but in the 17th century it is first recorded as a witness, John Howse, to the will of Edward Prentice in 1656. Mary, wife of John House, died in 1667, and he remarried, (Christiana Wadley), the following year. Elizabeth "Howe", who married Thomas Edmunds in 1671, may be from the same family. There was a meadow called "Houses" in 1705, between the manor house and the woodland. The SIBLEYS were not prominent in the farming documents, but there is a mention in 1705 (Bucks R.O. D/C/4/1) of "Sibley Pightle" near Green Farm, which suggests they owned, or at least occupied, some land. They could have been local craftsmen, tradesmen or carriers. In the Parish Register they are much more visible: eight children of Henry Sibley being baptised and one buried between 1655 and 1669. A reliable source of income must have been necessary to keep this numerous family above the poverty line. Henry Sibley died in 1676 and Widow Sibley in 1692, marking the end of their forty years' presence in the local records. In the list of those exempted from tax because of poverty there is one oddity: John WHITE, with two hearths, one probably his forge, was the blacksmith, and it seems strange that he was unable to pay. Indeed, in 1685 (CH188-9) he was buying "Pygotts" from the Burres. Less surprising is that four widows were exempted: Fowler, Paul, Lew(Law), and Reason. Widow FOWLER may have been Penelope, daughter of yeoman Gabriel Pedder, who in 1612 married Richard Fowler, perhaps socially beneath her and who died in 1665. They had at least six children and she was still alive in 1658. She would have been in her late 70s or 80s in 1671. She may have been the "Widow Fowler" who died in 1673. The Richard Fowler who was also exempted payment on his hearth could be her eldest son, born 1615, but there were probably other families of Fowlers in the parish. They were not related to the 16th century Fowler Lords of the Manor. In 1623 a Richard Fowler was present at the deathbed of the village carrier Robert Roberts when he made his will by word of mouth. A Richard Fowler, labourer, died in 1665 leaving a will (1667-8/99). He had a son Richard who was left a shilling, but his house (he must have been a freeholder) and goods went to his wife and then to his son Henry. There were also three married daughters (a shilling each) and 16 grandchildren (sixpence apiece). Squeezed in as an afterthought another son, John, was left a shilling. One of the witnesses was Robert Pedder, which may suggest a relationship. A Henry Fowler could sign his name as witness to Robert Pedder II's will (1686/32). A Richard Fowler of a later generation married Sara, sister of yeoman Richard Partridge, who in 1698 left money to her in his will, with two of her brothers as trustees, charged with seeing that none of it went to her husband. William PAUL first appeared on the Manor Court roll (CH 2/1) in 1605, when he answered for the absent William Groome, for whom he probably worked, and the 1608 survey (CH 3/2) shows him as tenant of the house and land of John Wells called "Braintons", which Wells had bought from Grome. Thomas Palle witnessed the will of Henry Hawkins 1619-20/233). In the Manor Court of 1620 (or 1629) Thomas Paul paid tax to pay the hayward at half the rate of other cottagers. The reason is not stated. Abraham Paul had four sons baptised between 1627 and 1640, but he appeared more prominently in 1655 as one of the party committing riotous trespass on the house of John Bucknam. He was described in court as "labourer", while the other three men concerned, Partridge, Purratt and Robert Pedder, were all yeomen, so it is probable that he worked for one or more of them. Paul was not accused of joining Partridge and Purratt in assaulting Bucknam's wife and sister. The Bishop's copy of the death register records John Paul dying on June 5th 1659, and the Parish Register in 1661 has "Old Paul" (perhaps Abraham) buried on November 22nd. "Widow Paul" was apparently the only member of the family occupying a house at the time of the Hearth Tax assessment for 1671. In 1676 Richard Paul married Ann Bland. By the end of the century there had been two burials of a Richard Paul (1685 and 1696), two of "Wife of Richard Paul" (1673 and 1678) and three of "Widow Paul" (1676, 1682 and 1685). There is no evidence as to how they were related to each other. No Paul baptisms were recorded in this period. There was no burial record for Robert Paul, labourer, who made his will on the 4th August, 1675 (1675-6/123). He had three daughters: Sarah (who received 20s), Annis (30s) and Alice (20s). His son Thomas was to have his brass pot and 10s. His wife, whose name is indecipherable, was made executor. If she married again she should share œ16 between the children, otherwise it was hers for life and then she should dispose of it among the children "as she seeth good." This shows that labourer Paul had been able to put some money by. The witnesses were Richard Partridge and Mary Morris. Mary provides a link with "Luce Pale" (Paul), the widow who made her will (1682/43) in 1682 and left 20s to Elizabeth Morris, her (married) sister and the residue of her estate to Richard Morris, her nephew. She seems to have had no children of her own. Her brother was Henry Stokes, a labourer in Dunstable. "Luce" employed William Peirson to draw up her will and he began with his usual lengthy religious preamble (see under "Partridge"). The other witness was the blacksmith John White, who also employed Peirson when his own time came. With so many funerals and no baptisms in the late 17th century, it is not surprising that the Pauls disappeared from the Tilsworth records by the 1700s. The LAWS (LOW, LEW) may have lived in Tilsworth for a very long time; the name appears in the tax assessments for 1309 and 1332, which included the names of the wealthier inhabitants. The vicar in the early 16th century was Robert Low. When yeoman Richard Hawkyns made his will (1649/57) he left substantial sums (œ30-œ40) to Edward and Henry Lawe and 10s each to Edward's four children. Henry Law died in 1670 and it may have been his widow who was exempted Hearth Tax in 1671. Over thirty years later, in 1705, the rent book of Chester lands in Tilsworth (Bucks R.O. D/C/4/1) seems to record the end of her one-hearth dwelling: "Laws cottage and land", and a "pightle since Widow Laws house pulled down, and all Law's pightle". The next year, April 12th 1706, the burial of Ann Law, widow, is recorded in the Parish Register. Perhaps she had had to move in with relatives in her old age, leaving a ramshackle cottage to be demolished by the landlord. Of course there is no certainty that the two "Widow Laws" were the same woman. The fourth widow to be exempted from the Hearth Tax was Widow REASON. The first record of the Reasons in Tilsworth is the burial of Griffin Reason in July 1624. Two months later Francis Reason had a daughter Ursula baptised. Another daughter (Sara) was born in 1640 and in 1659 his wife Ann was buried. In January of the following year he married again, and he himself lived until March 1668/9. His wife was almost certainly the "Widow Reason" in 1671. Her burial is not recorded in Tilsworth, so perhaps she moved elsewhere. Nothing else is known of this family or its connections. Two other such poor families were JACKSON and ROAFE (Roase). Like the Sibleys they first appeared in Tilsworth in the 1650s and seem to have been gone by the end of the century. The Roafes had two hearths, therefore a larger house than most of the othe exempted families, and they must have needed space, since they had four surviving children under sixteen, perhaps the reason for their poverty. William Roafe died in 1691, when he was described as "labourer". Thomas JACKSON, "yeoman" of Tilsworth was a witness in a trial at the assizes in 1671 but was too poor to be liable for the tax, had four young children in 1671 and Rebecca, wife of Thomas Jackson, died in 1675. The Parish Register records a Thomas Jackson marrying in 1672. The Parish Register does not reveal any families living at this time in the village but not listed for the Hearth Tax. One person, unnamed, was "in constant receipt of alms", poorer, therefore, than any others on the list.