III
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THE MANOR. ITS LORDS: THE ESKELL-
INGS. TURBERVILLES. HASELDENES.
BROOKSBYS, COKES, AND BECKFORDS
The Manor.
The Domesday tenant-in-chief of the Manor of Shillingstone was Schelin, but later the parish became part of the Honour of Gloucester, and is mentioned among the possessions of the Clares, Earls of Gloucester and Hertford, from whom it passed to the King. The Manor itself was in the family of the Schelins, or Eskellings, for some five or six generations, when it passed by marriage to the Turbervilles, in all probability a branch of the Bere Regis family. From the Turbervilles, after whom the village is referred to in some old documents as Ocford Turberville, it passed by marriage to the Haseldenes, an Essex family the last of whom married Sir Robert Peyton. In 1565 1 Frances (Haseldene) his widow sold the Manor to Thomas Brooksby, of London, and thus it passed from the family of the Eskellings, after being held by them for nearly 600 years. Bartholomew Brooksby, son and heir of Thomas Brooksby, was concerned in the plot to place Arabella Stuart on the throne, and was indicted for treason, attainted, and his property confiscated, and Shillingstone came by purchase in 1604, to the celebrated lawyer, Sir Edward Coke, in whose family it remained till the death in 1769 of Thomas, Earl of Leicester, when it was sold to Julines Beckford, of Jamaica and Stepleton. It came to his descendant, Lord Rivers, and was eventually purchased by Viscount Portman, its present owner. In 1480 the Manor was said to be worth 10 marks (£6 13s 4d.); in 1504, £20; in 1569, £40; and in 1584, £36 13s A few facts about the families themselves are here recorded.
.
Shilling or Eskelling
The original Schelin was one of the thanes of French origin, and was undoubtedly a Norman He also appears in Domesday as Exchelines, and previous to the Survey he held land in Edmundsham, Hampreston, and Witchampton, which he appears to have exchanged for the Manor of Ocford, afterwards Shilling Okeford. The family also held land in Parfura Eskelling, in Normandy, in Wilts, and in Gloucester.1 As mentioned in Hutchins, Margaret Skyllyng, a nun at Shaftesbury in 1504, was probably a member of the family, and the name is to be found in Wilts as late as 1630
1 In 11 Henry III (1226-7) a fine was levied, probably in accordance with a family arrangement, which gives certain particulars of its possessions at the time.
.
Turberville.
The Manor came to this family by the marriage some time before 1286, of Bartholomew Turberville with Viviana Eskelling. As already stated, Bartholomew was probably a member of the Turbervilles of Bere Regis, a name made famous by Mr. Thomas Hardy's novel, Tess of the D'Urbervilles. The Manor remained with this family till 1393, when Elizabeth, daughter of Stephen Turberville, carried it by marriage to Richard Haseldene. There is a long pedigree of the Turbervilles of Bere Regis in Hutchins (i. 138.)
Haseldene or Hassylden.
Hutchins (iii., 445) gives a pedigree of this family, which was of Steeple Morden, Essex, and Little Chesterford, Hants. Previous to the marriage of Richard Haseldene and Elizabeth Turberville it is very probable that the lords (the Eskillings and Turbervilles) resided at Shillingstone in the Manor House, which probably stood on the site of the present Jacobean Manor House. As a result of this marriage the lords became non-resident and never again occupied the Manor House, although there is a Charter of Richard Haseldene and his wife Elizabeth, dated at Ocford Shilling, 12 Richard II (1388-9) 1
The pedigree in Hutchins gives four generations of Haseldenes, who all married into families of note, until we come to Frances, daughter and heiress, who married Sir Robert Peyton of Melham, Cambridgeshire, who died in 1550. Sir Robert is said to have accompanied Henry VIII (1544) to the siege of Boulogne, and also to have been present (in 1520), and also, to have been present at the Field of the Golden Cloth of Gold.
1 Additional charters, also 9242 British Museum
Brooksby.
Thomas Brooksby, who purchased the Manor of Shillingstone in 1565 was son of Thomas Brooksby, of Meech Bradley, Suffolk, and descended from a Leicestershire family settled at Sholdby in that county in the time of Edward III. In 1567 Thomas Brooksby "became a lunatic by the Visitation of God" and in 1569 an Inquisition was held at High Holborn London-2 Among his possessions appear the Manor of Okeford Shilling, and the Advowsons of the Rectory there, of the yearly value of £40. Gregory Lovell, of the Household of Queen Elizabeth, was appointed collector of rents and his accounts are to be found in the Court of Wards and Liveries, Views of Accounts of Lunatics, Vol. 2. From these accounts it appears that Thomas died about 1593, leaving a wife, Dorothy, and two children, Bartholomew and Mary. Bartholomew was implicated in the plot to place Arabella Stuart on the throne, and was attainted of treason, but eventually pardoned. His Manor of Shilling Okeford was granted to Sir Thomas Fresham in 1604, and it afterwards passed by sale to the famous judge, Sir Edward Coke, some time before 1607, on which date it is mentioned among certain possessions of Sir Edward in a deed enrolled in Common Pleas l in connection with the marriage settlement of his second son, Arthur Coke, and Elizabeth Waldegrave.
. 1 (Deeds Enrolled Hil. 5 Jas. I.)
2 Chancery. In 9 D.M. 11 Elizabeth, also 88 Middlesex
Coke.
Sir Edward Coke was the famous Lord Chief Justice, and the author of Coke upon Littleton He descended from an ancient Norfolk family, and was ancestor of the Earls of Leicester. He died in 1633, aged 83. In 1645 his successor, Sir Robert Coke, was in trouble with the Parliamentary Committee for compounding, and in 1653 John Coke, nephew of Sir Robert, was still petitioning the Committee about his estates, including those in Dorset. In 1656 this same John Coke took action about some lands in Shillingstone (probably the Manor farm) occupied by William Bisson, a relative (perhaps nephew) of the Rev. William Bisson, a former Rector, and in the depositions made in the case,1 we find a reference to a native of Shillingstone who had emigrated to New England. William Bisson held his land on the lives of Nicholas Banton and Ambrose his son. Nicholas had died in 1655. Ambrose was said to have been born at Shillingstone fifty-two years before (about 1604) and to have been apprenticed as an apothecary to his uncle, Ambrose Banton, in London, where he was said to have died twenty years before. A certain William Williamson, however, gave evidence that in about 1654 he was in Boston, New England, where he saw an Englishman named Ambrose Banton, an apothecary, about fifty-two years of age, who said he came from the west part of England. The registers do not tell us anything about these Bantons, but Nicholas appears in the Subsiduary Roll for 7 James I (1609), as taxed 5 s. on goods valued at £3, in Shillingstone. He was probably a newcomer, as the name has not been traced on any other document relating to the parish. In 7 William III (1695) the Manor was in possession of Horatio Walpole, a member of the Orford family, in right of his wife, the widow of Robert Coke. It continued in the Coke family until 1759, when Thomas Coke, Earl of Leicester died, and Shillingstone was sold to Julines Beckford, of Iwerne Stepleton, after having been in the Coke family for more than 150 years.
1 Coke v Bisson- Chancery Depositions before 1714, 339-27
.Beckford.
Julines Beckford, the next possessor of Shillingstone, was son of Peter Beckford, Governor and Commander- in- Chief of Jamaica.1 He was brother of William Beckford, the celebrated Lord Mayor of London, whose son William was the owner of Fonthill and author of Vathek and other works. Julines Beckford was Sheriff of Dorset and M.P. for Salisbury, and died about 1764, in which year his will was proved. His son, Peter Beckford, was the famous sportsman and Master of Fox Hounds, author of Thoughts on Hunting. He was M.P. for Morpeth and died in 1811, and was buried at Stepleton. His descendant, William Horace Beckford, succeeded to the title of Lord Rivers and in 1888, the trustees of the fourth Lord Rivers sold Shillingstone to the late Viscount Portman.
1 The Beckfords are mentioned as merchants in Pepys' Diary