1681-2. Mar. 16. Charles, son of Mr. Nicholas Trotman. Affidavit of burial in sheepswool only, sworn March 17 by Hester Purnell and Elizabeth Atwood before, Mr. Edward Towgood, minister of Dursley. 1682. Sep. 1. Deborah Trotman. Affidavit of burial in 1683. June 17. Mary Trotman, widow. Affidavit of burial 1685. July 12. 1689. June 10. Dec. 23. 1693. July 5. 1700. Apr. 14. 1702. Dec. 8. 1705. July 2. 1706-7 Jan. 22. Daniel Trotman, churchwarden, [? buried]. Mrs. Anne, wife of Mr. Nicholas Trotman. [End of first volume of the register.] A Notes about Dursley. CCORDING to the return of Endowed Charities issued by the House of Commons in 1868, there is at Dursley a charity consisting of tenements and stock producing together £23 16 3, which is known by the name of "Finnimore and Hevens." Mr. Blunt, in his Dursley, further refers to it, and states that it was the gift of Richard Fynnimore and Thomas Heven, that the original deed was lost in the seventeenth century, but that a new one of Charles the Second's reign was preserved in the parish chest. There is no doubt that this statement in a material particular is incorrect. Fynnimore and Heven were not the donors, but merely the surviving trustees, who on the 4th September, 27 Henry VIII., 1536, conveyed the property, a certain messuage in Silver Street, Dursley, to new feoffees. They, in conjunction with others, had obtained the property by a feofment dated 20th June, 10 Henry VIII., 1495, from Richard Yate and Thomas Withyford. We are at present unable to say if Yate and Withyford were the original donors; probably like Fynnimore and Heven, they were merely the surviving feoffees or trustees. The appointment of new feoffees by Fynnimore and Heven is still extant, and by the kindness of Messrs. Vizard, Wenden & Son, we are able to give a copy of this deed. As giving the boundaries of the property, and as supplying the names of some of the leading inhabitants of Dursley in the reign of Henry VIII., it will be of some interest to the reader. Christi fidelibus ad quos presens scriptum pervenerit Ricardus Fynymore et Thomas Hevyn de Dursley in comitatu Gloucestrie clothiers Salutem Sciatis quod nos prefatos Ricardum Fynymore et Thomam Hevyn tradidisse feoffasse et hoc presenti scripto nostro liberasse et dimisisse Thome Presy Ballivo ae Durseley predicta Augustino Fynch Thome Smallwoode Johanni Hoskyns seniori Edmundo Wulworthe Johanni Dery Willelmo Hevyn Thome Hyll seniori Nicholao Galon Willelmo Attwoode Thome Fynche Thome Polle Johanni Hyll Thome Hyll juniori Robert Fy'more Thomas Fy'mor' Johanni Smalwoode Ricardo Dery Nicholao Trottman Johanni Lewys Willelmo Dery Thome Attwoode Willelmo Thomas Johanni Hoskyns juniori Nicholao Davyes Augustino Davyes Thome Wulworth Johanni Fynch et Johanni Watkyns unum Burgagium situatum in Burgo ville de Durseley predicta in comitatu predicto cum Gardino eidem adjacenti prout ibidem in quodam vico ducenti versus Woodmancoote in longitudini inter tenementum Nicholai Wykys armigeri ex una parte et tenementum in quo Johannes Heysooke modo inhabitat ex altera parte Quod latitudine extendit se a predicto vico anterius versus cimiterium ecclesie parochiane ibidem posterius quod quidem tenementum sive burgagium et gardinum cum omnibus suis pertinentiis nos prefati Ricardus Fynymore et Thomas Hevyn simul cum Georgio Davyes Johanne Davyes filio Willelmi Davyes Thoma Davys juniori, Thoma Austeyn, Thoma Trolley, Ricardo Sprott, Johanne Lewys, Willelmo Austeyn, Willelmo Sprott, Ricardo Samforde, Johanne Sherman, Johanne Harmer, Helia Trottman, Willelmo Parker, Johanne Stynchcombe, Roberto Bertelet, Johanni Payne, Thoma Stynchcombe, Edmundo Gybbys, Johanne Sprott, Roberto Pacy, Johanne Gennyver et David Williams modo defunctis inter alia nuper habuimus ex dono et feoffamento Ricardi Yate et Thome Withyford generosorum prout per quandam cartam corum nobis inde confectam cujus datum est apud Durseley predictam vicesimo die junii anno regni regis Henrici Septimo post conquestum decimo plenius appareat Habendum et Tenendum predictum Burgagium et Gardinum cum omnibus suis pertinentiis prefatis Thome Presye Augustino Fynch Thome Smallwoode Johanni Hoskyns Edo' Wulworth Johanni Dery Willelmo Hevyn Thome Hyll....Galon Willelmo Attwoode Thome Fynch Thome Polle Johanni Hyll Thome Hyll Roberto Fy'mor' Thome Fynymor❜ Johanni Smalwood Ricardo Dery Nicholao Trottman Johanni Lewys Willelmo Dery Thome Attwoode Wilielmo Thomas Johanni Hoskyns Nicholao Davyes Augustino Davyes Thome Wolworth Johanni Fynch et Thome Watkyns heredibus et assignatis suis imperpetuum Reddendo inde annuatim capitalibus dominis feodi illius duodecim denarios argenteos et tolecestriam servicium ibidum vocatum Tolleale secundum consuetudinem Burgi predicti tollecestriam servicie ecclesiastice vocatam the churchalle omnimodo exceptis et reservatis pro omni servicio exactionibus et demandis Sciatis insuper nos predicti Ricardus Fynymor' et Thomas Hevyn attornasse et in loco nostro posuisse dilectos nobis in Christo Robertum Thomas et Thomam Mayhowe de Durseley predicta nostro veros et legitimos attornatos conjunctim et divisim ad intrandum vice et nomine nobis in predictum Burgagium cum pertinentiis ad possessionem inde Capiendam et post possessionem sic inde captam et habitam deinde plenam et pacificam possessionem et seisinam eorundem predictis Thome Presye Augustino Fynch Thome Smalwoode Johanni Hoskyns Edo' Walworth Johanni Dery Willelmo Herrym Thome Hyll.... Galon Willelmo Atwoode Thome Fynch Thome Polle Johanni Hyll Thome Hyll Roberto Fy'mor' Thome Fynymor' Johanni Smalwood Ricardo Dery Nicholao Trottman Johanni Lewys Willelmo Thomas Johanni Hoskyns Nicholao Davyes Augustino Davys Thome Wulworth Johanni Fynch et Thome Watkyns vel eorum unum in hac parte secundum vim formam et effectum hujus presentis carte nostre inde confecte ratifacte et grate habentes et habituri totum et quicquid iidem attornati nostri fecerint seu alter eorum fecerit in premissis vel aliquo premissorum In cujus rei testimonium huic presenti carte nostre Sigilla nostra apposuimus Datum quarto die Septembris anno regni regis Henrici Octavi vicesimo septimo. NOTE.-Two seals have been appended, but both are now lost. The Father of Robert Fitz Harding. We reprint from Notes and Queries, 5th series, xii., 362, the following article on the ancestry of the Berkeley family. Robert fitz Harding of Bristol was one of those pre-eminent local men who leave behind them a name which will deservedly last as long as the town they benefited. Moreover, Robert was the founder of the only baronial family of the middle ages which has preserved its direct main line down to the present day without one instance of reversion to a distant collateral. From Robert downwards very few families have been so minutely and accurately recorded, but about Robert's father, Harding, everything seems uncertain. The canons of the abbey, founded by Robert, discovered long after that Harding was "son of a king of Denmark," a statement as vague as it is improbable. Smyth, the family historian, says Harding died Nov. 5, about 1115, and that his wife, Robert's mother, bore the unusual name of Lividia. Smyth, and more minutely, Seyer (Memoirs of Bristol, vol. i. ch. iv.), investigated the question of his identity with "Harding, son of Ednoth the staller," and Harding, son of Elnod, presumed to be the same, which Dr. Freeman admits Norm. Cong., iv. p. 757). According to Smyth, Harding was provost of Bristow, and had other sons besides Robert, named Nicholas, Elias, Maurice, and Jordan. About Nicholas he apparently knew nothing. Yet it seems clear to me he was the Nicholas fitz Harding, who besides holding a knight's fee of the old feoffment of the honour of Gloucester, in 1166 held two knights' fees in capite in Somerset, and describes in his return the subfeoffments made in the reign of Henry I. by his father, whose son and heir he, of course, was. No one has yet attempted to identify him or his lands, but he certainly was the ancestor of the family of de Meriet, and as certainly his father was the "Harding, son of Alnod," who at the date of Domesday Book (1086), was holding Meriet, Lopen, and four other manors in Somerset. When, in 1166, Nicholas made the return concerning his military tenure, he must have been about seventysix, which would accord very well with his being the eldest brother of Robert of Bristol. Robert named one of his sons Nicholas, and that Alnod or Elnod was also Robert's grandfather there is this interesting confirmation. Some of Alnod's lands in Dorsetshire had been acquired by Hugh, Earl of Chester, among them Fifehide (Magdalen), which, long after Robert fitz Harding and his suzerain Ranulf, Earl of Chester, gave to the abbey of St. Augustine at Bristol. Earl Hugh had also in Dorset three manors which had been Elnod's, but I think -the reasons are too long to give here-that Harding, son of Ednoth, was rather uncle of "Harding, son of Alnod," than one and the same, being a generation earlier, having held lands in Somerset even in the reign of Edward the Confessor. Elias, son of Harding, was probably the Elias de Bevington in Berkeley who had a son Maurice. Maurice, son of Harding, was the first of this favourite Christian name with the Berkeleys, and may have been a godson of the Bishop of London. Jordan, another brother of Robert fitz Harding, mentioned by Smyth, was in all likelihood the father of those three brothers called "de la Warr," viz., Jordan, David (of Bristol), and Arthur, who witnessed, as nephews, charters of their uncle Robert. I think it very probable their father got his name from living in that vicus or street at Bristol called "the Weir," from its proximity to the dam of the mills on the river Frome immediately beneath the castle walls. He was undoubtedly progenitor of the baronial family of "De la Warr," though it is not certain whether he was brother or brother-in-law of Robert fitz Harding. An old Tobacco Song.-The following quaint versestraditional in our parish-may perhaps be deemed worthy of preservation. I first heard them at the choir supper on New Year's Eve, 1888, from the lips of the late Mr. Joseph Grindon, "cordwainer" of this place. He was for 46 years parish clerk, and one of the last survivals of the ancient style of that order. As sung in all seriousness to a weird sort of chant by our good old friend, long "churchwarden clay" in hand, and with appropriate gesture, this seemed to be nothing less than an ideal song for a man of his calling. The not obscure allusion to the doctrine of Purgatory in verse 4 would appear to demand for this composition at least a respectable antiquity. Tobacco is an Indian weed: Grows up i' the morn, cut down at eve; Then it shews our decay, that we first came from clay; |