Katherine Deighton's New Royal Ancestry
Douglas Richardson
The ongoing valuable thread concerning the U.S. Presidential
candidates brought my attention to the fact that John Kerry, a leading
contender for the Democratic party nomination, is descended from
Katherine Deighton, 2nd wife of Governor Thomas Dudley of
Massachusetts.
The following new royal descent traces Katherine Deighton's ancestry
back to King Edward III of England. This descent goes back through
her Stradling-Beaufort ancestry, which connection was previously
thought to be invalid, but which recent research has determined to be
sound. For further particulars on this new line, please see my
forthcoming book, Plantagenet Ancestry.
For interest sake, I've listed below the names of the colonial
immigrants who share this descent from King Edward III of England:
1. Barbara Aubrey.
2. Frances, Jane & Katherine Deighton.
3. Edward Foliot.
4. Thomas Ligon.
Best always, Douglas Richardson, Salt Lake City, Utah
E-mail: royala...@msn.com
- - - - - - - - - -
KATHERINE DEIGHTON'S NEW ROYAL DESCENT FROM KING EDWARD III OF
ENGLAND.
1. Edward III, King of England, died 1377.
2. John of Gaunt, K.G., Duke of Aquitaine and Lancaster, married (3rd)
Katherine de Roet (or Ruet).
3. Henry Beaufort, Cardinal of England, by a mistress, Alice Arundel
(descendant of King Edward I).
4. Joan Beaufort, married Edward Stradling, Knt., of St. Donat's,
Glamorgan.
5. Katherine Stradling, married Maurice Dennis, Esq., of Olveston and
Earthcott, Gloucestershire.
6. Walter Dennis, Knt., of Olveston, Gloucestershire, married Agnes
Danvers.
7. William Dennis, Knt., of Dirham, Gloucestershire, married Anne
Berkeley (descendant of King Edward I).
8. Isabel Dennis, married John Berkeley, Knt., of Stoke Gifford,
Gloucestershire (descendant of King John).
9. Elizabeth Berkeley, married Henry Ligon, of Upton St. Leonard's,
Gloucester, Gloucestershire (descendant of King Edward I).
10. Elizabeth (or Isabel) Ligon, married Edward Basset, Gent., of
Uley, Gloucestershire.
11. Jane Basset, married John Deighton, Gent., of St. Nicholas,
Gloucester, Gloucestershire, surgeon.
12. Katherine Deighton, baptized at St. Nicholas, Gloucester,
Gloucestershire 16 Jan. 1614/5. She married (1st) Samuel Hackburne
(or Hagborne); (2nd) Gov. Thomas Dudley; (3rd) Rev. John Allin.
marshall kirk
intriguing! I remember encountering the published Stradling/Beaufort
disconnect and thinking, "Well, [expletive deleted]!" Perhaps I
should have looked carefully at the evidence before pitching the line
out the window. If I've learned anything (and I have, I have ...),
it's the general applicability of the Russian proverb: 'Your own eye
is the best spy.' (As applied here: look at the evidence and judge it
yourself.)
My appetite for _PA_ is whetted ...
Regards,
MK
P.S.: And after _PA_, it'll be Settipani's turn! We've been awaiting
the *deuxieme partie* of _Capetiens_ for, what, a decade now?
royala...@msn.com (Douglas Richardson) wrote in message news:<5cf47a19.0401...@posting.google.com>...
Jay
Big problem here. while Edward Stradling married Joan Beaufort, the
evidence I have seen shows Katherine not to be the daughter of Joan,
but rather an illegitimate daughter of Edward. This matter was
discussed earlier on the list, if you want to check out the debate. I
am wondering how this link was validated and Katherine shown to be
legit??? Anybody know?
Douglas Richardson
Dear Jay ~
It is difficult to discuss an issue unless the specifics are on the
table in full view. Please cite your alleged evidence, or re-post the
pertinent parts of the previous discussion from the newsgroup
archives. If you are citing actual evidence, please provide your
source(s) for the information. Thanks!
Nathaniel Taylor
royala...@msn.com (Douglas Richardson) wrote:
Dear Douglas ~
It is difficult to discuss an issue unless the specifics are on the
table in full view. Please cite your alleged evidence.
In starting this thread *yourself* you cited 'recent research' which
(you imply) overturns the status quo and proves Katherine Deighton to be
a legitimate daughter of Edward Stradling and Joan Beaufort, contra what
appears in Roberts RD500, which is essentially that, since she was not
proved to be Beaufort's daughter in sources available to him, and since
there are known to be illegitimate children of Edward Stradling, then
the formerly published line could not be trusted.
If you are citing actual evidence, please provide your source(s) for
your information.
That is, don't just crassly hawk your book like a wiener in the
bleachers. If you would like to make an issue of this descent on
s.g.m., please be prepared to cite real information--in this case the
document that proves the maternity of Katherine Stradling. And, by the
way, whose research was it that uncovered it? You didn't say in the
initial post.
Thanks!
Nat Taylor
Louise Staley
Amongst others on the topic of Katherine Stradling and her likely
illegitimacy:
On 30 June 1999 Bill Reitwiesner wrote:
The line doesn't appear to be correct. Sir Edward Stradling (generation 4)
had a number of illegitimate children, apparently including Catherine
(generation 5). Sir Edward's wife was Jane Beaufort, by whom he had one
son, Sir Henry Stradling, but the other children ascribed to Sir Edward do
not appear to by Jane. See Gary Boyd Roberts, *Royal Descents of 500
Immigrants* [1993], p. 204, and sources cited there.
On 4 Nov 1999 Kotilar wrote:
A Katherine Stradling who is listed as his daughter (possibly illegitimate)
married a Morris Dennis. The reference given is the Royal Descents of 500
Emigrants by Gary Boyd
Roberts page 204 (1993 edition).
On 3 Sep 2002 John Higgins wrote:
Gary Boyd Roberts in RD500 indicates that Katharine Stradling was probably
an illegitimate daughter of Sir Edward and not by his wife Jane Beaufort.
It appears all references to this come from RD 500 which I don't have
access to. It would seem that the place to start would be Gary Boyd Roberts
sources for p204 and a check of the new RD 600 to see if the same claim is
still made.
Louise
> > Douglas Richardson wrote:
> >
> > Dear Jay ~
> >
> > It is difficult to discuss an issue unless the specifics are on the
> > table in full view. Please cite your alleged evidence, or re-post the
> > pertinent parts of the previous discussion from the newsgroup
> > archives. If you are citing actual evidence, please provide your
> > source(s) for the information. Thanks!
>
> Nathaniel Taylor wrote
> Dear Douglas ~
>
> It is difficult to discuss an issue unless the specifics are on the
> table in full view. Please cite your alleged evidence.
>
> In starting this thread *yourself* you cited 'recent research' which
> (you imply) overturns the status quo and proves Katherine Deighton to be
> a legitimate daughter of Edward Stradling and Joan Beaufort, contra what
> appears in Roberts RD500, which is essentially that, since she was not
> proved to be Beaufort's daughter in sources available to him, and since
> there are known to be illegitimate children of Edward Stradling, then
> the formerly published line could not be trusted.
>
> If you are citing actual evidence, please provide your source(s) for
> your information.
>
<snip>
>
> Nat Taylor
Doug McDonald
>
> On 30 June 1999 Bill Reitwiesner wrote:
> The line doesn't appear to be correct. Sir Edward Stradling (generation 4)
> had a number of illegitimate children, apparently including Catherine
> (generation 5). Sir Edward's wife was Jane Beaufort, by whom he had one
> son, Sir Henry Stradling, but the other children ascribed to Sir Edward do
> not appear to by Jane. See Gary Boyd Roberts, *Royal Descents of 500
> Immigrants* [1993], p. 204, and sources cited there.
>
> On 3 Sep 2002 John Higgins wrote:
> Gary Boyd Roberts in RD500 indicates that Katharine Stradling was probably
> an illegitimate daughter of Sir Edward and not by his wife Jane Beaufort.
>
> It appears all references to this come from RD 500 which I don't have
> access to. It would seem that the place to start would be Gary Boyd Roberts
> sources for p204 and a check of the new RD 600 to see if the same claim is
> still made.
No, on p. 259 of RD600 she is listed as "probably (but not
certainly)
legitimate".
ref is M&G p 435(Stradling) this is G. T., Clark, Limbus
Patrum Morganiae and Glamorganiae (1886)
Doug
marshall kirk
position on this filiation in _RD600_, calling it "probable." Since I
haven't yet got my copy, I can't vouch for that, but I'd be surprised
if both my informants had read GBR awrong. (Have been trying to get
him on the phone this morning, but no dice.)
Has any evidence (that Sir Edward sowed wild oats, and that some of
the damned things are definitely known to have come up) in fact been
adduced and discussed here that *isn't* referred to in _RD500_? I
didn't see any in the course of a quick scan from about 1996 onward
*sub* keywords STRADLING and ILLEGITIMATE -- but a quick scan's only
that.
"Louise Staley" <car...@bigpond.com.au> wrote in message news:<PdoSb.34301$Wa....@news-server.bigpond.net.au>...
Douglas Richardson
>
> Amongst others on the topic of Katherine Stradling and her likely
> illegitimacy:
>
> On 30 June 1999 Bill Reitwiesner wrote:
> The line doesn't appear to be correct. Sir Edward Stradling (generation 4)
> had a number of illegitimate children, apparently including Catherine
> (generation 5). Sir Edward's wife was Jane Beaufort, by whom he had one
> son, Sir Henry Stradling, but the other children ascribed to Sir Edward do
> not appear to by Jane. See Gary Boyd Roberts, *Royal Descents of 500
> Immigrants* [1993], p. 204, and sources cited there.
>
> On 4 Nov 1999 Kotilar wrote:
> A Katherine Stradling who is listed as his daughter (possibly illegitimate)
> married a Morris Dennis. The reference given is the Royal Descents of 500
> Emigrants by Gary Boyd
> Roberts page 204 (1993 edition).
>
> On 3 Sep 2002 John Higgins wrote:
> Gary Boyd Roberts in RD500 indicates that Katharine Stradling was probably
> an illegitimate daughter of Sir Edward and not by his wife Jane Beaufort.
>
> It appears all references to this come from RD 500 which I don't have
> access to. It would seem that the place to start would be Gary Boyd Roberts
> sources for p204 and a check of the new RD 600 to see if the same claim is
> still made.
>
> Louise
Dear Louise ~
Thank you for your post. You're entirely correct. All references to
Katherine (Stradling) Dennis being illegitimate come solely from Gary
Boyd Roberts' RD 500 book.
Perhaps Bill Reitwiesner who first posted regarding this matter would
be willing to post a summary of Gary's evidence for us.
Jay
> table in full view. Please cite your alleged evidence, or re-post the
> pertinent parts of the previous discussion from the newsgroup
> archives. If you are citing actual evidence, please provide your
> source(s) for the information. Thanks!
I can appreciate that Douglas. Some have already been listed by
others since you posted this and I will try and see what I can find in
addition. It may indeed be that this line was not properly
invalidated, and that would be of course exciting news for me as I
connect to this through the Ligons and would gain a whole bunch of new
ancestors. I will endeavor to post all the challenges to this line I
can find for your benefit, it may be you have already seen them all
and they don't represent any new information respective to the line
you have worked out, but just in case I will see what I can find.
Jay
Peter Stewart
> All references to Katherine (Stradling) Dennis being
> illegitimate come solely from Gary Boyd Roberts' RD 500 book.
>
> Perhaps Bill Reitwiesner who first posted regarding this matter would
> be willing to post a summary of Gary's evidence for us.
>
> Best always, Douglas Richardson, Salt Lake City, Utah
This blatant attempt to side-step will surely convince at least some of
the few remaining admirers of Richardson that he does not deserve their
loyalty.
It was Richardson himself who purported to be on top of the evidence,
including new research on which William Reitwiesner has had nothing to say.
On 24 January in starting this thread Richardson wrote:
"This descent goes back through her Stradling-Beaufort ancestry, which
connection was previously thought to be invalid, but which recent
research has determined to be sound."
Unless he already knew the contrary evidence behind the view put by Gary
Boyd Roberts in RD500, how could a genealogist worth tuppence have made
this statement? And if he knew it, why not summarise it for us himself
instead of bothering Mr Reitwiesner? Or if he didn't & doesn't know it,
why not confess his foolish talking out of turn?
The embarrassment of Richardson's claque is exemplified by the absurd
position of Marshall Kirk: on 26 January he was willingly taken in by
Richardson's lightest word, writing:
"If I've learned anything (and I have, I have ...), it's the general
applicability of the Russian proverb: 'Your own eye is the best spy.'
(As applied here: look at the evidence and judge it yourself.)"
Yet apparently he hasn't spied any evidence at all. Today he writes,
pitifully:
"Has any evidence (that Sir Edward sowed wild oats, and that some of
the damned things are definitely known to have come up) in fact been
adduced and discussed here that *isn't* referred to in _RD500_?"
So now Marshall Kirk is publicly learning something else - that the
unsupported word of Richardson is not fit to trust _at any time on any
medieval or genealogical matter whatsoever_.
Peter Stewart
Jay
my notes. I thought someone had posted ( or perhaps emailed me) about
a problem in her being Joan Beaufort's daughter because of something
to do with wills and/or inheritence but coulsn't find the source.
Does anybody recall such an issue???
what I found so far:
From a post by Brad Verity:
Luckliy, though, I found a 1994 book "Conquerors and Conquered in
Medieval Wales" by Welsh medieval historian R. A. Griffiths, who has a
chapter 'The Rise of the Stradlings of St Donat's':
"Born in 1389, Sir Edward Stradling married Jane, the illegitimate
daughter of Henry Beaufort (later bishop of Winchester and cardinal),
a great-uncle of Henry VI and leader of one of the factions in the
young king's Council. At Agincourt in 1415 he had fought in the
retinue of Duke Humphrey of Gloucester, a brother of Henry V and,
later, Beaufort's principal antagonist. But his marriage about 1423
brought Sir Edward into the political orbit of his shrewd and
assertive father-in-law, and to the bishop he may have owed his
appointment as chamberlain of south Wales in December 1423, a position
he held until March 1437."
In footnotes, Griffiths cites among his sources for the above:
1) DWB, p. 925
2) J. Nichols (ed.), "A Collection of Royal Wills" (1780), p.329
3) K.B. McFarlane, 'At the Death-bed of Cardinal Beaufort', "Studies
in Medieval History presented to F.M. Powicke" (Oxford, 1948), p. 425
n.5
So, Jane as illegitimate daughter of Cardinal Beaufort appears to be
confirmed (I ordered from the Reserve Library the 1988 biography of
the Cardinal and will check it tomorrow), but so far no mention of
Alice, lady of Powis as her mother.
According to Griffiths, Jane and Sir Edward Stradling had three sons,
1) Henry "born in 1423 and married to a sister of Sir William Herbert,
later earl of Pembroke"; 2) John Stradling, who "entered the Church
and became archdeacon of Llandaff in 1448; but he too may have
deserted Wales, acquiring the rectory of North Tawton in the diocese
of Exeter in 1454"; and 3) David Stradling, the youngest, who "lived
in Somerset, where he kept close to his mother's apron-strings."
from Leo van de Pas
Cahiers de Saint Louis (page 875) with sources
Dictionary of Welsh Biography
G.T.Clark "Genealogies of the Older Families of Glamorgan" 1886
J.E.Griffith "Pedigrees of Anglesey and Carnarvonshire Families 1914
Henry Beaufort, Bishop of Lincoln and Winchester
1375-1447
had an illegitimate daughter
Joan Beaufort
married Edward Stradling (died 5 May 1453)
they had three children
Sir Henry
John, a priest
David (unmarried)
but a clarification of:
Dear Benjamin,
In Cahiers de Saint Louis (page 977) it gives that Anne Berkeley
married
(the widower of Edith Twinihoe) William Dennis/Denis, son of Walter
and
Agnes Davers(! Sic)
On page 875 it gives Joan Beaufort and Sir Edward Stradling had,
AMONGST
OTHERS [emphasis mine] , three sons, Henry, John (priest) and David
(who remained unmarried).
Do you have a source that makes Catherine Stradling one of those
"other
children"?
Best wishes
Leo van de Pas
PS. Cahiers de Saint Louis, at the end of each chapter, has a long
list of
sources.
The Complete Peerage
Burke's Peerage
Burke's Landed Gentry
The Visitations of Somerset 1623
The Visitations of Hereford 1569
The Visitations of Gloucestershire 1623
Wiltshire Visitation Pedigrees, 1623
Visitations of Kent, 1530-1,1574,1592
Visitations of Norfolk, 1563,1589,1613
T.George, De Georges, Pedigrees and History of the Families George and
Gorges, 1903
R.Gorges, The Story of a family through Eleven Centuries, Boston,1944
H.A.Wyndham, A Family History, the Wyndhams of Norfolk and Somerset,
1939
J.Collinson, A History of Somerset, 1791
G.T.Clark, Limbus Patrum Morganiae et Clamorganiae, London, 1886
J.Smyth, Lives of the Berkeleys
Miscellanea Genealogica et Heraldica, IX 5th series, pages 162-166
Burke's Peerage, 1938 Edition
Sir Bernard Burke, dormant, abeyant, forfeyted and extinct peerages,
London,
1866
Genealogisches Handbuch des Adels, Fuerstliche Haeuser 1964
and 'other sources'
marshall kirk
speak for him *vis-a-vis* his one-eighty on Katherine Stradling's
legitimacy. Although he was highly specific, I'll leave it to Doug,
who has been the prime mover in this rehabilitation, to fill in the
details.
In essence, Gary says that for _RD500_, he concluded that Katherine
was "probably illegitimate" essentially because he'd identified a "Sir
Edward Stradling" -- said in secondary sources to have had a slew of
bastards -- as 'our' Sir Edward. In fact, he says, this was really
our Sir Edward's great-grandson and namesake; an observation called to
his attention by Doug, with whom he now fully agrees. This markedly
undercuts the evidence that the Sir Edward who married the daughter of
Henry Cardinal Beaufort had illegitimate children, and with it, the
probability that Katherine was among them. Furthermore, he says, Doug
called to his attention circumstantial evidence bearing on Katherine's
legitimacy that he finds strongly suggestive; and there are relevant
considerations of chronology, as well. (Again, I'll leave it to Doug
to deal with these matters in detail, as I'd be *ultra vires* to
comment further.) In sum, he now -- in _RD600_ -- considers Katherine
Stradling's filiation from Joan Beaufort "probable."
I don't offer this as a summary of my own opinion, and in fact I
haven't got one to offer, save to observe that the evidence and
reasoning I've seen to date look pretty good. If there are
counterevidences to set against this proposed line, I'm sure we'd all
be ready to consider them.
On a marginally related matter -- some of my posts may duplicate
information already presented. This is because I view *via* Google,
which imposes a delay of 3 to 9 hours on what I see. Sorry for any
unnecessary rehash.
--mk
"Louise Staley" <car...@bigpond.com.au> wrote in message news:<PdoSb.34301$Wa....@news-server.bigpond.net.au>...
Peter Stewart
Is this supposed to be what in Australia we call a leg-pull? If so, you
will have to do better: the fact that Gary Boyd Roberts may have
mistaken one Edward Stradling for another is _not_ evidence for
Katherine's legitimacy.
If you want some other considerations, for a start she isn't listed as
daughter of Sir Edward Stradling in Peter Bartrum's _Welsh Genealogies_,
or in G.T. Clark's _Limbus patrum Morganić et Glamorganić, Being the
Genealogies of the Older Families of the Lordships of Morgan and
Glamorgan_. The visitation of Gloucester which presents the Dennis
lineage, as I am reliably informed, states only that she was daughter of
Edward, without giving her mother.
Why should anyone assume on second-hand "circumstantial" grounds that
Katherine must be, by default, legitimate - when her father not
improbably behaved like so many other Marcher lords who had children by
concubines and treated them quite handsomely? Or why should anyone
assume that Sir Edward could not have married more than once, given the
very scant information we have of him?
Evidence is either direct, recorded by a source that can be evaluated,
or indirect, in which case rigorous logic needs to be applied rather
than passing on an account of chatter between two people with books to sell.
Chronological evidence isn't very promising - a normally potent father
can sire an illegitimate child, or two, on the same day as a legitimate one.
Peter Stewart
Brad Verity
> back to King Edward III of England. This descent goes back through
> her Stradling-Beaufort ancestry, which connection was previously
> thought to be invalid, but which recent research has determined to be
> sound. For further particulars on this new line, please see my
> forthcoming book, Plantagenet Ancestry.
Douglas,
As Marshall Cook has now shown, this is rather underhanded. Newsgroup
members who wish to know particulars of this "recent research" which
"has determined to be sound" need to buy your yet-to-be-published book
(which, according to one of your articles in the latest Foundation for
Medieval Genealogy Journal, you expect to be available for shipping
sometime in April 2004 - a date I've yet to see announced on the
newsgroup, though I've been on a break from it the past two weeks).
When asked for particulars on this recent research, you've basically
played dumb, though we now find out from Marshall that you were the
one pushing for the legitimacy of Katherine Stradling, wife of Maurice
Dennis, from the get-go - enough to have Gary Boyd Roberts alter his
conclusion for RD600.
I'm not sure why you went through the whole 'naive' act when asked
directly what your evidence is, but if it's an attempt to entice more
folks to buy the as yet unpublished PA3, please simply say so directly
"If you want further particulars, buy my book."
Louise, Jay and others went through the trouble of trying to engage a
newsgroup discussion on a subject you introduced, and may have been
spared the effort had they known from the beginning the whole topic
was another plug for PA3.
> KATHERINE DEIGHTON'S NEW ROYAL DESCENT FROM KING EDWARD III OF
> ENGLAND.
>
> 1. Edward III, King of England, died 1377.
>
> 2. John of Gaunt, K.G., Duke of Aquitaine and Lancaster, married (3rd)
> Katherine de Roet (or Ruet).
>
> 3. Henry Beaufort, Cardinal of England, by a mistress, Alice Arundel
> (descendant of King Edward I).
I did a lot of research last year on the topic of Henry Beaufort's
alleged affair with Alice Fitzalan/Arundel, wife of John, Lord
Cherleton of Powis. Research that determined there is absolutely no
contemporary evidence from the late 14th or 15th centuries that has
surfaced to date to indicate that the Alice Fitzalan/Arundel in
question had an affair with Henry Beaufort or was the mother of his
illegitimate daughter Jane. Indeed her chronology basically rules out
such an affair and daughter.
The first recorded mention of an Alice Arundel as the mother of Jane,
wife of Edward Stradling, does not occur until the reign of Elizabeth
I. And the vagueness of that ascription of maternity led some
subsequent genealogists and historians to conclude the mother was
Alice, widow of Thomas Holland, Earl of Kent, rather than her niece
that you name above.
You're of course welcome to disagree with my conclusion that the
mistress of Cardinal Beaufort who was mother to Jane is far from
positively identified, but unless there's other "recent research" that
you've uncovered and are saving for the publication of PA3, I don't
know what causes you to so certainly identify Jane Stradling's mother.
> 4. Joan Beaufort, married Edward Stradling, Knt., of St. Donat's,
> Glamorgan.
>
> 5. Katherine Stradling, married Maurice Dennis, Esq., of Olveston and
> Earthcott, Gloucestershire.
FWIW, historian R. A. Griffiths, in his article 'The Rise of the
Stradlings of St. Donats' in his 1994 book "Conquerors and Conquered
in Medieval Wales", mentions only three sons for Edward Stradling and
Jane Beaufort. I would think if the evidence was more than
circumstantial that Katherine Dennis was their daughter, she would've
merited a mention.
I've not delved into the Dennis family in any detail so I'm not
certain what evidence exists at all to make Maurice's wife Katherine a
Stradling. But I do know from researching the Henry Beaufort/Alice
Fitzalan alleged affair that 'evidence' which 19th-century historians
accepted as sound does not hold up under modern scrutiny, and must be
fact-checked thoroughly.
Cheers, -----Brad
marshall kirk
it sounds to me as though you read me as stating or implying that Gary
changed his position on the Beaufort-Stradling matter merely to oblige
Doug. If you know Gary, you'll admit, I think, that "obliging" isn't
the first adjective to leap to mind when one assesses him. (Nor are
"pliant," "malleable," or "Trilbyesque.") If I was in fact ambiguous
in my report, let me disambiguate: Gary was at pains to make it clear
that, *after careful and cautious consideration of Doug's evidence and
arguments*, he concluded that he had probably been wrong in _RD500_,
and that Doug is probably right.
Unlike Bartholomew Cubbins, I'm wearing only one hat here: my
reporter's hat. (A slouchy sort of thing with no particular shape.)
--Marshall Kirk (*alias* "Cook," apparently)
P.S.: in a way, I find all this rather funny. Had I in fact been
part of some scheme to promote _PA3_ -- which, as I myself am fairly
obstinate, is laughable to anyone who knows me -- I nevertheless
couldn't have done half so effective a job as the people inveighing
against it. Indeed, I think they've done him yeoman service in
calling attention to his work. As Oscar Wilde said, "The only thing
worse than being talked about is NOT being talked about."
P.P.S.: But not funny enough to go on reading this thread. I'd
appreciate it if someone, perhaps Don or Brice or Nat, would forward
to me copies of any relevant and substantive evidence or arguments,
con or pro.
bat...@hotmail.com (Brad Verity) wrote in message news:<8ed1b63.04013...@posting.google.com>...
Kelsey J. Williams
<snip>
>
> I've not delved into the Dennis family in any detail so I'm not
> certain what evidence exists at all to make Maurice's wife Katherine a
> Stradling. But I do know from researching the Henry Beaufort/Alice
> Fitzalan alleged affair that 'evidence' which 19th-century historians
> accepted as sound does not hold up under modern scrutiny, and must be
> fact-checked thoroughly.
>
> Cheers, -----Brad
Hello,
The evidence for this marriage may be from the Harleian Society
edition of the 1623 Visitation of Gloucestershire which states on p.
50 that "Morrys Dennys" married "Katherine d. of Sr Edward Stradling
K. 1 wiffe" and "Alice d. of Nicholas Pointz 2 wiffe". See:
http://www.uk-genealogy.org.uk/england/Gloucestershire/visitations/p60.html
Sincerely,
Kelsey J. Williams
Jay
>
> I did a lot of research last year on the topic of Henry Beaufort's
> alleged affair with Alice Fitzalan/Arundel, wife of John, Lord
> Cherleton of Powis. Research that determined there is absolutely no
> contemporary evidence from the late 14th or 15th centuries that has
> surfaced to date to indicate that the Alice Fitzalan/Arundel in
> question had an affair with Henry Beaufort or was the mother of his
> illegitimate daughter Jane. Indeed her chronology basically rules out
> such an affair and daughter.
>
> The first recorded mention of an Alice Arundel as the mother of Jane,
> wife of Edward Stradling, does not occur until the reign of Elizabeth
> I. And the vagueness of that ascription of maternity led some
> subsequent genealogists and historians to conclude the mother was
> Alice, widow of Thomas Holland, Earl of Kent, rather than her niece
> that you name above.
So there is evidence that the mother was named Alice?
> > 5. Katherine Stradling, married Maurice Dennis, Esq., of Olveston and
> > Earthcott, Gloucestershire.
>
> FWIW, historian R. A. Griffiths, in his article 'The Rise of the
> Stradlings of St. Donats' in his 1994 book "Conquerors and Conquered
> in Medieval Wales", mentions only three sons for Edward Stradling and
> Jane Beaufort. I would think if the evidence was more than
> circumstantial that Katherine Dennis was their daughter, she would've
> merited a mention.
>
> I've not delved into the Dennis family in any detail so I'm not
> certain what evidence exists at all to make Maurice's wife Katherine a
> Stradling. But I do know from researching the Henry Beaufort/Alice
> Fitzalan alleged affair that 'evidence' which 19th-century historians
> accepted as sound does not hold up under modern scrutiny, and must be
> fact-checked thoroughly.
I confess that my only source on the Dennis-Stradling marriage was
The Royal Descents of 500 Immigrants to the Amer. Colonies, by Gary
Boyd Roberts, so I cannot answer to primary materials on this score.
Perhaps someone else researching this line can help?
-Jay
Tim Powys-Lybbe
<large snip>
> > 4. Joan Beaufort, married Edward Stradling, Knt., of St. Donat's,
> > Glamorgan.
> >
> > 5. Katherine Stradling, married Maurice Dennis, Esq., of Olveston and
> > Earthcott, Gloucestershire.
>
> FWIW, historian R. A. Griffiths, in his article 'The Rise of the
> Stradlings of St. Donats' in his 1994 book "Conquerors and Conquered
> in Medieval Wales", mentions only three sons for Edward Stradling and
> Jane Beaufort. I would think if the evidence was more than
> circumstantial that Katherine Dennis was their daughter, she would've
> merited a mention.
>
> I've not delved into the Dennis family in any detail so I'm not
> certain what evidence exists at all to make Maurice's wife Katherine a
> Stradling. But I do know from researching the Henry Beaufort/Alice
> Fitzalan alleged affair that 'evidence' which 19th-century historians
> accepted as sound does not hold up under modern scrutiny, and must be
> fact-checked thoroughly.
The only place I've found Katherine Stradling is in the 1623 visitation
of Oxford which gives her, her father and her husband "Morrys Dennys"
(page 50). No sign of her mother.
--
Tim Powys-Lybbe t...@powys.org
For a miscellany of bygones: http://powys.org
Jay
There is an abbreviation of a latinization of a name on that page,
namely Rad'us, what is this the abbreviation of? Is this a latinized
form of Rodney? Thanks for any help.
Jay
Jay
> Douglas Richardson wrote:
> > All references to Katherine (Stradling) Dennis being
> > illegitimate come solely from Gary Boyd Roberts' RD 500 book.
> >
> > Perhaps Bill Reitwiesner who first posted regarding this matter would
> > be willing to post a summary of Gary's evidence for us.
> >
> > Best always, Douglas Richardson, Salt Lake City, Utah
>
> This blatant attempt to side-step will surely convince at least some of
> the few remaining admirers of Richardson that he does not deserve their
> loyalty.
I am so glad you don't believe in judging people Peter. LOL
>
> So now Marshall Kirk is publicly learning something else - that the
> unsupported word of Richardson is not fit to trust _at any time on any
> medieval or genealogical matter whatsoever_.
Gee if this isn't judging people, I would hate to see judging people. LOL
Jay
Jerry W. Murphy
source:
http://searches2.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/ifetch2?/u1/textindices/G/GEN-MEDIEVAL+2002+1521539310592+F
Date: Tue, 3 Sep 2002 16:10:36 -0700
From: "John Higgins" <jthi...@surfree.com>
To: GEN-MED...@rootsweb.com
Message-ID: <000001c2539f$1ca9f100$72d30b3f@com>
Subject: RE: Descent of Thomas Lygon from Edward III?
Content-Type: text/plain;
charset="iso-8859-1"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Gary Boyd Roberts in RD500 indicates that Katharine Stradling was probably
an illegitimate daughter of Sir Edward and not by his wife Jane Beaufort.
John Higgins
jthi...@surfree.com
"Who begot whom is a most amusing kind of hunting" - Horace Walpole
Jerry W. Murphy
jwm_ge...@hotmail.com
> ______________________________
John Higgins
> From: Doug McDonald [mailto:mcdo...@scs.uiuc.edu]
> Sent: Friday, January 30, 2004 6:27 AM
> To: GEN-MED...@rootsweb.com
> Subject: Re: Katherine Deighton's New Royal Ancestry
>
>
I'm looking at a copy of the cited page from G. T. Clark's Limbus Patrium
Morganiae and Glamorganiae. It doesn't mention Catherine Stradling at all,
let alone whther she was legitimate or illegitimate. One could perhaps draw
the conclusion from this that she was not legitimate and therefore not
mentioned, but it would be hard to come to the conclusion from this that she
was legitimate. If Roberts has a reason to support his changed conclusion,
this particular source doesn't support it.
To quote Doug Richardson:
> It is difficult to discuss an issue unless the specifics are on the
> table in full view. Please cite your alleged evidence, or re-post the
> pertinent parts of the previous discussion from the newsgroup
> archives. If you are citing actual evidence, please provide your
> source(s) for the information. Thanks!
The ball's back in your court, Doug....and "see my forthcoming book" is NOT
a collegial answer!!
John Higgins
Gordon Banks
I found an error in his new volume on the descendants of Francis Marbury
and would like to communicate it to him. The one I found at
ix.netcom.com is no longer valid.
Jerry W. Murphy
"Anne Berkeley = Sir William Dennis, son of Walter Dennis (and Agnes
Danvers), son of Morris Dennis and Katherine Stradling, daughter of Sir
Edward Stradling, who had various illegitimate children, probably including
Katherine, but whose wife was Jane Beaufort, SETH, a great-granddaughter of
Edward III, King of England, d. 1377, and Philippa of Hainault."
The only source sited was SETH (See Elsewhere in This Volume) and it
apparently only points to Jane Beaufort's ancestry.
RD500 says Katherine was probably illegitimate which is not conclusive, thus
leaving open a possibility that she was indeed the daughter of Jane/Joan
Beaufort.
I don't have access to RD600 to see if changes were made concerning
Katherine Stradling's lineage.
Jerry W. Murphy
jwm_ge...@hotmail.com
----- Original Message -----
From: "Louise Staley" <car...@bigpond.com.au>
To: <GEN-MED...@rootsweb.com>
Sent: Friday, January 30, 2004 2:03 AM
Subject: Re: Katherine Deighton's New Royal Ancestry
> ______________________________
Richard C. Browning, Jr.
You started this thread with a quote:
"The following new royal descent traces Katherine Deighton's ancestry
back to King Edward III of England. This descent goes back through her
Stradling-Beaufort ancestry, which connection was previously thought to
be invalid, but which recent research has determined to be sound. For
further particulars on this new line, please see my forthcoming book,
Plantagenet Ancestry."
To which Jay [heli...@yahoo.com] answered with:
"Big problem here. while Edward Stradling married Joan Beaufort, the
evidence I have seen shows Katherine not to be the daughter of Joan, but
rather an illegitimate daughter of Edward. This matter was discussed
earlier on the list, if you want to check out the debate. I am wondering
how this link was validated and Katherine shown to be legit??? Anybody
know?"
The crux of this being the question.
"I am wondering how this link was validated and Katherine shown to be
legit???"
Which probably should have been posed as, what new sources have you
found to validate the legitimacy of Kathering?
You, Douglas, then responded with:
"Please cite your alleged evidence, or re-post the pertinent parts of
the previous discussion from the newsgroup archives. If you are citing
actual evidence, please provide your source(s) for the information. "
To which Nathaniel Taylor [nathani...@earthlink.net]pointed out, in
other words, that as you were the one that brought up the new research
disproving current thinking, you were the one required to provide the
supporting sources to the new discovery.
Louise Staley [car...@bigpond.com.au] and Jerry W. Murphy
[jwm_ge...@hotmail.com], among others provided the source for the
original premise to the illegitimacy of Katherine, as being Gary Boyd's
RD500.
And Doug McDonald [mcdo...@scs.uiuc.edu] provided information that
RD600 has now changed this to "probably (but not certainly) legitimate",
and provided Mr. Boyd's reference for this as "M&G p 435(Stradling) this
is G. T., Clark, Limbus Patrum Morganiae and Glamorganiae (1886)".
John Higgins [jhigg...@earthlink.net] researched this source and
provided a summary for the entry on Katherine, or lack thereof, saying
"I'm looking at a copy of the cited page from G. T. Clark's Limbus
Patrium Morganiae and Glamorganiae. It doesn't mention Catherine
Stradling at all, let alone whther she was legitimate or illegitimate.
One could perhaps draw the conclusion from this that she was not
legitimate and therefore not mentioned, but it would be hard to come to
the conclusion from this that she was legitimate. If Roberts has a
reason to support his changed conclusion, this particular source doesn't
support it."
Following this post, in a reply to Louise, you stated:
"Perhaps Bill Reitwiesner who first posted regarding this matter would
be willing to post a summary of Gary's evidence for us."
Why bring Mr. Reitwiesner into this, as the original position of
illegitimacy has been adequately summarized? It is now time for you to
provide your reasoning for the statement that generated this thread, and
I quote again, ".recent research has determined to be sound". Who
performed this research? What sources were used in this research? How
do those sources, support the statement that Katherine was the
legitimate daughter of Edward Stradling and Joan Beaufort?
I repeat John Higgins' closing statement, as I can't think of a better
one
"The ball's back in your court, Doug....and "see my forthcoming book" is
NOT a collegial answer!!", and will add, Douglas take the ball and run
with it!
For now, thank you in advance.
Richard C. Browning, Jr.
Grand Prairie, TX
John Higgins
This is beginning to look more and more like a situation of conjectures (or
guesses) rather than evidence. In fact it looks like the common
genealogical sin of finding a convenient place to attach a person to a
family tree in order to acquire a royal descent.
The ONLY source (that I know of) for Katherine's parentage is the
Gloucestershire visitation cited by Peter Stewart, which calls her daughter
of an Edward (who is said by the editor of the visitation to be "Sir") with
no mother given. It may (or may not) be chronologically convenient for her
to be daughter of the Sir Edward who married Joan Beaufort, but that's a
guess only - certainly not proven so far. And the secondary sources (as
cited by Peter) don't support the conjecture.
And although this Sir Edward may not have been as busy as his great-grandson
Sir Edward who had the "slew of bastards" referenced by Marshall Kirk, he
appears to have pretty active on his own. Clark's pedigree gives him only a
single legitimate child by Joan, but also 6 illegitimate children (4 sons
and 2 daughters - NOT including Katherine). If there's a case for
Katherine's legitimacy, to say nothing of the more basic issue of whether
this couple were her parents, it's yet to be made.
Doug Richardson's report of "recent research" which causes this connection
to be "determined to be sound" nows seems to be based solely on
"circumstantial evidence" which is "strongly suggestive". Standards are
certainly slipping....
This whole discussion sounds eerily like the current uproar in Washington
(and London?) over the Bush administration's use (or misuse) of intelligence
information on weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.
Hal Bradley
Roskell used for his article on Gilbert Denys, however, HOP 2:772 indicates
that Maurice Denys, eldest son of Gilbert Denys by his second marriage, "was
granted in wardship to Edward Stradling, esquire (the husband of Bishop
Beaufort's bastard)." Evidently, Edward then arranged the marriage between
his daughter and his ward, Maurice Denys. Roskell's sources may shed more
light on this. I do not recall if he directly addresses the issue of
legitimacy, but I had the impression that Katherine Stradling was the
daughter of Joan Beaufort.
IIRC, Roy Denning, in his The Story of St. Donat's Castle and Atlantic
College, cited an article in Morgannwg, 7(1963): 15-47 showing the evidence
for the alleged relationship. However, I was unable to find a copy of this
article in either the FHL in SL City or the library at UCLA in Southern
California, so have not had a chance to follow up. If anyone has access to
this article, it might provide the evidence needed to solve the problem. It
may be available at the Cardiff Central Library.
Memorials of the Danvers Family may also have references to original
sources. IIRC, Katherine, wife of Maurice Denys, is asserted to be the
daughter of Sir Edward Stradling. Again, I do not believe the issue of
legitimacy is addressed.
Hal Bradley
-----Original Message-----
From: Tim Powys-Lybbe [mailto:t...@powys.org]
Sent: Saturday, January 31, 2004 10:23 AM
To: GEN-MED...@rootsweb.com
Subject: Re: Katherine Deighton's New Royal Ancestry
Peter Stewart
This is part of a snow-storm of rubbish that is descending on SGM today,
including yet another staggeringly idiotic post in the series from
Robert Todd.
Do these people all think we are stupid enough to be diverted from
Richardson's latest gaffe by this ploy?
Judging people's moral character & worth as human beings on the one
hand, and assessing someone's abilites & worth as a self-proclaimed
scholar on the other, are quite distinct, as anyone with a grain of
intelligence would recognise. Jay, however, wishes us all to see that he
does not.
Richardson is a mere gleaner of cropped & winnowed grain, like Gary Boyd
Roberts. The idea that either of these, or both in gabbling collusion,
could settle a matter of legitimacy where there appears to be no primary
evidence (of which neither of them could make head or tail anyway) is
ludicrous. If they are right, it will be by chance and not from the
application of judicious & informed scholarship - and it will need to be
proved by someone else with a more sound preparation for this kind of
research.
Marshall Kirk is patently learning the Richardson technique of covering
any difficulty with smarmy, self-serving blather. No-one is taken in:
attention to Richardson's book is not at issue, and he can be counted on
to take care of that himself anyway - he has even, disgracefully,
insinuated an advertisement into some gleanings from SGM submitted as
content under his own name to the FMG publication _Foundations_.
The looming problem for this disreputable crew is what is in the book,
and what credibility it carries, not how many copies are sold. Kirk
won't silence critics by pretending that they are helpers in their
campaign to tout the product.
Peter Stewart
D. Spencer Hines
Vide infra pro sapienta.
DSH
"Peter Stewart" <p_m_s...@msn.com> wrote in message
news:SIWSb.37679$Wa.1...@news-server.bigpond.net.au...
richard browning
gateway. I appologize to the memebers of GEN-MED who will see this
twice.
I wrote:
Douglas,
"Perhaps Bill Reitwiesner who first posted regarding this matter would
be willing to post a summary of Gary's evidence for us."
Why bring Mr. Reitwiesner into this, as the original position of
Brad Verity
> it sounds to me as though you read me as stating or implying that Gary
> changed his position on the Beaufort-Stradling matter merely to oblige
> Doug. If you know Gary, you'll admit, I think, that "obliging" isn't
> the first adjective to leap to mind when one assesses him. (Nor are
> "pliant," "malleable," or "Trilbyesque.")
I don't know Gary Boyd Roberts, but I didn't take from your post that
he changed his opinion on Katherine Dennis's maternity merely to
oblige Doug.
What I did get from your post was that it was Doug who brought the new
research to Mr. Roberts that caused him to adjust his conclusion. And
what this means of course is that Doug was not only familiar with the
'recent research' on the topic, since it was he himself who produced
(or at least forwarded) it, but also by implication was familiar with
the research behind the original conclusion that Katherine was Sir
Edward Stradling's illegitimate daughter.
But instead of being forthright about any of this, he played dumb as
it were, and made other newsgroup members take the time and trouble of
combing the newsgroup archives and posting relevant material. His
last word on this topic was simply confirming Louise's observation
that RD500 was the only source discussed in the newsgroup that
mentions Katherine's illegitimacy.
Thanks to your conversation with Mr. Roberts, we know that Doug must
be very familiar with his own and Roberts's sources on Katherine
Stradling. But he didn't discuss those sources - he made others post
evidence and asked for yet more from Bill Reitwiesner instead of
summarizing the arguments for the original conclusion and the new
evidence that adjusted the conclusion.
To me, Doug being an active participant behind the scenes but a
passive one on a topic he initiated is not a straightforward
communication with the newsgroup.
> If I was in fact ambiguous
> in my report, let me disambiguate: Gary was at pains to make it clear
> that, *after careful and cautious consideration of Doug's evidence and
> arguments*, he concluded that he had probably been wrong in _RD500_,
> and that Doug is probably right.
That's fine - I have no knowledge of the sources that led Roberts and
Doug to their conclusion, and to date, neither does the newsgroup.
> Unlike Bartholomew Cubbins, I'm wearing only one hat here: my
> reporter's hat. (A slouchy sort of thing with no particular shape.)
>
> --Marshall Kirk (*alias* "Cook," apparently)
Sorry about your surname mix-up, Marshall. I have a good friend named
Michael Cook.
> P.S.: in a way, I find all this rather funny. Had I in fact been
> part of some scheme to promote _PA3_ -- which, as I myself am fairly
> obstinate, is laughable to anyone who knows me -- I nevertheless
> couldn't have done half so effective a job as the people inveighing
> against it. Indeed, I think they've done him yeoman service in
> calling attention to his work. As Oscar Wilde said, "The only thing
> worse than being talked about is NOT being talked about."
I don't think you're a part of any scheme to promote PA3. As for
calling attention to his work, it's hard to separate Doug from his
forthcoming PA3, since he mentions it in almost every post he makes.
From his apparent reticence to discuss the Katherine Dennis matter in
detail, even when asked to by interested newsgroup members, I've
concluded that his initial post that began this thread was not meant
to share the 'recent research' but merely to announce it, reducing it
to another plug for his book.
> P.P.S.: But not funny enough to go on reading this thread. I'd
> appreciate it if someone, perhaps Don or Brice or Nat, would forward
> to me copies of any relevant and substantive evidence or arguments,
> con or pro.
Tim Powys-Lybbe, Jay, Kelsey Williams and Hal Bradley have all posted
evidence for Katherine Stradling and Morris Dennis, and have cited
sources.
heli...@yahoo.com (Jay) wrote in message news:
> So there is evidence that the mother was named Alice?
Not contemporary (late 14th & 15th century) evidence, Jay. Check out
the thread 'Affair of Alice Fitzalan & Cardinal Henry Beaufort -
Evidence?' in the archives, as it goes into the topic in great detail.
Paul Reed also researched the matter in several 16th century sources
and his findings are posted in the thread 'Richard, 11th Earl of
Arundel & Elizabeth de Bohun - Marriage'.
To summarize - one of the earliest mentions of Alice as the mother of
Joan Stradling was in 1572, as accounted in Llyfr Baglan (The Book of
Baglan). In the 1560s, Sir Edward Stradling (descendant of Edward and
Jane), at the request of William Cecil, set out an account of the
Stradlings with an early history that it turns out is entirely
fictional. Apparently he is the earliest known source for Jane
Stradling's mother being Alice, one of the daughters of the Earl of
Arundel.
Not very reliable - especially when fact checked with surviving
contemporary records from the 14th & 15th centuries.
hw.br...@verizon.net ("Hal Bradley") wrote in message news:
> I do not have the article in front of me so do not recall the sources
> Roskell used for his article on Gilbert Denys, however, HOP 2:772 indicates
> that Maurice Denys, eldest son of Gilbert Denys by his second marriage, "was
> granted in wardship to Edward Stradling, esquire (the husband of Bishop
> Beaufort's bastard)." Evidently, Edward then arranged the marriage between
> his daughter and his ward, Maurice Denys. Roskell's sources may shed more
> light on this. I do not recall if he directly addresses the issue of
> legitimacy, but I had the impression that Katherine Stradling was the
> daughter of Joan Beaufort.
This is great, Hal.
HOP then seems like the best place to start, and the source it used to
determine that Maurice Denys was made a ward of Edward Stradling can
be tracked down, probably along with other 15th century sources on the
Stradlings and Denyses that may shed further light.
Maurice being a ward of Sir Edward Stradling is actually strong
corroboration that his wife Katherine was Sir Edward's daughter, as
the 1623 Visitations of Oxford and Gloucestershire set forth. The
Denyses also seem to be of sufficient status (Gilbert was an MP - were
they tenants-in-chief?) to suggest that Katherine was a legitimate as
opposed to a bastard daughter, though it's curious that the 1623
Visitations did not emphasize her Beaufort ancestry, if so.
Cheers, --------Brad
Loomis McPhee
Your problem contacting him may have to do with the fact his name is Marston
Watson, not Marsden. He is currently a director of the (U.S.) National
Societies of Royal and Noble Ancestry. You may consider trying to forward your
message to him through that organization's contact email:
Hope that helps.
Michael Marston
Jay
us have current access to (i.e. through the group).
1. Edward Stradling married Joan Beaufort
2. Looks like there is reasonable evidence that Katherine Stradling
was a daughter of Edward Stradling, but as yet no evidence presented
yet making a strong case as to who her mother was. I don't think it
can be said that she was illegitimate, legitimate by Joan, or
legitimate by another wife at this point given what has been given on
the group.
3. Maurice Dennys married Katherine Stradling
4. The mother of Joan Beaufort is uncertain
So the descent through Joan Beaufort to Edward III (as far as the
discussion on the group is concerned) seems possible but as yet
unproven.
Doug McDonald
>
>
> And Doug McDonald [mcdo...@scs.uiuc.edu] provided information that
> RD600 has now changed this to "probably (but not certainly)
> legitimate",
> and provided Mr. Boyd's reference for this as "M&G p 435(Stradling)
> this
> is G. T., Clark, Limbus Patrum Morganiae and Glamorganiae (1886)".
That's not quite correct. i.e. neither the atribution that
I SAID that GBR's reference was that piece or that that piece
was the reference.
What I am saying in the above sentence is that while GBR clearly
says that reference concersn Stradling, he could possible have meant
that
the actual piece of info necessary to prove her legitimacy was
elsewhere. This is a failing of his book, passim. He lumps
references
at the end and has no indication at each person in the
lineage which reference or references are used. Sure, he does
indicate names on some references, but not all references and
not all names.
Theoretically you need to look at all the list of references!
This post is mainly a criticism of RD600.
Doug
Richard C. Browning, Jr.
Doug,
I apologize if I misrepresented what you meant in your post concerning
the change from RD500 to RD600, but the format of your post made this
interpretation very easy to reach. Not having used RD500 as a
reference, I do not have any basis to evaluate Boyd's method of
referencing, and understood that you considered this to be the
appropriate one, since it was the only one you provided.
Again, I apologize for misunderstanding.
Jay
line, whether it holds up over time or not is irrelevant as folks
bring up possible lines all the time and new evidences come forward.
It has certainly been of interest to me, and I have picked up some
information and some ancestors I didn't know about irrespective of
whether Joan was mother of Katherine.
Douglas has always been very nice to me and answered many questions I
have put to him. He has been cordial, and I do not mind if he markets
his book, clearly this group is a target audience for a book limited
to folks interested in genealogy.
I do not pay attention to the squabbles other folks have with Douglas.
If people have critiques of a particular line Douglas presents, that
is of interest to me and others of the group, but they can do so
without assaults on him as an individual. Some folks have a history
with Douglas but it isn't really relevant to the topic at hand, he has
ever been pleasant to me, so I will remain cordial to him. That
doesn't mean I take everything he writes as revealed truths, but then
again he has never expected me to. Debate and presentation of
counter evidences is it seems an integral part of the genealogical
process.
I pay attention to the various counter evidences and on occassion
they have indicated that Douglas has been in error. That seems true
of every genealogist and genealogical work, including the cp, which is
why corrections are issued. I think perhaps the tone of the
criticisms of his work (i.e. personal attacks included) might yield
the difference between a cordial response from him and otherwise.
Sometimes when there is a lack of response, we must factor in that
this group yields a good deal of posts and not all can be read.
So Douglas is not unique in offering up on occassion lines on the
group that have some error. I have offered lines up for critical
review and it is of great help to learn where I am in error. There
are many folks on the group who have studied lines that I am
interested in great detail and have knowledge of primary and secondary
sources far in excess of mine. Others are conversant with languages
(particularly medieval forms of languages) that I do not know, or do
not know well enough for particular problems, and their translations
have been invaluable. I appreciate everybody who has been kind
enough to point out particular sources and problems with materials I
have found. Douglas has been one of those many individuals who has
kindly shared information with me. If you don't like him, that is your
business, but do not expect those who have always had pleasant
correspondence with him to share your unkind opinions.
-Jay
Douglas Richardson
Below please find the information you requested on the Beaufort,
Stradling, and Dennis families. This information is taken straight
from the manuscript of my forthcoming book, Plantaganet Ancestry,
which should be available for shipping in or before April 2004. If
anyone has any questions about ordering a copy of the book, they may
contact me at my e-mail address below.
Best always, Douglas Richardson, Salt Lake City, Utah
E-mail: royala...@msn.com
9. HENRY BEAUFORT, Bishop of Lincoln, Lord Chancellor of England,
Cardinal Bishop of Winchester, Cardinal-Priest of the titular church
of St. Eusebius (commonly called Cardinal of England), Privy
Councillor, illegitimate son, born about 1375. He rented rooms in
Peterhouse, Cambridge 1388-9, and occupied the ‘alta camera' in
Queen's College, Oxford in 1390-3. He was appointed Canon of Lincoln,
1389, Canon of York, 1390, Dean of Wells, 1396, and Canon of
Salisbury, 1397. He had one illegitimate daughter, Joan, by a
mistress, ALICE ARUNDEL, which Alice was afterwards wife of John
Cherleton, 4th Lord Cherleton of Powis (died 19 Oct. 1401), and
daughter of Richard de Arundel, K.G., 11th Earl of Arundel, 10th Earl
of Surrey (descendant of King Henry III), by Elizabeth, daughter of
William de Bohun, Earl of Northampton (grandson of King Edward I) [see
FITZ ALAN 11.iii for her ancestry]. Henry was legitimated with the
assent of Parliament by letters patent dated 9 Feb. 1396/7. He
obtained a M.A. degree by 1397, and was ordained deacon 7 April 1397.
In 1397 he was elected Chancellor of Oxford University, and, in 1398,
he was chosen Bishop of Lincoln by papal provision in 1398. On his
half-brother, Henry's accession to the throne as King Henry IV, he
took a leading part in upholding the new dynasty. He celebrated the
marriage of King Henry IV and Joan of Navarre in 1403 in Winchester
Cathedral. He served as Lord Chancellor of England in 1403-1405,
1413-1417, and 1424-1426. He accompanied King Richard II on his
expedition to Ireland in 1399. He was elected Bishop of Winchester in
1404. He was appointed executor of the 1409 will of his brother, John
Beaufort, Earl of Somerset. As the crown's most skilled advisor, he
liaised between King and Parliament and was instrumental in securing
the substantial grants of taxes for Henry V's French campaigns. In
1417 he participated in the council of Constance, where he engineered
the election of Pope Martin V. In 1426 he was nominated
Cardinal-priest of San Eusebio by Pope Martin V. In 1427 he was
subsequently appointed papal legate for Germany, Hungary, and Bohemia,
and entrusted with the management of crusading efforts against the
Hussites. In 1429 his unauthorized deployment of papal troops in
defense of Paris ruined his prospects at the Curia. He accompanied
King Henry VI to France in 1430. He attended Parliament in Jan. 1431,
then crossed to France for the trial of Joan of Arc. In 1431
proceedings of præmunire and treason were levied against him in
England for his attempt to purchase an exemption from the jurisdiction
of Canterbury. He crowned Henry VI in Paris as King of France 17 Dec.
1431. In 1432 he was exonerated from the treason charge and the
præmunire proceedings were dropped. In the early years of the reign
of Henry VI, he served as informal president of the council and
principal financier of the war. His loans to the Crown totalling
£212,303, representing the same money lent repeatedly, bought royal
favors, most notably the right to buy royal lands for his Beaufort
nephews and endow his almshouse at Winchester. HENRY BEAUFORT,
Cardinal of England, died testate at Wolvesey Palace, Winchester 11
April 1447, and was buried in the chantry-chapel in the retro-choir in
Winchester Cathedral.
References:
T. Rymer, Fœdera 7 (1728): 849-850; 11 (1727): 22-24, 42, 55, 76
(instances of Henry styled "uncle" [avunculo] by King Henry VI of
England). J. Nichols, Coll. of All the Wills (1780): 120-144,
321-344. G. Baker Hist. & Antiq. of Northampton 1 (1822–1830): 54-56.
N.H. Nicolas, Testamenta Vetusta 1 (1826): 174, 249-255. J.
Dallaway, Hist. of the Western Div. of Sussex 2 Pt. 1 (1832): 134.
Coll. Top. et Gen. 6 (1840): 20, footnote f ["Vincent says she (Alice
Arundel) was married to Cardinal (Henry) Beaufort, before he was in
orders, and had a daughter, Jane, married to Sir Edward Stradling
(Vinc. upon Brooke: 27), and, quotes as his authority, Dr. Powell's
treatise of the Conquest of Glamorganshire…. In the pedigrees of
Stradling (Vinc. Chaos: 118, and Le Neve's Baronets i: 5.) Sir Edward
Stradling is said to marry Jane, daughter of Henry Beaufort, where
Alice Fitzalan is given to the Cardinal as a wife. Sandford and Le
Neve style her base daughter"). C. Munro, Letters of Queen Margaret
of Anjou & Bishop Beckington (Camden Soc. 86) (1863): 48–52 (Cardinal
Beaufort styled "cousin" c. 1433/5 by E.L.B., "a noble Lorde"). T.
Wright, Feudal Manuals of English Hist. (1872). Misc. Gen. et
Heraldica 3rd Ser. 4 (1902): 16-21 (Wynston pedigree: "Henry Beauford
ye Cardinall tooke to wife Alice daughter to Richard Earle of
Arundell"). C.P.R. 1401-1405 (1905): 123, 254, 462 (instances of
Henry styled "king's brother"). List of Inqs. ad Quod Damnum 2 (PRO
Lists and Indexes 22) (1906): 750, 752, 753. Cal. of the Mss. of the
Dean and Chapter of Wells 1 (Hist. Mss. Comm. 12B) (1907): 461.
D.N.B. 2 (1908): 41–48 ("Beaufort was ambitious, haughty, and
impetuous… seems to have clung unduly to his office as trustee of the
family estates of the House of Lancaster, which must have given him
command of a considerable sum of money… His speeches in parliament are
marked by a constitutional desire to uphold the crown by the advice
and support of the estates of the realm… Family relationships gave him
a place in Europe such as was held by no other statesman, and made him
the fittest representative of his country abroad"). C.P. 3 (1913):
161 (sub Cherleton); 12 Pt. 1 (1953): 39–41 (sub Somerset); 14 (1998):
39 (citing R.W. Hunt et al., Studies in Medieval Hist. Presented to F.
M. Powicke (1948): 425, note 5). A.S. Cook, Chaucerian Papers I
(Trans. Connecticut Academy of Arts & Sciences 23) (1919): 44-63
(cites letter dated c. 1420 written by Henry Beaufort mentions his
"cousin Chaucer" [i.e., Thomas Chaucer]. Papal Regs.: Letters 11
(1921): 669; 13 Pt. 1 (1955): 52–53. V.H.H. Green, The Later
Plantagenets (1955): 301-312. TAG 32 (1956): 9-23. A.B. Emden, Biog.
Reg. of the Univ. of Oxford 1 (1957): 139-142 (biog. of Henry
Beaufort). Coat of Arms 7 (1962): 122-127 (arms of Henry Beaufort:
Quarterly France modern and England, a bordure gobony argent and azure
charged in centre chief with a mitre gold). D.C. Douglas, English
Hist. Docs. 4 (1327–1485) (1969): 169. English Hist. Rev. 88 (1973):
721–752 ("… a diplomatist of undoubted skill"). G. Paget, Lineage &
Anc. of Prince Charles 1 (1977): 22-24. K.B. McFarlane, England in
the 15th Cent. (1981). R.A. Griffiths, Reign of Henry VI (1981). D.
Williams, England in the 15th Cent. (1987): 111-127. G.L. Harriss,
Cardinal Beaufort (1988). M.A. Hicks, Who's Who in Late Medieval
England (1991): 244-246 (biog. of Henry Beaufort: "… the greatest
royal creditor of the fifteenth century… he ran his diocese
competently, crusaded against heresy, refounded the great almshouse at
St. Cross at Winchester, attended General Councils of the Church, and
visited Jerusalem and Santiago… an able administrator, diplomat and
councillor of great value"). S. Saygin, Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester
(1390-1447) and the Italian Humanists (2002).
10. JOAN BEAUFORT, illegitimate daughter, born before 4 March 1392.
She married EDWARD STRADLING, Knt., of St. Donat's, Hawey, Coyty,
etc., Glamorgan, Wales, and Halsway and Comb Hay, Somerset, king's
knight, chamberlain and receiver of South Wales, Sheriff of cos.
Somerset and Dorset, 1424, steward and receiver of Cantreselly and
Penkelly, keeper of Carmarthenshire and Cardiganshire, Constable of
Taunton, Knight of the Sepulchre, son and heir of William Stradling,
Knt., of St. Donat's, Glamorgan, by Isabel, daughter and heiress of
John Saint Barbe, of South Brent, Somerset. He was born about 1389
(aged 22 in 1411). They had three sons, Henry, Knt., John (clerk)
[Archdeacon of Llandaff], and David, and one daughter, Katherine. He
was heir in 1411 to his great-uncle, Lawrence de Berkerolles, Knt., by
which he inherited the manors of East Orchard, Llanphey, and Merthyr
Mawr, Glamorgan. He fought at the Battle of Agincourt in 1415 in the
retinue of Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester. He and his wife, Joan,
obtained a papal indult for a portable altar in 1423. Joan was a
legatee in the 1447 will of her father, Cardinal Henry Beaufort, who
bequeathed her "two dozen dishes, four chargers, salt cellars, etc., &
c li. in gold." She was living in 1451/2. SIR EDWARD STRADLING died
at Jerusalem shortly before 27 June 1452. [Note: It is commonly
assumed that Joan Beaufort was born out of wedlock c. 1402 following
the death of her mother Alice Arundel's husband, John Cherleton, in
1401 (see, for example, K.B. McFarlane England in the Fifteenth
Century (1981): 135, footnote 113; G.L. Harriss Cardinal Beaufort
(1988): 16). The Wynston pedigree cited below and Vincent upon
Brooke: 27 both assert Joan was born before her father, Henry
Beaufort, took holy orders. If correct, then Joan was presumably born
before 4 March 1392, when her mother, Alice, was known to be the wife
of John Cherleton, 4th Lord Cherleton (see McFarlane, ibid., pg. 135;
C.P. 3 (1913): 161 (sub Cherleton) and before 7 April 1397 when
Cardinal Beaufort took deacon's orders (see Harriss, ibid., pg. 8)].
References:
T. Carte, Cat. des Rolles Gascons, Normans et François Conservés dans
les Archives de la Tour de Londres 2 (1743): 326 (not seen). N.H.
Nicolas, Testamenta Vetusta 1 (1826): 249-255. M.A. Tierney, Hist. &
Antiq. of the Castle and Town of Arundel (1834): 192-193 (not seen).
J.M. Traherne, Stradling Correspondence (1840): xvii–xx (not seen).
H. Chitting, Vis. of Gloucester 1623 (H.S.P. 21) (1885): 49-52 (Dennis
pedigree). Report on the Mss. of the Wells Cathedral (Hist. Mss.
Comm. 12A) (1885): 159. G.T. Clark, Limbus Patrum Morganiæ et
Glamorganiæ (1886): 433-439 (sub Stradling). List of Sheriffs for
England & Wales (PRO Lists & Indexes 9) (1898): 123. Misc. Gen. et
Heraldica 3rd Ser. 4 (1902): 16-21 (Wynston pedigree: "Sr Edward
Stradling Kt Lord of St Donatts maried = Jane daughter to Henry
Beauford the Cardinall but she was borne before he tooke orders.").
Papal Regs.: Letters 7 (1906): 300. E. Green, Feet of Fines for
Somerset 3 (Somerset Rec. Soc. 22) (1906): 56. Cal. of the Mss. of
the Dean and Chapter of Wells 1 (Hist. Mss. Comm. 12B) (1907): 324; 2
(1914): 623, 665-666. J. Williams, Llyfr Baglan (1910): 149
(Stradling pedigree: "Sir Edward Stradling ma. Jane, da. to Henrie
Bewford"). G.L. Clark, Cartæ et Alia Munimenta de Glamorgancia 4
(1910): 1466-1469, 1492, 1536-1537, 1541-1542, 1580-1585; 5 (1910):
1635. T. Beckington, Reg. of Thomas Bekyngton Bishop of Bath & Wells
1443-1465 1 (Somerset Rec. Soc. 49) (1934): 44-45. T.A. Glenn, Fam.
of Griffith (1934): chart opp. 221. C.F.R. 1422-1430 (1935): 88, 100,
122. C.F.R. 1437–1445 (1937): 99. C.F.R. 1452-1461 (1939): 3. TAG
32 (1956): 9-23. Dict. Welsh Biog. (1959): 925–927 (sub Stradling
family). Morgannwg 7 (1963): 15-47. K.B. McFarlane, England in the
15th Cent. (1981): 135, footnote 113. R. Denning, The Story of St.
Donat's Castle and Atlantic College (1983) (Edward Stradling: "… An
able, ambitious and in the main fortunate man"). P.C. Bartrum, Welsh
Gens. 1400–1500 10 (1983): 1621-1623 (Stradling pedigree: "Sir Edward
[Stradling] l[iving] 1412–51 = Jane f. Henry Beaufort (afterwards
Cardinal)"). G.L. Harriss, Cardinal Beaufort (1988): 16, 120, 271,
362, 380. Stradling online resource:
http://www.stradling.org.uk/docs/Donatfam.htm.
11. KATHERINE STRADLING, married (as his 1st wife) MAURICE DENNIS (or
DENYS), Esq., of Olveston and Earthcott, Gloucestershire, Sheriff of
Gloucestershire, 1461, son and heir of Gilbert Dennis, Knt., of
Siston, Gloucestershire, Knight of the Shire for Gloucestershire,
Sheriff of Gloucestershire, by his 2nd wife, Margaret, elder daughter
of Maurice Russell, Knt. He was born about 1410 (aged 12 in 1422).
They had two sons, Walter, Knt., and John. On his father's death in
1422, Maurice's wardship was granted to Edward Stradling, Knt. (his
future father-in-law). He was granted seisin of his father's lands 20
Nov. 1431. He married (2nd) before 1 Nov. 1437 (date of settlement)
Alice Poyntz, daughter of Nicholas Poyntz, Esq., of Iron Acton,
Gloucestershire. They had three sons, Hugh, Maurice, and Francis, and
four daughters, Isabel (wife of Reyborne Mathew), Jane, Emme, and
Alice. MAURICE DENNIS, Esq., was living in 1466. He was buried at
Olveston, Gloucestershire. His wife, Alice, was living in 1473.
References:
H. Chitty, Vis. of Gloucester 1623 (H.S.P. 21) (1885): 49-52 (Dennis
pedigree: "Morrys Dennys [1] = Katherine d. of [Sr] Edward Stradling
[K. 1 wiffe], [2] = Alice d. of Nicholas Poyntz [2 wiffe].") (Dennis
arms: Gules, a bend engrailed azure between two leopards' faces
jessant de lis or), 128-129 (Poyntz pedigree: "Alice [Poyntz] ux.
Morris Dennis."). G.T. Clark, Limbus Patrum Morganiæ et Glamorganiæ
(1886): 381–382 (sub Dennis), 433–439 (sub Stradling). C.P.R.
1461–1467 (1897): 531. Trans. Bristol & Gloucs. Arch. Soc. 12 (1887):
326-327; 23 (1900): 64-65. List of Sheriffs for England & Wales (PRO
Lists & Indexes 9) (1898): 50. Desc. Cat. of Ancient Deeds 4 (1902):
291. List of Early Chancery Procs. 2 (PRO Lists and Indexes 16)
(1903): 1. C.P.R. 1436-1441 (1907): 120. C.C.R. 1429-1435 (1933):
137–138. C.F.R. 1413-1422 (1934): 100, 441–442. C.C.R. 1468–1476
(1953): 305. J.S. Roskell, House of Commons 1386-1421 2 (1992):
771–772 (biog. of Sir Gilbert Denys). G.B. Roberts, Royal Descents of
500 Immigrants (1993): 204-206 (erroneous identification of Katherine
Stradling's parentage).
12. WALTER DENNIS (or DENYS), Knt., of Olveston, Aust, Dirham, and
Siston, Gloucestershire, and Kingston Russell, Dorset, Escheator of
Gloucestershire, 1457, Sheriff of Gloucestershire, 1479, 1493, son and
heir by his father's 1st marriage. He married (1st) _____ FIENNES,
daughter of _____ Fiennes, Lord Dacre of the South. They had no
issue. He married (2nd) before 1467 AGNES DANVERS, daughter and
co-heiress of Robert Danvers, Knt., of Ipwell, Oxfordshire, Chief
Justice of the Common Pleas, by his 1st wife, Agnes, daughter of
Richard Delabar, Knt. She was born about 1445 (aged 22 in 1467).
They had three sons, William, Knt., Richard, and John, and three
daughters, Anne, Jane, and Katherine. He married (3rd) AGNES MYNNS.
They had no issue. He married (4th) before 10 Nov. 1503 ALICE WALWYN,
widow of Thomas Baynham, Esq. (died 16 Feb. 1499/1500), and daughter
of William Walwyn. They had no issue. SIR WALTER DENNIS died 1 Sept.
1505, and was buried at Olveston, Gloucestershire. His widow, Alice,
died 22 Oct. 1518.
References:
W. Harvey et al., Vis. of Oxford 1566, 1574 & 1634 (H.S.P. 5) (1871):
187 (Danvers pedigree). H. Chitty, Vis. of Gloucester 1623 (H.S.P.
21) (1885): 49-52 (Dennis pedigree: "Sr Walter Dennys [K.] [1] = .…
da. to …. ffines L. Dacres of the South 1 wiffe – Harl. 1041], [2] =
Agnes d. and co-heire of Sr Robert Davers [K. Judge of the Comon place
– Harl. 1041], [3] = Agnes Mynns 3 wiffe – Harl. 1041, [4] = Alice d.
of …. Baynham [4 wiffe].") (Danvers arms: Argent, on a bend gules
three martlets or). G.T. Clark, Limbus Patrum Morganiæ et Glamorganiæ
(1886): 381-382 (sub Dennis). F.N.Macnamara, Memorials of the Danvers
Family (1895): 102-116, 122. List of Sheriffs for England & Wales
(PRO Lists & Indexes 9) (1898): 50. Trans. Bristol & Gloucs. Arch.
Soc. 23 (1900): 64-65. List of Early Chancery Procs. 3 (PRO Lists and
Indexes 20) (1906): 180. Cal. IPMs Henry VII 2 (1915): 442-443.
Misc. Gen. et Heraldica 5th Ser. 6 (1926-1928): 288-290. List of
Escheators for England & Wales (List & Index Soc. 72) (1971): 55.
richard....@direcway.com (richard browning) wrote in message news:<27058bd4.0401...@posting.google.com>...
Nathaniel Taylor
royala...@msn.com (Douglas Richardson) wrote:
<dump of MS from PA on Beaufort - Stradling - Dennys>
Thank you for posting your MS draft. But of course in this form it is
inadequate to properly convey the genealogical argument which is
necessary to support the contention in your original post on this
subject. Can you, in fact, make such an argument for the list?
That is, is there anything among the voluminous citations in your MS
passage that strengthens the (vague) statement of the 1623 Visitation of
Gloucester that Katherine, wife of Morris Dennis, was daughter of one
Edward Stradling? Specifically, can you write a concise, supported
argument as to why she must be a daughter of Sir Edward Stradling and
Jane Beaufort, dau. of Cardinal Henry Beaufort?
Nat Taylor
Richard C. Browning, Jr.
> To: GEN-MED...@rootsweb.com
> Subject: Re: Katherine Deighton's New Royal Ancestry
>
>
>
Douglas,
Thank you for posting this. It gives something more for us to analysize
than the original statement, and definitly is a better advertisement
than the previous attempts to call attention to you forthcoming book. I
was extremely worried how you were going to present your references.
Thank you again
Brad Verity
of his sources from his PA3 manuscript, I'll split it into three
posts.
The Dennys family of Gloucestershire is a fairly difficult family to
research, as there has been no modern study of them outside of the
articles on the MP family members in HOP. They - rather surprisingly
- even seem to have been passed over by Victorian-era antiquarians.
Unlike the closely-related Poyntz family of Iron Acton, there was no
study of this family published in the late-19th century.
We are left with the Rolls series and whatever other miscellaneous
original documents have survived in various Gloucestershire Record
Offices. Douglas Richardson has done a decent job of combing through
the Rolls for Dennys references, but an inspection of the sources he
cites as evidence after his potted biography of Katherine Stradling
and Maurice Dennys in his PA3 manuscript, shows there is no 15th
century evidence at all for the marriage, and only indirect evidence
from the Rolls that Maurice even had a wife prior to Alice Poyntz.
royala...@msn.com (Douglas Richardson) wrote in message news:
> 11. KATHERINE STRADLING, married (as his 1st wife) MAURICE DENNIS (or
> DENYS), Esq., of Olveston and Earthcott, Gloucestershire, Sheriff of
> Gloucestershire, 1461, son and heir of Gilbert Dennis, Knt., of
> Siston, Gloucestershire, Knight of the Shire for Gloucestershire,
> Sheriff of Gloucestershire, by his 2nd wife, Margaret, elder daughter
> of Maurice Russell, Knt. He was born about 1410 (aged 12 in 1422).
> They had two sons, Walter, Knt., and John. On his father's death in
> 1422, Maurice's wardship was granted to Edward Stradling, Knt. (his
> future father-in-law). He was granted seisin of his father's lands 20
> Nov. 1431. He married (2nd) before 1 Nov. 1437 (date of settlement)
> Alice Poyntz, daughter of Nicholas Poyntz, Esq., of Iron Acton,
> Gloucestershire. They had three sons, Hugh, Maurice, and Francis, and
> four daughters, Isabel (wife of Reyborne Mathew), Jane, Emme, and
> Alice. MAURICE DENNIS, Esq., was living in 1466. He was buried at
> Olveston, Gloucestershire. His wife, Alice, was living in 1473.
>
> References:
> H. Chitty, Vis. of Gloucester 1623 (H.S.P. 21) (1885): 49-52 (Dennis
> pedigree: "Morrys Dennys [1] = Katherine d. of [Sr] Edward Stradling
> [K. 1 wiffe], [2] = Alice d. of Nicholas Poyntz [2 wiffe].") (Dennis
> arms: Gules, a bend engrailed azure between two leopards' faces
> jessant de lis or), 128-129 (Poyntz pedigree: "Alice [Poyntz] ux.
> Morris Dennis.").
The Dennys pedigree from the 1623 Visitation of Gloucester can be
found online at the link provided by Kelsey Williams earlier in this
thread:
http://www.uk-genealogy.org.uk/england/Gloucestershire/visitations/p60.html
>.T. Clark, Limbus Patrum Morganić et Glamorganić
> (1886): 381?382 (sub Dennis), 433?439 (sub Stradling).
I have not seen this work. According to Peter Stewart's post of
January 30th in this thread, Katherine is not listed as a daughter of
Sir Edward Stradling (presumably in the Stradling pedigree on pp.
433-439). I'd be curious if she is mentioned as wife of Maurice in
the Dennis pedigree on pp. 381-382.
>C.P.R.
> 1461?1467 (1897): 531.
From Patent Rolls: "12 Oct. 1466, Westminster. Licence, for 33s. 4d.
paid in the hanaper, for Maurice Denys, esquire, and Alice his wife to
grant the manors of Alleweston and Erthecote and the hundreds of
Langley and Alleweston, co. Gloucester, held in chief, to Humphrey
Poyntz and Thomas Lymeryk; and for the latter to re-grant the same to
the said Maurice and Alice for life, with remainder to the heirs of
the body of Maurice and final remainder to his right heirs."
The above suggests to me that Maurice did have a first wife who was
the mother of his son Walter Denys, for if Alice was the mother, I
believe the wording would have been 'with remainder to the heirs of
their bodies and final remainder to the right heirs of Maurice.'
> Trans. Bristol & Gloucs. Arch. Soc. 12 (1887):
> 326-327; 23 (1900): 64-65.
Newsgroup member Richard Cochran posted the relevant extracts back in
January 2001. He hasn't posted anything in awhile. Mr. Cochran, if
you're still reading the newsgroup, you've done a lot of research on
the Dennyses, and I'd love to hear if you have anything to add.
*****************
Then, Transactions of the Bristol and Gloucestershire Archaeological
Society, vol. 12 (1887), p. 326-327:
OLVESTON CHURCH.
The building is a fine and large structure, but almost everything of
ecclesiological interest has been swept away through successive "
restorations " by well-meaning though ignorant and incompetent people.
It
sadly needs a restoration indeed, in the proper sense of the word. It
consists of a chancel, nave of five bays, north and south aisles, with
a
chapel at the east end of each, and a tower, the basement of which
forms
the choir, the upper part, with the spire that surmounted it, was
destroyed
by lightning in 1604. In the south aisle there is a recessed tomb of
second-pointed work, probably that of a benefactor to the church.
There is
a shield of arms on it, but the stone is so much abraded that the
charges
cannot be defined. Against the east wall of the north chapel is a
brass
commemorating Morys Denys, Esq., son and heir of Sir Gilbert Denys,
Knt.,
Lord of the Manors of Alveston and Irdecote, and, also, of Sir Walter
Denys, Knt., son and heir of the said Morys. The figures are
represented
kneeling, Morys on the dexter side and Sir Walter on the sinister,
both
wear tabards over their armour with their arms thereon. From the mouth
of
the former proceeds a scroll inscribed "unicus et trinus bone Jsu sis
nobis
Jhus,"and another from the mouth of Sir Walter inscribed: "In
trinitate
p'fecta sit nobis requies et eterna vita." And on a label between them
is:
"Miseremini n'ri, miscremini nostri, saltem vos filii et amici nostri,
quia
Manus dominus tetgit nos." [Job. xix. 21]. On the sinister upper
corner are
the arms of Denys: Gu. a bend Eng. ar. betw. 3 leopards' heads jessant
de
lis or, and on the dexter corner the arms of Russell of Dyrham: ar. on
a
chief gu. three bezants.
On a brass plate is the following inscription :
Her lyeth buryed in ye middl of the quere morys denys esquyere sonne
and
heire of Sr Gylbert denys knyght lorde of the manor of Erdecote: and
also
Sr Walter denys knyght sonne and heire to the seid morys denys Esquyer
ye
which Sr Walter denys decessed the the first day of the moneth of
Septembre
in the xxi yere of the reigne of Kyng henry the vii whos soules Jhu
p'don,
Ame. All ye that this rede and see of yor charite saye for their
soules a
pater noster and an ave.
On the tabard of Morys are the following arms : quarterly. 1. Denys.
2,
Russell, as above. 3. lozengy. ar. and az. a chevron gu. Gorges. 4. a
cross moline .... (query). On the tabard of Sir Anthony Denys: Denys
quartering, Russell, Gorges, and 4, ...a chevron... between three
roses ...
? for Danvers. Without the blazon, which does not appear, we are
unable to
assign the fourth quarter in the first shield without greater research
than
we can give it. The arms are thus derived:
Sir Gilbert Denys acquired the Manors of Alveston and Erdoote by the
marriage of his father, William Denys, with Margaret, daughter and
heir of
William Corbett, of Alveston (ob. 2nd Ric. II.) and relict of William
Wroth, who died in the same year. Sir Gilbert succeeded his father in
8th
Ric. II, from whom the manor descended as stated in the inscription.
Sir
Gilbert married Margaret, dau. and coheir of Sir Maurice Russell, of
Dyrham, Knt., whose grandmother was dau. and heir of Sir Ralph Gorges,
Knt. Maurice Denys married twice: first, the dau. of Sir Edward
Stradling,
Knt., and, secondly, Alice, the dau. of Sir Nicholas Poyntz, of Iron
Acton,
Knt., by whom he was the father of Sir Walter, who was four times
married.
His second wife was Agnes, the daughter of Sir Robert Danvers, Justice
of
the Common Pleas, his last wife being Alice. dau. and heir of William
Walwyn, of Bykerton, co. Hereford, and relict of Thomas Baynham, of
Dene,
Constable of St. Briavels Castle in 1483 (ob. 10th Feb. 1499-1500).
Sir
Walter Denys died 1st Sept. 1505. She survived him, and died 10th Oct.
1518
(Inq. p.m. 10th Henry VIII. No. 1 Exch.). Her monument is at Michel
Dene
Church, together with that of Sir Thomas Baynham's first wife (See
ante
Vol.VI. Pl. VIII.)
*******
In Transactions of the Bristol and Gloucestershire Archaeological
Society, vol. 23 (1900), p. 64-65, there is a description of the
Siston manor:
The manor of Siston was held in 1086 by Roger de Berkeley of Dursley.
Anne
had held it in the time of the Confessor. Robert de Waleran, who
married
Maud, daughter of Ralph Russell of Dyrham, was lord of the manor in
the
time of Henry III. From the Walerans it passed by marriage to the
Plonkenets, who were seized of it till the time of Edward III., when
it was
sold to the Corbets. Sir Gilbert Dennis married Margaret, sister and
heiress of William Corbet, and the Dennises held it till the time of
Elizabeth, when it passed after several sales to the Trotmans. Fiennes
Trotman was lord of the manor in 1803. It is now in the possession of
Major
Fiennes Boughton Newton Dickenson. Henry Billingsley, who held it in
the
time of James I., is said to have entertained Queen Anne of Denmark
here on
the occasion of her visit to Bristol, in 1614.
Siston Court is a fine Tudor house, with a noble front, two wings, and
turrets in the angles. It is said to have been built by the Dennises ;
and
this statement is confirmed by the heraldic shields on the ends of the
wings. Amongst them will be found: (I) Gules, a bend engrailed azure,
between two leopards' faces jessant de lys, for Dennis; (2) Argent, a
raven
sable, within a border of the 2nd bezantee, for Corbet ; (3) Argent,
on a
chief gules three bezants, for Russell; (q) Losengy argent and azure,
a
chevron gules, for Georges; (5) Argent, on a bend three mantlets or,
for
Danvers; (6) Argent four fusils conjoined in fesse, for Newmarch ; and
many
others.
The following sketch pedigree will be a guide to students of the
Dennis
monuments and heraldry:
William Dennis married Margaret, daughter and heiress of Walter
Corbet.
Their son and heir, Sir Gilbert, married Margaret, daughter and
heiress of
Sir Morys Russell of Dyrham, who was heir of the Newmarches and
Gorges.
[Footnote here states: "Sir Gilbert married first Margaret, widow of
William Wyryot, and sister of William Corbet, his second wife being
Margaret Russell. The Heralds' Visitation is not correct. Note by
Mr. T.
S. Bush."] Their son and heir, Morris, married Katherine, daughter of
Sir
Edward Stradling, and had son and heir, Sir Walter, who married
Agnes, daughter and co-heiress of Sir Richard Danvers.
Their son and heir, Sir William, married Anne, daughter of William,
Marquis
Berkeley, and had two sons, the eldest of whom, Sir Morys, died in
1563,
sine prole, leaving his brother, Sir Walter, his heir, then sixty
years of
age. Sir Walter married Margaret, daughter of Sir Richard Weston.
Their
son, Richard Dennis, by his wife Anne, daughter of Sir John St. John,
of
Bletsoe, had son, Walter, who married Margaret Pauncefoot. The manor
had
some years previously passed away from the family.
******
Note that though the above extracts are fine for evidence of where
Maurice Dennys and his son Sir Walter were buried, they are conflicted
as evidence for the line of descent given by Douglas in his PA3
manuscript. The 1887 article says Walter Dennys was the son of
Maurice by his second wife Alice Poyntz, which would of course
eliminate any possible royal connection from the Stradlings.
The 1900 article states that Sir Walter Dennys was the son of Maurice
by first wife Katherine Stradling, but the source for this is clearly
the 1623 Visitation pedigree, since the article incorrectly calls Anne
Berkeley, the wife of Sir William Dennis, the daughter of William,
Marquess of Berkeley, just as the Visitation pedigree does (in
actuality she was his niece).
I'll post the remainder of Douglas's cited sources in a post to
follow.
Cheers, ------Brad
Brad Verity
the sources cited by Douglas Richardson in the potted biography of
Katherine Stradling and Maurice Dennys from his PA3 manuscript.
royala...@msn.com (Douglas Richardson) wrote in message news:
> List of Sheriffs for England & Wales (PRO
> Lists & Indexes 9) (1898): 50.
It's nice to know Maurice Dennys was the Sheriff of Gloucestershire in
1461, but this of course tells us nothing of his wives.
> Desc. Cat. of Ancient Deeds 4 (1902):
> 291.
"Glouc. A. 8322. Feoffment by William Adam son of Adam Buggegode
late of Mourton, co. Gloucester, to Thomas Mulle, lord of Harscombe,
Master John Moreton, parson of the parish church of Cromehale, John
Foort of Thornbury, and Thomas Note of Cowhulle in the said county, of
a messuage with lands, &c. which he lately had by the gift and
feoffment of John Danyell in the town and fields of Mourton aforesaid.
Witnesses:--Maurice Denys and Thomas Poyntz, esquires, John Machon
and others (named). 5 March, 22 Henry VI. Seal, broken."
How the above 1444 feoffment has anything to do with Maurice's
marriages, other than to show he was witnessing deeds with a
brother-in-law, is beyond me.
> List of Early Chancery Procs. 2 (PRO Lists and Indexes 16)
> (1903): 1.
Louise Staley pointed out that the above entry probably refers to the
PRO document:
C 1/38/7 Maurice Denys, esquire, son of Gilbert Denys, knight. v.
John Dalden, clerk, feoffee to uses.: Manors of Siston (Syston) and
Alston, and manor and lordship of Lawrenny.: Gloucester, Pembroke.
1386-1486
Again, nothing to do with either of Maurice's marriages.
> C.P.R. 1436-1441 (1907): 120.
From Patent Rolls: "1 Nov. 1437, Westminster. Licence, for 4 marks
paid in the hanaper, for Maurice Denys to enfeoff John Fort, Simon
Cotesbroke, John Burnell the younger and John Pakker of Irenacton, and
their heirs, of two parts of the manors of Alveston and Erdecote, with
the hundred and view of frankpledge of Langele, co. Gloucester, held
in chief, and of the remainder of the third part of the premises,
likewise held in chief, after the death of Margaret, the wife of John
Kemys, who with her said husband, holds the same in dower. Licence
also for the said feoffees, after having had seisin and received the
attornment of the said John Kemys and Margaret to refeoff the said
Maurice and Alice, his wife, and the heirs of their bodies of the said
two parts, and to grant them the said remainder under the same entail;
with remainder to the right heirs of the said Maurice."
This is an interesting grant - Maurice is taking his paternal
inheritance (except for the manor of Siston, Gloucestershire), and
enfeoffing it jointly on himself, his second wife and their children
together. This may be due to a marriage settlement, as Douglas
indicates in his text, or it may not. Perhaps the decision to make
the enfeoffment was the result of issue born to the couple - there's
not enough evidence from the CPR entry to determine the cause.
Siston and the eventual maternal inheritance (Dyrham, Gloucestershire,
and Kingston Russell, Dorset) is not mentioned, possibly because there
was a son and heir (Walter) from a previous wife to Alice who needed
the bulk of the inheritance. It's also interesting that the 1466 CPR
entry above alters the remainder of this 1437 grant - changing
"Maurice and Alice, his wife, and the heirs of their bodies" to
"Maurice and Alice for life, with remainder to the heirs of the body
of Maurice".
> C.C.R. 1429-1435 (1933):
> 137?138.
From Close Rolls: "20 Nov. 1431, Westminster. To the escheator in
Gloucestershire and the March of Wales adjacent. Order to give
Maurice Denys, son and heir of Gilbert Denys knight, seisin of his
father's lands; as he has proved his age before the escheator, and the
king has taken his fealty, and for 13s. 4d. paid in the hanaper has
respited his homage until Whitsuntide next."
> C.F.R. 1413-1422 (1934): 100, 441?442.
The CFR entry on p. 100 is in regards to lands "held of Isabel wife of
Richard de Bello Campo of Bergavenny, 'chivaler,' as of the lordship
of Kerdyf and the county of Glamorgan by service of a moiety of a
knight's fee." The lands were in the king's hand by reason of the
death of "Laurence Berkkerolles" and the minority of his heir Thomas
de la Beer, who had died 28 Oct. 1414. The entry is dated 16 Jan.
1415, and among the long list of tenants and their holdings are "22s.
3.25d. of rent in Waterton which Gilbert Denys, knight, and others
render yearly for certain messuages, cottages and land which they hold
there" as well as "an annual rent of 2s. 4d. from all the lands
assigned to Edward Stradelyng and John Stradelyng as their pourparty
of the castle, lordship and manor of Coytyff and of the manors of
Neweschastell, Neweland and Lanharry."
Also cited is From Fine Rolls: "17 July 1422, Westminster. Commitment
to Edward Stradlyng, 'chivaler,'--by mainprise of William Oldhalle of
the county of Norfolk and William Stradlyng of the county of
Somerset,--of the keeping of two-thirds of all the lands, and of
two-thirds of the hundred of Langeley, co. Gloucester, late of Gilbert
Denys, 'chivaler,' who held of the king in chief by knight service on
the day of his death, the same being in the king's hand by the death
of Gilbert and by reason of the minority of Maurice his son and heir;
to hold the same from Michaelmas next until the lawful age of the said
heir, and so from heir to heir until one of them shall have attained
full age, rendering the extent thereof, or as much as may be agreed
upon between him and the treasurer, yearly at Easter and Michaelmas
equally, maintaining all houses, enclosures and buildings, and
supporting all other charges incumbent on the said two-thirds of the
lands and hundred aforesaid. By bill of the treasurer."
Note that there is no mention of Sir Edward Stradling being granted
the marriage of the heir (Maurice Dennys) in the above grant.
> C.C.R. 1468?1476
> (1953): 305.
From Close Rolls: "Elisabeth Poynes 'gentilwoman' late of Iron Acton
co. Gloucester, to Henry earl of Essex, and Alice Denys daughter of
the grantor, their executors and assigns. Gift of all her goods and
chattels and of all debts to her due: and she has put them in
possession thereof by delivery of a bowl with silver cover. Dated 20
March, 13 Edward IV. Memorandum of acknowledgment, 28 April."
> J.S. Roskell, House of Commons 1386-1421 2 (1992):
> 771?772 (biog. of Sir Gilbert Denys).
I won't reproduce the entire Sir Gilbert Denys article from HOP -
Maurice is only mentioned in the final paragraph, so here is the
genealogical info from it:
"DENYS [footnote: Variants: Deneys, Deonys, Dynys.], Sir Gilbert
(d.1422), of Siston, Glos.
GLOUCESTERSHIRE 1390 (Nov.), 1395
?s. of William Denys. [footnote: W.R. Williams, 'Parl. Hist. Glos.'
29.] m. (1) between Oct. 1377 and Oct. 1382, Margaret (c. 1352-1398),
da. of William Corbet and sis. and h. of William Corbet of Hope,
Salop, and Siston, wid. of William Wyriot, s.p.; (2) bef. 1408,
Margaret (c.1386-1460), er. da. and event. coh. of Sir Maurice
Russell* of Dyrham, Glos., and Kingston Russell, Dorset, by his 1st
w., at least 2s., 1 da. Kntd. by Jan. 1385.
Denys probably came from Ogmore in Glamorgan, and most of his landed
holdings in Gloucestershire were acquired through his first marriage,
to Margaret Corbet. On the death of her brother in 1377, Margaret had
inherited the manors of Siston, Alveston and Earthcott, together with
the hundred of Langley in that county, as well as the hamlet of Hope
in Shropshire. That her inheritance did not also include the family's
substantial estates in Pembrokeshire was due to earlier settlements
restricting their descent to the male line. After her marriage to
Denys some five years later the couple made Siston their home. For
quite a while they were to receive no income from the other Corbet
manors, however, for Margaret's brother had died leaving outstanding
part of a debt of f320 to William Canynges*, the Bristol merchant,
which sum had now to be raised from his estate. Margaret died
childless in or before April 1398, but arrangements made during her
lifetime enabled Denys not only to retain her property for the rest of
his life, but also to pass it on to the children of his second
marriage. [footnote: 'CIPM', xv. 26-30; C143/401/2; CP25(1)78/80/57;
'Reg. Wakefield' (Worcs. Hist. Soc. n.s. vii), 321, 443; 'CFR', xi.
269.] By 1412 Denys was receiving an estimated annual income from land
in Gloucestershire of f40. This came almost entirely from the Corbet
properties, for no immediate material advantage had accrued from his
second marriage, to Margaret Russell. The match was socially
advantageous, even so, for Margaret came of a good family; and there
was the certain prospect of her inheritance of at least part of the
wealthy Sir Maurice Russell's estates. In due course, when Russell
died in 1416, under the terms of an entail made nearly 50 years
before, his Gloucestershire manors of Dyrham, Haresfield and 'Henton'
were partitioned between his daughters, Margaret Denys and Isabel,
wife of Sir John Drayton*: but Denys and Drayton were no longer alive
when, 16 years later, the bulk of the Russell estates fell to Margaret
and Isabel following the deaths of their half-brother, Thomas, and the
latter's infant daughter. [footnote: C115/K2/6682 ff. 37d-39;
C138/17/61; 'CFR', xiv. 175-6.]
...snip...
Denys had effected an entail of his principal manor of Siston in 1420,
and it was there that he made his will on 16 Oct. 1421. He asked to
be buried in the local church near the grave of his first wife, and
insisted that his widow should take a vow of chastity if she wished to
retain possession of his moveable goods. (If she refused she would
only receive the customary third share, the rest being divided between
his sons and assigned for payment of his funeral expenses.) Denys
evidently mistrusted his wife; and moreover, he did not ask her to act
as an executor, choosing instead his daughter Joan, wife of Thomas
Gamage (a kinsman of his former lieutenant). The overseers of the
will were Bishop Henry Beaufort of Winchester, Bishop Philip Morgan of
Worcester and Master Lewis Cocherche. Denys died on 24 Mar. 1422 and
his will came up for probate on 1 Apr. His heir was Maurice Denys,
his eldest son by his second marriage, who, then aged 12, was granted
in wardship to Edward Stradling, esquire (the husband of Bishop
Beaufort's bastard). Denys's widow was far from inclined to take a
vow of chastity; on 12 Dec. she obtained the Council's licence to
marry John Kemys*. [footnote: PCC 53 Marche; C138/63/27; C139/56/53;
'CCR, 1422-29', p. 3; 'CFR', xiv. 441-2; 'CPR, 1422-9', p. 19.] Ten
years later she and her sister Isabel (by now married to Stephen
Hatfield*), inherited the rest of the considerable Russell estates in
Somerset, Dorset and elsewhere; and she lived on in enjoyment of the
same until 1460. It was not until Kemys died in 1477 that her
property descended to Denys's grandson, Sir Walter. [footnote: 'CFR',
xvi. 125-7, 129, 131; xix. 246; G. Scott Thomson, 'Two Cents. Fam.
Hist.' 326-7; C140/60/16; 'CCR, 1476-85', pp. 145-6.]"
> G.B. Roberts, Royal Descents of
> 500 Immigrants (1993): 204-206 (erroneous identification of Katherine
> Stradling's parentage).
This of course makes Katherine Stradling the illegitimate daughter of
Sir Edward Stradling.
I'll sort through all of the above plus the sources extracted in my
previous post, and offer additional 15th-century evidence from the
Rolls, to sum up the validity of the Beaufort-Stradling-Dennys line,
in a third and final response post.
Cheers, -------Brad
Tim Powys-Lybbe
<snip>
> In Transactions of the Bristol and Gloucestershire Archaeological
> Society, vol. 23 (1900), p. 64-65, there is a description of the
> Siston manor:
<snip>
> The 1900 article states that Sir Walter Dennys was the son of Maurice
> by first wife Katherine Stradling, but the source for this is clearly
> the 1623 Visitation pedigree, since the article incorrectly calls Anne
> Berkeley, the wife of Sir William Dennis, the daughter of William,
> Marquess of Berkeley, just as the Visitation pedigree does (in
> actuality she was his niece).
Smyth's "Lives of the Berkeleys", Vol II, p. 178 explicitly says that
Anne Berkeley was the only dau. of lord Maurice B., the younger brother
of Wm the marquess, so she is clearly Wm.'s niece. This was written in
the 1620s, much the same time as the Visitation.
Brad Verity
Richardson cited in his PA3 manuscript, and offers some additional
sources.
In conclusion, the evidence falls as follows:
KATHERINE STRADLING
There is no direct 15th-century evidence that a Katherine Stradling
existed. There is no 15th-century evidence that Maurice Dennys had a
wife named Katherine, nor is there any 15th-century evidence that Sir
Edward Stradling had a daughter named Katherine. The first mention of
Katherine Stradling is not until nearly two hundred years later, in
the Dennys pedigree in the 1623 Visitation of Gloucester.
With lack of any direct 15th-century mention of her, we then must look
at the 1623 Visitation pedigree and attempt to judge its accuracy. We
know it was in error on at least three points: 1) Sir Gilbert Denys'
first wife was not "Jone d. of ... Kemys" but "Margaret d. and heire
of Walter Corbett", who the pedigree mistakenly makes his mother; 2)
Lady Anne Berkeley, the first wife of Sir William Dennys, grandson of
Maurice, was not "d. of Wm. Marquis Barkley" but rather his niece; 3)
"Joane da. to .... Stradling" given as the 2nd wife of Maurice
Russell, grandfather of Maurice Dennys, in the pedigree, was
apparently the third and final wife of Russell, as the following CPR
entry attests:
From Patent Rolls: "2 May 1434, Westminster. The like [licence], for
10 marks paid in the hanaper, for John Kemes, esquire, and Margaret
his wife and Stephen Haitfeld and Isabel his wife to enfeoff Maurice
Berkeley of Uley, knight, John Kemes, clerk, Maurice Kemes, Nicholas
Alderley and John Codryngton, and their heirs, of the manor of Derham,
co. Gloucester, and the advowson of Derham church, also of 2 acres of
land in Horsyngton and of the advowsons of Horsyngton church and of
the free chapel of Southcheryton, co. Somerset, except one acre of
land in the said manor, all held of the king in chief; and also to
grant to the same the reversion of one third part of 6 caucates of
land in Derham, one third part of the said manor of Horsyngton, one
third part of the manor of Kyngeston Russell, co. Dorset, and the
advowson of the free chapel of Kyngeston Russell, also held in chief,
which are now held in dower by John Stradelyng, knight, and Joan his
wife, of the inheritance of the said Margaret and Isabel, after the
death of the said Joan."
Joan, Maurice Russell's widow, was the sister and eventual heiress of
Walter Dauntsey of Wiltshire, and was married to Sir John Stradling
(younger brother of Sir Edward Stradling, husband of Jane Beaufort) by
July 1417, according to historian Ralph A. Griffiths' "The Rise of the
Stradlings of St Donat's" in his 1994 book "Conquerors and Conquered
in Medieval Wales".
Since the 1623 Visitation Dennys pedigree is not without error, is
there any other evidence to corroborate its claim that Maurice Dennys
had a first wife Katherine, daughter of Sir Edward Stradling, who bore
him two sons, the elder of whom became the Dennys family head? We can
determine two links of Maurice Dennys to the Stradlings of St.
Donat's: 1) His mother Margaret Russell's stepmother Joan was married
by 1417 to Sir John Stradling; 2) Sir Edward Stradling, John's elder
brother, was granted wardship in 1422 of the lands (minus the dower of
Margaret Russell) of Sir Gilbert Dennys, Maurice's recently deceased
father. But the grant of the wardship of the Dennys lands did not
include the marriage of the Dennys heir, so is there any chronological
evidence that Sir Walter Dennys, Maurice's eldest son, was from a wife
previous to Alice Poyntz?
SIR WALTER DENNYS
Walter Dennys was not knighted until 1490 or 1491, when he was close
to age 60. He first appears in the Rolls in 1452:
From Patent Rolls: "17 July 1452, Westminster. Commission of oyer and
terminer ..., reciting the complaint of Thomas, abbot of the monastery
of St. Augustine, Bristol, that Theobald Gorges, knight, Walter
Gorges, esquire, ... [snip of long list of defendants] ... Maurice
Denys, esquire, Walter Denys, 'gentilman,' John Somerlyne, 'yoman,'
and Richard Coke, 'yoman,' all late of Alston, co. Gloucester, ...
[snip of more defendants]..., with others broke the abbot's close and
houses at Bristol and assaulted, beat and imprisoned him; and
appointing the said commissioners to make inquisition in the county of
Bristol touching the premises."
I don't know how old a man had to be to be referred to as a
"gentleman". But we know Walter served as escheator of
Gloucestershire in 1457, so he had to be of age by then (born by
1436), and possibly of age in 1452 (so born by 1431, when his father
was age 21 and received his paternal inheritance). We know Maurice
Dennys was married to Alice Poyntz by 1437, and the following document
in the Bristol Record Office, brought to my attention by Rosie Bevan,
indicates Maurice was tied to the Poyntz family as early as 1434:
> Reference: D1866/T20
> Beverstone
> Creation dates: [1434]
> Extent and Form: 1
> Scope and Content
> 6 Oct., 13 Hen. VI
>
> Grant:
>
> (i) John ap Tomelyn alias John Huntely
>
> (ii) Sir Maurice Berkeley de Beverstone
>
> - 2a. arable in the field of Beverstone and the advowson or patronage of the house and church of the Friars Preachers [Dominicans] in Bristol.
>
> Warranty against all men.
>
> Witnesses: Robert Poyntz, Thomas Bradston [ ? Nicholas] Poyntz, Maurice Denys, Thomas Poyntz, knights, Walter Herne, John Hambroke.
In 1437, Maurice Dennys enfeoffed two of the three manors of his
paternal inheritance jointly on himself and his wife Alice with
remainder to the heirs of their bodies. This basically left only one
manor (Siston, the chief seat of the family), plus whatever would
someday be inherited after the deaths of Maurice's mother Margaret and
stepfather John Kemys, for eldest son Walter Dennys (presuming he was
from a prior marriage). In 1466, there was a re-enfeoffment of the
same properties as the 1437 grant, again jointly on Maurice and his
wife Alice, but with the remainder now to the heirs of the body of
Maurice, which meant that Walter as eldest son, regardless of his
maternity, would inherit the lands after the deaths of Maurice and
Alice, which is exactly what happened.
Further indication that Walter was probably not the son of Alice
Poyntz is provided in the following CCR entry:
From Close Rolls: "Will of Nicholas Poyntz esquire, reciting a charter
dated 17 September, 29 Henry VI, whereby he gave to Maurice Berkeley
of Beverston knight, Maurice Denys esquire and John Andreux, and to
Matthew Delahay and Thomas Gylmyn both now deceased, their heirs and
assigns, to perform his will, the manor of Brokenburgh with
appurtenances in Almondesbury, Tokynton, Hempton, Petyshawe,
'Overwodelande' and Wynterbourne, the manor of Daggelyngworth, a
messuage, two carucates of land, 12 acres of meadow, 100 acres of wood
and the moiety of a mill in Daggelyngworth and Cirencestre, and the
advowson of the chantry of St. Mary Almondesbury, that the feoffees
shall by charter grant the manor of Brokenburgh with the appurtenances
and the said advowson to the said Nicholas and Elizabeth his wife for
their lives and the life of the longest liver, with remainder to
Maurice Poyntz their son and to the heirs male of his body, remainder
to Thomas their son and the heirs male of his body, remainder to
Nicholas their son and to the heirs male of his body, remainder to
Henry their son and the heirs male of his body, remainder to Maurice
Denys, son of the said Maurice and of Alice his wife their daughter,
and to the heirs male of his body, remainder to Joan their younger
daughter and to the heirs of her body, remainder to the said Alice
their elder daughter and to the heirs of her body, remainder to
Margaret wife of John Lysle esquire their middle daughter and to the
heirs of her body, remainder to the right heirs of Nicholas the
father, and the manor of Daggelyngworth and premises there and in
Cirencestre to the said Nicholas and Elizabeth (as above), with
successive remainders to Nicholas, Thomas, Maurice and Henry their
sons and Maurice Denys the son and to the heirs male of their
respective bodies, the said Joan, Alice and Margaret their daughters
and to the heirs of their bodies, remainder to the right heirs of
Nicholas the father. Dated 5 June, 34 Henry VI [1456]."
So in 1450, it was Maurice Dennys, son of Maurice Dennys and Alice
Poyntz, who was mentioned in his grandfather's remainder. This could
be the case of a younger son being taken care of over the heir
presumptive Walter (if son of Alice), or it could be that Maurice was
the eldest son of Alice, and Walter was indeed from a previous
marriage.
The 15th-century evidence for Walter Dennys being a son of Maurice by
a wife previous to Alice Poyntz is not direct or conclusive, but it is
suggestive. The 1623 Visitation then fills in the blank by providing
an identity for this wife. It seems unlikely the early 17th-century
Dennyses would have completely invented a first wife for Maurice and
mother of their ancestor Sir Walter, yet its possible they made a
mistake, either in her first name (Katherine) or her paternity.
SISTON COURT
There may be a way to verify the Dennys/Stradling marriage that
resulted in Sir Walter Dennys. The 1900 article on the manor of
Siston from Transactions of the Bristol and Gloucestershire
Archaeological Society, describes six heraldic shields (Dennis,
Corbet, Russell, Gorges, Danvers and Newmarch) on the wings of Siston
Court, and adds that there are "many others." Siston Court still is
standing, and if one of the other heraldic shields in it is Stradling,
that's good evidence for Maurice's first marriage.
KATHERINE STRADLING'S MOTHER
Without being able to definitively establish either Maurice Dennys'
first marriage or the identity of this first wife using 15th-century
evidence, we have to try and rely on estimated chronology to determine
if the 1623 Visitation identification could be accurate. Sir Edward
Stradling was born in 1389, and Maurice Dennys was born in 1410. His
first marriage took place after 1422 and before 1437. His son Walter
Dennys was born by 1436, and perhaps as early as 1431. Chronology
does work for Maurice's first wife to have been a daughter of Sir
Edward Stradling.
But could she have been a daughter of Jane Beaufort, Sir Edward's
wife? That chronology gets much tighter. We know that Sir Edward and
Jane were married by 1423, and that their eldest son was born about
that year. It's possible they had a daughter prior to their son,
perhaps as early as 1420. Establishing Jane Beaufort's birth year
becomes crucial here - if the 1480 IPM at the PRO is indeed hers, she
could not have been born much earlier than 1405, and certaonly not
before 1400. This makes a birth of a daughter prior to 1420 less and
less likely. So if Walter Dennys was born about 1431, Jane Beaufort
could not have been his grandmother. However a birth for him closer
to 1436 could just make it possible (if both Jane Beaufort and
Katherine Stradling were teenaged mothers).
CONCLUSION
There's a lot of 'ifs'. I agree with the earlier posts in this thread
made by Rosie Bevan, Peter Stewart, John Higgins and others. Douglas
Richardson has not produced sufficient evidence to warrant the
certainty with which he presents this line of descent in his PA3
manuscript. His "recent research" - the HOP article on Sir Gilbert
Dennys which states that Bishop Henry Beaufort of Winchester was an
overseer of Sir Gilbert Dennys's will - does not prove anything. The
Bishop of Worcester was also a supervisor of the will. Though Bishop
Beaufort may have aided his son-in-law in obtaining the wardship of
Sir Gilbert Dennys's lands in 1422, there's no indication it was to
provide for a marriage for a granddaughter, nor was it necessarily
Beaufort's influence that allowed Stradling to receive wardship of the
lands. Sir Gilbert Dennys's widow Margaret had kinship ties to
Stradling's brother.
Though the 1623 Visitation may be correct in making Maurice Dennys's
first wife a Stradling, this has yet to be verified with any
contemporary 15th century (or even heraldic/tomb) evidence.
Corroborative evidence and chronology allow for her to be a daughter
of Sir Edward Stradling (1389-1453), but it is far from conclusive,
and even more flimsy to make her mother Jane Beaufort. The
illegitimate children of Sir Edward, apparently laid out by T. Clark
in Limbus Patrum Morganić et Glamorganić, need to be examined in
detail to determine if its likelier that Katherine Dennys would fit in
among them.
If Katherine Stradling did exist, she died at a young age, leaving not
so much a legacy with her husband, whose second marriage was at least
thirty years long, or with history (no tomb,or even document from her
lifetime that names her, survives). It is the distant descendants of
her son that stress the importance of her existence, hoping to find in
her a link to a Plantagenet past.
Cheers, -----Brad
Douglas Richardson
My comments are interspersed. For brevity's sake, I've snipped
unnecessary portions of Brad Verity's previous post. Douglas
Richardson
bat...@hotmail.com (Brad Verity) wrote in message news:<8ed1b63.04021...@posting.google.com>...
> As this will be quite a long response to Douglas Richardson's listing
> of his sources from his PA3 manuscript, I'll split it into three
> posts.
>
> The Dennys family of Gloucestershire is a fairly difficult family to
> research, as there has been no modern study of them outside of the
> articles on the MP family members in HOP. They - rather surprisingly
> - even seem to have been passed over by Victorian-era antiquarians.
> Unlike the closely-related Poyntz family of Iron Acton, there was no
> study of this family published in the late-19th century.
Mr. Verity has correctly observed that there is no modern study of the
Dennys family in print. Had such a work been available, the matter of
Katherine (Stradling) Dennys's existence and marriage might have been
resolved decades ago. Indeed the lack of sources on the Dennys family
is surely why Brad overlooked Katherine Stradling's existence when he
examined the question of her mother, Joan Beaufort's birthdate, this
past year. Without knowledge of Katherine Stradling's existence, Brad
summarily dismissed the possibility that Katherine's mother, Joan
Beaufort, was born before her father, Cardinal Beaufort, took holy
orders. As we will see in future posts, this misstep on Brad's part
created a fatal flaw in his analysis of Joan Beaufort's birthdate and
maternity.
Even without a major work on the Dennys family being in print, had
Brad done a simple Google search, he would have and should have found
Katherine (Stradling) Dennys. Missing Katherine Stradling's existence
was careless work on Brad's part. Below are just a few websites which
mention her:
http://www.harleyt.net/newtree/gp430.html
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~jamesdow/s004/f005175.htm
http://www.geocities.com/tudorgenealogist/Beaufort.html
http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~wadhams/pafg81.htm
http://worldconnect.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=DESC&db=emsuggs&id=I80339
> We are left with the Rolls series and whatever other miscellaneous
> original documents have survived in various Gloucestershire Record
> Offices. Douglas Richardson has done a decent job of combing through
> the Rolls for Dennys references, but an inspection of the sources he
> cites as evidence after his potted biography of Katherine Stradling
> and Maurice Dennys in his PA3 manuscript, shows there is no 15th
> century evidence at all for the marriage, and only indirect evidence
> from the Rolls that Maurice even had a wife prior to Alice Poyntz.
I believe my posted account of Maurice Dennys and his wife, Katherine
Stradling, is both accurate and reliable.
<SNIP>
> >.T. Clark, Limbus Patrum Morganić et Glamorganić
> > (1886): 381?382 (sub Dennis), 433?439 (sub Stradling).
>
> I have not seen this work. According to Peter Stewart's post of
> January 30th in this thread, Katherine is not listed as a daughter of
> Sir Edward Stradling (presumably in the Stradling pedigree on pp.
> 433-439). I'd be curious if she is mentioned as wife of Maurice in
> the Dennis pedigree on pp. 381-382.
Yes, I believe Katherine Stradling is mentioned as Maurice Dennys'
wife on pages 381-382. I haven't double checked to make sure,
however.
> >C.P.R. 1461-1467 (1897): 531:
>
> From Patent Rolls: "12 Oct. 1466, Westminster. Licence, for 33s. 4d.
> paid in the hanaper, for Maurice Denys, esquire, and Alice his wife to
> grant the manors of Alleweston and Erthecote and the hundreds of
> Langley and Alleweston, co. Gloucester, held in chief, to Humphrey
> Poyntz and Thomas Lymeryk; and for the latter to re-grant the same to
> the said Maurice and Alice for life, with remainder to the heirs of
> the body of Maurice and final remainder to his right heirs."
>
> The above suggests to me that Maurice did have a first wife who was
> the mother of his son Walter Denys, for if Alice was the mother, I
> believe the wording would have been 'with remainder to the heirs of
> their bodies and final remainder to the right heirs of Maurice.'
In general, if a man had children by a prior first marriage, he would
settle property on himself and his second wife for life, with
reversion to "his" issue, not "their" issue. As such, the wording of
the property settlement above strongly implies that Maurice Dennys had
been married previously and that he had issue by that marriage living
at the date of the settlement. In this case, the previous marriage
was to Katherine Stradling. Maurice Dennys definitely had living
children by his marriage to Katherine Stradling at the date of the
above settlement.
<SNIP>
> In Transactions of the Bristol and Gloucestershire Archaeological
> Society, vol. 23 (1900), p. 64-65:
<SNIP>
> Sir Gilbert Dennis married Margaret, sister and
> heiress of William Corbet, and the Dennises held it till the time of
> Elizabeth, when it passed after several sales to the Trotmans. Fiennes
> Trotman was lord of the manor in 1803.
<SNIP>
> The following sketch pedigree will be a guide to students of the
> Dennis monuments and heraldry:
>
> William Dennis married Margaret, daughter and heiress of Walter
> Corbet. Their son and heir, Sir Gilbert, married Margaret, daughter and
> heiress of Sir Morys Russell of Dyrham. Their son and heir, Morris, married >Katherine, daughter of Sir Edward Stradling, and had son and heir, Sir >Walter, who married Agnes, daughter and co-heiress of Sir Richard Danvers.
>Their son and heir, Sir William, married Anne, daughter of William,
> Marquis Berkeley, and had two sons, the eldest of whom, Sir Morys, died in
> 1563, sine prole, leaving his brother, Sir Walter, his heir.
<SNIP>
> Note that though the above extracts are fine for evidence of where
> Maurice Dennys and his son Sir Walter were buried, they are conflicted
> as evidence for the line of descent given by Douglas in his PA3
> manuscript. The 1887 article says Walter Dennys was the son of
> Maurice by his second wife Alice Poyntz, which would of course
> eliminate any possible royal connection from the Stradlings.
Actually the 1887 article does not actually state that Alice Poyntz
was Walter Dennys' mother. The author gives BOTH marriages of Maurice
Dennys, and does not clearly indicate which marriage produced his son
and heir, Walter. This has confused Dennis family genealogists. A
cursory reading of the text suggests that the second wife, Alice
Poyntz, was the mother of Walter. But due to the odd wording of the
text, I'm not sure that this is what the author actually intended to
say.
> The 1900 article states that Sir Walter Dennys was the son of Maurice
> by first wife Katherine Stradling, but the source for this is clearly
> the 1623 Visitation pedigree, since the article incorrectly calls Anne
> Berkeley, the wife of Sir William Dennis, the daughter of William,
> Marquess of Berkeley, just as the Visitation pedigree does (in
> actuality she was his niece).
You are quite mistaken, Brad. The 1623 Visitation of Gloucestershire
clearly states that Anne Berkeley, wife of Sir William Dennis, was the
niece of Sir William Berkeley, not his daughter. The following is a
quotation from the actual visitation:
H. Chitting & J. Phillipot Vis. of Gloucester 1623, 1569 & 1582–3
(H.S.P. 21) (1885): 49–52 (Dennis pedigree: "Sir Wm. Dennys K. [1] =
Lady Anne d. of Morris Lord Barkley brother to Wm. Marquis Barkley,
[2] = Edith d. of… Twinihoe")
I accurately quoted the 1623 visitation records that I posted on
February 1st, 2004. Brad should show the same care when citing such
sources. We see here he is just plain wrong.
> I'll post the remainder of Douglas's cited sources in a post to
> follow.
>
> Cheers, ------Brad
I'll comment on Brad Verity's second post tomorrow. Hopefully his
analysis and recitation of the facts will improve in his second post.
So far, he has failed to make the grade.
Tim Powys-Lybbe
> bat...@hotmail.com (Brad Verity) wrote in message
> news:<8ed1b63.04021...@posting.google.com>...
> > by first wife Katherine Stradling, but the source for this is clearly
> > the 1623 Visitation pedigree, since the article incorrectly calls Anne
> > Berkeley, the wife of Sir William Dennis, the daughter of William,
> > Marquess of Berkeley, just as the Visitation pedigree does (in
> > actuality she was his niece).
>
> You are quite mistaken, Brad. The 1623 Visitation of Gloucestershire
> clearly states that Anne Berkeley, wife of Sir William Dennis, was the
> niece of Sir William Berkeley, not his daughter. The following is a
> quotation from the actual visitation:
>
> H. Chitting & J. Phillipot Vis. of Gloucester 1623, 1569 & 1582–3
> (H.S.P. 21) (1885): 49–52 (Dennis pedigree: "Sir Wm. Dennys K. [1] =
> Lady Anne d. of Morris Lord Barkley brother to Wm. Marquis Barkley,
> [2] = Edith d. of… Twinihoe")
>
> I accurately quoted the 1623 visitation records that I posted on
> February 1st, 2004. Brad should show the same care when citing such
> sources. We see here he is just plain wrong.
>
> > I'll post the remainder of Douglas's cited sources in a post to
> > follow.
> >
> > Cheers, ------Brad
>
> I'll comment on Brad Verity's second post tomorrow. Hopefully his
> analysis and recitation of the facts will improve in his second post.
I regret to say that on the count of reading the text in the published
version of the 1623 Gloucester Visitation, Brad is quite right. I am
putting a copy of page 51 on the www at:
http://www.south-frm.demon.co.uk/Manuscripts/Glos_p_51.pdf
For any who cannot access it, the text reads:
Lady Anne = Sr Wm. = Edith d. of
d. of Wm. Dennys .... Twi-
Marquis K. nihoe
Barkley [d. [A. a chev
of Morris ron bet. 3
Lord Bark- lapwings
ley brother sa. - Harl
to Wm. 1041]
Marquis
Barkley -
Harl
1041]
The square brackets mean that these are additions by the editor from
another manuscript, Harleian 1041 in this case.
However neither of the manuscript sources used for this visitation were
the official one made by a herald, of which nothing now survives
(according to the Preface to the 1623 Visitation). So what was said by
the person visited and written down by the herald we shall never know.
Personally I think the statement "he has failed to make the grade" is
not supported by the contrary evidence produced. But what is evident
is that the 1623 visitation is not a very satisfactory source.
Louise Staley
> Douglas Richardson wrote:
> Dear Newsgroup ~
<snip>
>
> Even without a major work on the Dennys family being in print, had
> Brad done a simple Google search, he would have and should have found
> Katherine (Stradling) Dennys. Missing Katherine Stradling's existence
> was careless work on Brad's part. Below are just a few websites which
> mention her:
>
> http://www.harleyt.net/newtree/gp430.html
This site has no sources and BTW no parents for Katherine Stradling.
>
> http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~jamesdow/s004/f005175.htm
Similarly there are no sources here and Katherine Stradling is presented
without parents.
>
> http://www.geocities.com/tudorgenealogist/Beaufort.html
Again no sources but this one does assert Katherine Stradling was the
daughter of Sir Edward Stradling and Jane Beaufort.
>
> http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~wadhams/pafg81.htm
At last a sourced page, but what's the source? It's RD 500 so no new
research there.
>
>
http://worldconnect.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=DESC&db=emsuggs&id=I80339
This page also cites RD500 and by the way this site is titled "Our Kingdom
Come" and starts with Adam (Michael) Of Eden
http://worldconnect.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=GET&db=emsuggs&id=I50909
>
<snip>
>
> I'll comment on Brad Verity's second post tomorrow. Hopefully his
> analysis and recitation of the facts will improve in his second post.
> So far, he has failed to make the grade.
Are we to take from this that unsourced webpages, including those with
biblical lines, are relevant proof that Katherine Stradling exisited in the
15th century?
Tim Powys-Lybbe
This is incredible. How could anyone merely use unsourced web pages as
sources for valid medieval genealogy?
Was Mr Richardson joking? Surely he should have put a smiley after such
rubbish?
Peter Stewart
> This is incredible. How could anyone merely use unsourced web pages as
> sources for valid medieval genealogy?
>
> Was Mr Richardson joking? Surely he should have put a smiley after such
> rubbish?
And you are astonished by shameless foolishness from that quarter, after
so many examples and warnings? Or where is your own smiley face?
Richardson tried to use these web pages as a stick to beat Brad Verity -
a desperate measure, of course, since Brad's careful examination goes to
the heart of his, and consequently of PA3's, methodological defects.
But if only such a broken reed came to hand, what else could be expected
of a trained & professional ignoramus?
Peter Stewart
marshall kirk
You write:
"But could [Maurice Denys's first wife] have been a daughter of Jane
Beaufort, Sir Edward's wife? That chronology gets much tighter. We
know that Sir Edward and Jane were married by 1423, and that their
eldest son was born about that year. It's possible they had a
daughter prior to their son, perhaps as early as 1420. Establishing
Jane Beaufort's birth year becomes crucial here - if the 1480 IPM at
the PRO is indeed hers, she could not have been born much earlier than
1405, and certainly not before 1400."
I don't wish to embroil myself further in this debate as a whole,
which really cries out for a very full, detailed treatment (preferably
arising from a real-time round-table discussion, with all documents at
hand). However, tho' I appreciate your contributions, which I've
followed closely, I feel that I must take issue with part of the
above.
You seem to be saying that Jane (Beaufort) Stradling "could not have
been" over 75 years old at death, and "certainly not" over 80. As far
as I can see, this uncompromising stance is no more than an assumption
deriving from probability, which I take to be based on the
demographics of the period … and, I suspect, on the gross
improbability -- which you correctly observe -- that any given newborn
English girl would survive to 88.
However, on your own showing, Jane was at least 70 when she died (1480
minus {1423 minus 13}), and perhaps at least 73. Therefore, the
probability of Joan having survived to 88 is not independent, but
contingent or conditional. (My statistical terminology may well be
wrong, but I hope the point's clear.) In other words, the question is
not, "what %age of upper-class English baby girls in that era lived to
be 88," but "what %age of upper-class English women who'd *already*
survived to *70* lived on to 88?" Certainly, the latter %age was far,
far higher than the former.
Most of that era's massive disadvantage in life-expectancy, compared
to our own, lay in early mortality from infectious disease,
complications associated with childbirth, and garden-variety
malfunctions that, nowadays, are set right surgically. The average
life-expectancy at birth was perhaps 45, compared to our own 75; but
the life-expectancy of those who'd already survived to age 50 was only
five years or so less than that of our own 50-year-olds. (Based on
later stats from populations living under similar medical conditions.)
I suspect that women who survived to 70 must have had, to begin with,
excellent constitutions and a high degree of resistance to infectious
disease. Their life-expectancy at 70 may have been no less than our
own. (This is all, of course, amenable to empirical test.)
That some English aristocrats of the period did live deep into their
80s is clear enough. John Sutton VI, Baron Dudley, was, I think, just
shy of 87 when he died; and one can find other examples. (I believe
there was one other in the Sutton-Dudley family itself, two or three
generations before John Sutton VI. However, I'm writing from work, so
somebody check me {as tho' I need to ask!}. In any case, it was a
woman, and her heir was, I think, her great-grandson.)
All that to the side, I have the uneasy feeling that the probability
that Jane Beaufort lived to be 88 is conditional on still broader
considerations. The clearest way I can put it, briefly, is to say
that, if a theory comprising several positive evidences -- even weak
ones -- requires also that one player lived to a great age, the
probability of that great age is higher than it would be if taken in
isolation. The extreme (and illustrative) case would be one in which
the 'other evidence' was *overwhelmingly convincing*, in which case
one would pretty much have to accept the great age entailed,
willy-nilly. (Just possibly this has something to do with Bayesian
concepts, which would account for the tinnitus and vertigo I'm
experiencing. It certainly is fundamental to the intellectual basis
on which one assesses inductive arguments.)
I may have fallen into some fundamental conceptual error here, and if
so, would appreciate being apprised of it. (Nicely, of course.)
Jay
Brad and really have highlighted the critical issues of discussion. I
for one do appreciate your work and you sharing it with the rest of
us.
On Nicholas Poyntz, do I understand the will correctly that he was
married to Elizabeth and had the following children:
Nicholas m. to ?
Thomas m. to ?
Maurice m. to ?
Alice m. Maurice Denys as his second wife
Margaret m. to John Lysle
Joan m. to ?
Is this kinsman of Sir Nicholas Poyntz of Iron Acton (died bef 1460)
m. to Elizabeth Mill whose children I have down as John and Humphrey?
No Poyntz are on my lines but they intersect with folks on my lines
and often pop up in the discussions so I have included them in my
database for reference purposes.
Jay
she died? So it is possible for a woman to live into her eighties in
the middle age, although uncommon. So she could have been born even
in the late 1390's when her father would have been in his early
twenties unless there were some circumstances in her father's life
that would make such a conception during this period impossible or
improbable.
Thus it seems that the chronology is not the major issue, but rather
that lack of contemporary supporting evidence and the problematical
nature of the 1623 Visitation information, given its other errors.
If I understand the discussion correctly, what we are lacking are
three crucial bits of evidence. 1. A more reliable source for
Maurice Denys first wife to confirm her as indeed Katherine Stradling.
2. That such a Katherine Stradling if she exists was the daughter of
said Edward Stradling
3. Katherine is the daughter of Joan Beaufort
Brad I think has made a good case that Maurice had a first wife who
was the mother of Walter. I think it is clear that the best we can do
is "said to be Katherine Stradling daughter of Edward Stradling" and
only by a source two centuries distant from events. (I think a case
can be made that it is quite possible for Joan and Edward Stradling to
chronologically have had a daughter Katherine, born say between
1420-1423 or perhaps earlier. the issue now is whether they in fact
did.
Tim Powys-Lybbe
> Intersting discussion. You have really put a lot of work into this
> Brad and really have highlighted the critical issues of discussion. I
> for one do appreciate your work and you sharing it with the rest of
> us.
>
>
> On Nicholas Poyntz, do I understand the will
I don't have his will but I do have "Memoirs of the family of Poyntz"
by John Maclean and there is a pedigree on pp. 94 and 95 on the later
Poyntzes of iron Acton.
> correctly that he was married to Elizabeth
He married two Elizabeth's, Mill and Hussey; you are talking of the
second marriage, to Hussey.
> and had the following children:
>
> Nicholas m. to ?
Listed but only his name. I wonder if he died young?
> Thomas m. to ?
He is listed but no wife. He had a grant of the manor of Nympsfield
from his brother.
> Maurice m. to ?
Elena, as named in his will, PCC 3 Blamyr. (ie you may find this will
on Documents-on-Line.)
> Alice m. Maurice Denys as his second wife
No mention of second wife.
> Margaret m. to John Lysle
"Lisle, or Lisley, of Sussex"
> Joan m. to ?
William Doddington of Woodland.
>
> Is this kinsman of Sir Nicholas Poyntz of Iron Acton (died bef 1460)
> m. to Elizabeth Mill whose children I have down as John and Humphrey?
See above, Elizabeth Mill was the first wife of the same Nich: Poyntz
who m. (2) Eliz. Hussey. Eliz. Mill's children were indeed John and
Humphrey.
> No Poyntz are on my lines but they intersect with folks on my lines
> and often pop up in the discussions so I have included them in my
> database for reference purposes.
The Owsley society has done enormous studies of parts of the Poyntz
family with contributions by Ronny Bodine being highly competent. See:
They will even sell you a reprint of the above Poyntz book, see the
publications section.
Louise Staley
This thread provides an interesting study of standards of proof and
methodology in genealogy that seem worth exploring.
There is only one fact that needs to be established if the line is not to
fail at what will appear in PA3 as generation 11. It is:
1. Is Katherine Stradling the daughter of Joan Beaufort?
All other issues such as other children, careers of the Stradling and
Dennis men etc. are interesting in fleshing out the bones but in themselves
are not relevant to whether the line holds.
In the extract from PA3 posted by Douglas Richardson on 2 Feb 2004, 15
references are assigned to Katherine Stradling and her husband Maurice
Dennis. On 17 Feb 2004 Brad Verity very helpfully posted details and
pertinent discussion of almost all of those 15 references. From these two
posts the evidence presented for Katherine Stradling being the daughter of
Jane Beaufort can be summarised in increasing order of relevance as:
References which are only about Maurice Dennis or his second wife Alice
Poyntz (6)
List of Sheriffs for England & Wales (PRO Lists & Indexes 9) (1898): 50.
Desc. Cat. of Ancient Deeds 4 (1902): 291. List of Early Chancery Procs. 2
(PRO Lists and Indexes 16) (1903): 1. C.C.R. 1429-1435 (1933): 137-138.
C.C.R. 1468-1476 (1953): 305. C.P.R. 1436-1441 (1907): 120.
References which appear to show Katherine was NOT the daughter of Sir
Edward Stradling (1)
G.T. Clark, Limbus Patrum Morganić et Glamorganić (1886): 381-382 (sub
Dennis), 433-439 (sub Stradling).
See SGM post 31 Jan 2004 by Peter Stewart which said in part "she isn't
listed as daughter of Sir Edward Stradling in Peter Bartrum's 'Welsh
Genealogies', or in G.T. Clark's 'Limbus Patrum Morganić et Glamorganić,
Being the Genealogies of the Older Families of the Lordships of Morgan and
Glamorgan'."
References which show Katherine was NOT the daughter of Joan Beaufort (1)
G.B. Roberts, Royal Descents of 500 Immigrants (1993): 204-206.
This is refuted in PA3 as incorrect and partially recanted in RD600.
References that show Katherine Stradling was the daughter of Sir Edward
Stradling and the wife of Maurice Dennis but DO NOT mention her mother (3)
Trans. Bristol & Gloucs. Arch. Soc. 12 (1887): 326-327.
"Maurice Denys married twice: first, the dau. of Sir Edward Stradling,
Knt., and, secondly, Alice, the dau. of Sir Nicholas Poyntz, of Iron Acton,
Knt., by whom he was the father of Sir Walter, who was four times married."
Trans. Bristol & Gloucs. Arch. Soc. 23 (1900): 64-65.
"Their son and heir, Morris, married Katherine, daughter of Sir Edward
Stradling, and had son and heir, Sir Walter, who married Agnes, daughter
and co-heiress of Sir Richard Danvers."
G.T. Clark, Limbus Patrum Morganić et Glamorganić (1886): 381-382 (sub
Dennis).
Douglas Richardson posted to SGM on 17 Feb 2004 "I believe Katherine
Stradling is mentioned as Maurice Dennys' wife on pages 381-382. I haven't
double checked to make sure, however."
References that show Sir Edward Stradling was the guardian of the lands
and/or wardship of Maurice Dennis while he was a minor (2).
C.F.R. 1413-1422 (1934): 100, 441-442.
J.S. Roskell, House of Commons 1386-1421 2 (1992): 771-772 (biog. of Sir
Gilbert Denys).
"The overseers of the will were Bishop Henry Beaufort of Winchester, Bishop
Philip Morgan of Worcester and Master Lewis Cocherche. Denys died on 24
Mar. 1422 and
his will came up for probate on 1 Apr. His heir was Maurice Denys, his
eldest son by his second marriage, who, then aged 12, was granted in
wardship to Edward Stradling, esquire (the husband of Bishop Beaufort's
bastard)."
References that suggest Maurice Dennis had a first wife but do not show her
name (1)
C.P.R. 1461-1467 (1897): 531.
"12 Oct. 1466, Westminster. Licence, for 33s. 4d. paid in the hanaper, for
Maurice Denys, esquire, and Alice his wife to grant the manors of
Alleweston and Erthecote and the hundreds of Langley and Alleweston, co.
Gloucester, held in chief, to Humphrey Poyntz and Thomas Lymeryk; and for
the latter to re-grant the same to
the said Maurice and Alice for life, with remainder to the heirs of the
body of Maurice and final remainder to his right heirs."
Brad Verity (SGM 17 Feb 2004) notes that this suggests "that Maurice did
have a first wife who was the mother of his son Walter Denys, for if Alice
was the mother, I believe the wording would have been 'with remainder to
the heirs of their bodies and final remainder to the right heirs of
Maurice.'" Douglas Richardson (SGM 17 Feb 2004) agrees that "the wording of
the property settlement above strongly implies that Maurice Dennys had been
married previously and that he had issue by that marriage living at the
date of the settlement."
References that show Katherine as the daughter of Joan Beaufort (1)
Visitation of Gloucester 1623 (H.S.P. 21) (1885): 49-52
The question of whether Katherine Stradling was the daughter of Joan
Beaufort would therefore appear to hinge on joining together C.P.R.
1461-1467 (1897): 531, which suggests Maurice Dennis had a first (unnamed)
wife who was the mother of at least one (unnamed) son, with C.F.R.
1413-1422 (1934): 100, 441-442 and J.S. Roskell, House of Commons 1386-1421
2 (1992): 771-772 which show Sir Edward Stradling was the guardian of
Maurice Dennis and his lands during Maurice's minority. The assumption must
then be made that Sir Edward Stradling married his daughter Katherine to
his ward Maurice Dennis and crucially that this could have only occurred if
Katherine was the daughter of Sir Edward Stradling's wife Joan Beaufort.
If it is equally likely that Sir Edward Stradling could have married an
illegitimate daughter to his ward then the line fails.
As Brad has pointed out, there is no contemporary source that makes
Katherine Stradling the daughter of Joan Beaufort or the wife of Maurice
Dennis. On the only relevant question for this generation in the line: who
is the mother of Katherine Stradling, these 15 citations boil down to the
Gloucestershire Visitation.
Katherine Stradling may well have been the daughter of Joan Beaufort but
nobody has yet put forward a coherent argument, as opposed to a list of
largely irrelevant references, which proves she was.
As Douglas Richardson is the primary author of the revision of the Deighton
line it seems fitting that it should be him that explains why the 15
references he provides for Katherine Stradling prove she is the daughter of
Joan.
As he wrote on 25 Jan 2004 at the beginning of this thread: "the following
new royal descent traces Katherine Deighton's ancestry back to King Edward
III of England. This descent goes back through her Stradling-Beaufort
ancestry, which connection was previously thought to be invalid, but which
recent research has determined to be sound."
So Douglas, as an infamous Australian politician is wont to say, "please
explain."
Louise
Jay
the Poyntz family end up being on an ancestral line I may seek out
such publications, but currently they are just in my database as
reference folks. Course there are those on the list who probably
already have Poyntzs in their trees so the archives will be improved
by your listings.
-Jay
Brad Verity
> This thread provides an interesting study of standards of proof and
> methodology in genealogy that seem worth exploring.
Great post, Louise.
> There is only one fact that needs to be established if the line is not to
> fail at what will appear in PA3 as generation 11. It is:
>
>
>
> 1. Is Katherine Stradling the daughter of Joan Beaufort?
>
I think there may still be the question of who was the mother of
Walter Dennys. The evidence is suggestive that he was from a first
wife of Maurice Dennys rather than the well-documented wife Alice
Poyntz, but it is not conclusive - yet.
> References which appear to show Katherine was NOT the daughter of Sir
> Edward Stradling (1)
>
> G.T. Clark, Limbus Patrum Morganić et Glamorganić (1886): 381-382 (sub
> Dennis), 433-439 (sub Stradling).
>
> See SGM post 31 Jan 2004 by Peter Stewart which said in part "she isn't
> listed as daughter of Sir Edward Stradling in Peter Bartrum's 'Welsh
> Genealogies', or in G.T. Clark's 'Limbus Patrum Morganić et Glamorganić,
> Being the Genealogies of the Older Families of the Lordships of Morgan and
> Glamorgan'."
We still don't know for sure if Clark's Dennis pedigree shows
Katherine Stradling as wife to Maurice Dennys - Douglas thought that
it does but needs to double-check.
> References which show Katherine was NOT the daughter of Joan Beaufort (1)
>
> G.B. Roberts, Royal Descents of 500 Immigrants (1993): 204-206.
>
> This is refuted in PA3 as incorrect and partially recanted in RD600.
I believe it was Sir Edward Stradling having the wardship of Maurice
Dennys (per the HOP article on Sir Gilbert Dennys), plus Bishop
Beaufort being an overseer of Sir Gilbert's will that made Mr. Roberts
adjust his conclusion in RD600. If I'm incorrect and there was
further evidence, perhaps someone can provide particulars.
> References that show Katherine Stradling was the daughter of Sir Edward
> Stradling and the wife of Maurice Dennis but DO NOT mention her mother (3)
>
> Trans. Bristol & Gloucs. Arch. Soc. 12 (1887): 326-327.
>
> "Maurice Denys married twice: first, the dau. of Sir Edward Stradling,
> Knt., and, secondly, Alice, the dau. of Sir Nicholas Poyntz, of Iron Acton,
> Knt., by whom he was the father of Sir Walter, who was four times married."
I still think this wording means that Walter was the son of Alice
Poyntz - I don't see the ambiguity in the above statement. Perhaps
I'm missing it - if so, and someone could elaborate, I'd be grateful.
> Trans. Bristol & Gloucs. Arch. Soc. 23 (1900): 64-65.
>
> "Their son and heir, Morris, married Katherine, daughter of Sir Edward
> Stradling, and had son and heir, Sir Walter, who married Agnes, daughter
> and co-heiress of Sir Richard Danvers."
Both of these Bristol & Gloucs. extracts need to be put in perspective
- neither cite sources for their genealogical statements, and so are
not strong evidence either way. As sources for the heraldry and
memorial brasses, etc., though, they are very useful.
I stated in one of my long posts, and don't want it to get lost in the
shuffle - Siston Court may provide a valuable clue into the Dennys
heraldry - there are apparently many heraldic shields contained in
this Tudor-era manor house that the Dennises built. If there is a
Stradling one, that would be very good evidence for a Dennys/Stradling
marriage.
> G.T. Clark, Limbus Patrum Morganić et Glamorganić (1886): 381-382 (sub
> Dennis).
>
> Douglas Richardson posted to SGM on 17 Feb 2004 "I believe Katherine
> Stradling is mentioned as Maurice Dennys' wife on pages 381-382. I haven't
> double checked to make sure, however."
This should definitely be double-checked. I don't have easy access to
this source.
> References that show Sir Edward Stradling was the guardian of the lands
> and/or wardship of Maurice Dennis while he was a minor (2).
>
> C.F.R. 1413-1422 (1934): 100, 441-442.
>
> J.S. Roskell, House of Commons 1386-1421 2 (1992): 771-772 (biog. of Sir
> Gilbert Denys).
>
> "The overseers of the will were Bishop Henry Beaufort of Winchester, Bishop
> Philip Morgan of Worcester and Master Lewis Cocherche. Denys died on 24
> Mar. 1422 and
> his will came up for probate on 1 Apr. His heir was Maurice Denys, his
> eldest son by his second marriage, who, then aged 12, was granted in
> wardship to Edward Stradling, esquire (the husband of Bishop Beaufort's
> bastard)."
The HOP article gives Sir Edward Stradling wardship of the actual body
of the heir (Maurice) in addition to wardship of the lands. But the
Fine Rolls entry only mentions the lands - not the body of the heir.
It definitely does not mention the marriage of the heir. It's
possible Sir Edward Stradling eventually received the physical custody
plus the marriage of Maurice, but we don't have any evidence of this
yet.
> References that show Katherine as the daughter of Joan Beaufort (1)
>
> Visitation of Gloucester 1623 (H.S.P. 21) (1885): 49-52
This actually does not provide an identification of Katherine's mother
- there is no mention of Joan Beaufort in the pedigree.
> As Brad has pointed out, there is no contemporary source that makes
> Katherine Stradling the daughter of Joan Beaufort or the wife of Maurice
> Dennis. On the only relevant question for this generation in the line: who
> is the mother of Katherine Stradling, these 15 citations boil down to the
> Gloucestershire Visitation.
Yes.
> Katherine Stradling may well have been the daughter of Joan Beaufort but
> nobody has yet put forward a coherent argument, as opposed to a list of
> largely irrelevant references, which proves she was.
The argument seems to be that Bishop Beaufort would not have bothered
to intercede on behalf of his son-in-law receiving wardship of Maurice
Dennys if it was a bastard daughter of Sir Edward who was being
married off to the ward. Yet there is no evidence that the wardship
was granted to Sir Edward in the first place in order for him to marry
off a daughter, bastard or legitimate - the marriage of the heir was
not included in the grant of wardship.
> As Douglas Richardson is the primary author of the revision of the Deighton
> line it seems fitting that it should be him that explains why the 15
> references he provides for Katherine Stradling prove she is the daughter of
> Joan.
That would be interesting, for certain.
charl...@earthlink.net (Charles Carpenter) wrote in message news:
> I have two comments on Ms. Staley's excellent summary of the
evidence with regard to Katherine Stradling. First, G.T. Clark,
Limbus Patrum MorganiĂŚ et GlamorganiĂŚ (1886): 381-382 (sub Dennis)
cannot both give K Stradling as the daughter of E Stradling, and not
give K. Stradling as the daughter of E Stradling. Ms. Staley has
listed it twice -- I guess someone would have to look at the book, if
this was the key missing element.
Yes, if someone has ready access to this source, please give the
Dennis pedigree in it a look and post the findings.
>That distinction, though, brings up my second comment: the Visitation
of Gloucester does not show K. Stradling to be the daughter of Joan
Beaufort.
This is correct. One could surmise that if the Dennyses did have
Beaufort ancestry through Katherine Stradling via her mother, they
would have emphasized this to the 1623 herald in the Visitation.
After all it would make them relatively close kin to the Tudors.
Isn't there some kind of manuscript from the reign of Henry VII that
details all of his relations then living? I wonder if the Stradlings
and Dennyses are included?
> Correct me if I am wrong, but the state of the art prior to January
2004 was that Maurice Dennis' first wife was thought to have been a
bastard daughter of E. Stradling. This seems to be based on a 19th
century reference to E Stradling's many bastard children. Even if one
now accepts that this reference was to a different E Stradling -- and
coming to that conclusion seems to be the "new research" here -- we
are still lacking anything but mere supposition that K was the
daughter of Joan.
I'm not sure how definitive the 'new research' is regarding the many
bastards of Sir Edward Stradling (d. 1453) actually being a mistake
for the many bastards of his great-grandson Sir Edward Stradling
(alive temp-Elizabeth I).
I found this on a great Stradling website:
http://www.stradling.org.uk/docs/O_r_16.htm#KKKK
"The History of the Stradlings of St Donats
Together with that of the Parish, Manor and Castle.
"- T.C.Evans -
" Cardiff central Library Manuscript No. 3.166
Transcribed from the original by Dr Hugh Stradling, 1996
"The
Revd G Gamage - a connection of the Stradling family, writing in
1726 after a prolonged research in the then safely preserved St
Donats Library for materials for family history, thus writes
thereon.
"A further account of the Stradling family.
" Mr Gamages notes are far more copious than the foregoing
extracts from them would indicate; he is however sadly deficient
in dates. Col. Clark in the account of the family which
accompanies his "Thirteen Views", while stating little of the
marriages and collateral descents, is rich in dates and other
particulars relating to the lives of successive heads of the
houses. An attempt will be made to combine the best features of
the two sketches into one narrative.
[snip]
"He [Edward Stradling] married Jane, daughter of Henry Beaufort,
afterwards
Cardinal Beaufort, and with her received the manor of Halsway,
county of Somersetshire. In 1402, Edward Stradling had half a
burgage in Swansea from Alice Charles. In 1429 he granted the
manor of Lamphey to Cardinal Beaufort and others, no doubt as
trustees. In 1441, a recovery was suffered in the court of
Ogmore for the manor of lamphey. Sir Edward, Jane his wife,
Cardinal Beaufort & others being parties. In 1452, an
inquisition records Sir Edward as seized of Halfway and Combe Hawey
manors, and a burgage in Watchet. In 1480-81, Joan was seized of
Compton Hawey, Combe Hawey and Halfway manors. Col Clark says
Sir Edward died at Jerusalem. He appears to have had but one
son born in wedlock, but there was a numerous family of
illegitimate children begotten by him upon various women. These
says Col Clark with the names of their mother, as is common in
Welsh pedigrees, are recorded with such scrupulous accuracy, as
shows that their characters not to have materially suffered!
Many of these children founded families."
> Maybe "the truth is out there" still, but this Deighton descendant reluctantly concludes that we're not quite there yet.
Agreed - and the above passage from 1726 or so suggests that we must
look closely into the bastards of Sir Edward Stradling, and their
spouses, before we can dismiss them as either 1) Misascribed to Sir
Edward (d. 1453), and actually belonging to his great-grandson; 2) Not
of stature sufficient enough to warrant a marriage to a
tenant-in-chief family such as the Dennyses.
Thanks and Cheers to both of you for your posts.
----Brad
Jay
Of course if Walter Denys turns out to be the Alice Poyntz rather than
Katherine Stradling or some unnamed first wife, than I will have to
put all the stradlings into "reference" status and mark a bunch of
Poyntzs as ancestors. Now if someone would stumble over some long
overlooked document of the 15th century that would help us here.
Anybody planning to dig around in some dusty British archive any time
soon? ;-). Not likely to find any 15th century British documents
in these parts.
-Jay
Jay
have to put all sorts of notes and caveats down over the mother of
Walter Denys, the issue over whether Maurice had one wife, two wives,
and if the latter one named Katherine who was ? daughter of Edeard
Stradling and ?? daughter of Joan Beaufort.
On one methodological notes, was the wardship of Maurice Denys one
granted by the crown (for a fee) providing some lucrative benefits to
Edward Stradling and/or the Bishop Henry Beaufort, such that there may
be another motive beyond marrying a daughter (in Edward's case) or a
granddaughter ( in Henry's case) for getting involved in the wardship
of said Maurice, namely the remuneration from managing the Denys
estates? That far from being above such finagling, this was a
lucrative business even among even the greater magnates of the realm?
If so could this said to perhaps mute the evidence of the wardship
with respect to the case of Katherin Stradling as daughter of Edward
and granddaughter of Henry? I am not offering an opinion here, just a
question, I do not know the answer to this.
I would love to find there was a Katherine Stradling, and that she was
the mother of Walter, wife of Maurice, daughter of Edward AND Joan,
but so far all I have are messy scribbles of possibilities and caveats
thanks to this most intriguing discussion.
-Jay
Tim Powys-Lybbe
> Isn't there some kind of manuscript from the reign of Henry VII that
> details all of his relations then living?
Yes.
The manuscript is in the British Library, Harleian MS 1074, folio 286.
An article was made from this in Collectanea Topographica y Genealogica
I pp. 310 seq (a copy is in the Library of the Society of Genealogists,
London).
> I wonder if the Stradlings and Dennyses are included?
While I have copies of some of the pages of that article, I regret I
did not take copies of them all so am unable, currently, to help.
John Higgins
the Beauforts, but only those who had legitimate descendants. So Cardinal
Henry isn't mentioned, and thus the connections to Stradling and possibly to
Dennis are also omitted.
Therefore, no evidence for Katherine Stradling in this source either.
John Higgins
"Who begot whom is a most amusing kind of hunting" - Horace Walpole