Baskerville-arden

[Clagett, Brice]

Michael Miller and Tony Ingham's reconstruction of the Baskerville
family,
including details and sources generously shared with me off-list by
Tony,
show Richard Baskerville (1370-1394) as marrying Margaret de Ardern,
daughter of Sir Henry de Ardern. Margaret's first name was supplied by
Rosie Bevan, who showed that she m. (2) Sir Nicholas Montgomery and
was still living in 1436.

That she was an Ardern seems to rest solely on a record of 1381,
Calendar
of Fine Rolls 5 Richard II p. 276, which is a grant for 100 marks to Sir

Henry de Ardern of the marriage of Richard, son and heir of Richard
Baskerville, a minor in the king's ward. Do our experts consider that
this
is sufficient proof that Sir Henry married young Baskerville to his
daugh-
ter, or at least to establish the probability?

Sir Henry was not of the Cheshire Arderns but of the Warwickshire
family that later spelled its name usually as Arden; he was the first of
the
Ardens to live at Park Hall, in Castle Bromwich, and was an ancestor of
William Shakespeare.
Confusingly, he did have Cheshire connections and property by virtue
of his marriage to Ellen Whettenhall, whose mother was a Cheshire
Ardern. See Ormerod. Sir Henry's own male line traces back to Aelfwine,
earl or sheriff of Warwick temp. Edward the Confessor.