William de Hoo

Notes:

Captain of Hammes (Pas-de-Calais); Captain of Oye Castle in Picardy, 1387-1402.

Family/Spouse: Eleanor Wingfield. Eleanor (daughter of Thomas Wingfield and Margaret de Bovile) died after 1414. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: Alice de Saint Omer. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Margaret married Thomas St. Clair before 8 Feb 1424. Thomas (son of Philip St. Clair and Margaret Lovaine) was born about 1403 in of Chalgrove, Oxfordshire, England; died on 6 May 1434. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Fought at Agincourt. Present at the siege of Rouen.

Thomas married Eleanor Felton before 18 Feb 1395. Eleanor (daughter of Thomas de Felton and Joan de Walkefare) was born about 1361; died on 8 Aug 1400. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Edith married Richard Harcourt before 1444. Richard (son of Thomas Harcourt and Jane Francis) was born about 1412 in of Witham, Berkshire, England; died on 1 Oct 1486. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Sheriff of Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire 1430. Esquire of the Chamber to Thomas Beaufort, Duke of Exeter. Chancellor in France and Normandy. Summoned to Parliament 2 Jan 1449, 5 Sep 1450, and 20 Jan 1453.

Thomas married Elizabeth Wychingham before 1 Jul 1428. Elizabeth (daughter of Nicholas Wychingham) died before 1445. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Thomas married Eleanor Welles before 1445. Eleanor (daughter of Lionel Welles and Joan Waterton) died before 1504. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: William Bessiles. William (son of Thomas Bessiles and Clemence Lydyard) was born in of Bessels Leigh, Buckland, Berkshire, England; died between 4 May 1515 and 18 May 1515; was buried in Friars Preachers, Oxford, Oxfordshire, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Christopher married Joan Stapleton before 1468. Joan (daughter of Miles Stapleton and Katherine de la Pole) died between 18 Apr 1518 and 10 Jun 1519. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Anne married Geoffrey Boleyn, Lord Mayor of London before 1445. Geoffrey (son of Geoffrey Boleyn and Alice Bracton) was born about 1405 in of London, England; died between 14 Jun 1463 and 2 Jul 1463; was buried in St. Lawrence Jewry, London, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Eleanor married James Carew about 1468. James (son of Nicholas Carew and Margaret Fiennes) was born in of Beddington, Surrey, England; died on 22 Dec 1492. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: Richard Fettiplace. Richard (son of John Fettiplace and Joan Fabian) was born in of East Shefford, Berkshire, England; died between 11 Aug 1510 and 15 May 1511. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: Agnes Darell. Agnes (daughter of Thomas Darell and Thomasine Gresley) died after 1508. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: Henry Heydon. Henry (son of John Heydon and Eleanor Winter) was born in of Baconsthorpe, Norfolk, England; died between 20 Feb and 22 May 1504 in Baconsthorpe, Norfolk, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Alice married John Fortescue before 1473. John (son of Richard Fortescue and Alice de Windsor) died on 28 Jul 1500 in Punsborne, Hertfordshire, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Baron of the Exchequer. A member of the Mercers’ Company and of Lincoln’s Inn.

William married Margaret Butler before 16 Nov 1469. Margaret (daughter of Thomas Butler and Anne Hankford) died before 20 Mar 1540. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

He was made a knight banneret by Henry VII after the battle of Blackheath, 1497.

Family/Spouse: Malyn Oxenbridge. Malyn (daughter of Robert Oxenbridge and Anne Lyvelode) died on 3 Oct 1544. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate death: 16 Aug 1568

Family/Spouse: Edward Purefoy. Edward (son of Nicholas Purefoy and Alice Denton) was born on 13 Jun 1494 in Etfield, Buckinghamshire, England; died on 1 Jun 1558; was buried in Shalstone, Buckinghamshire, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Sheriff of Staffordshire 1545-46. Knight of the shire for Staffordshire.

John married Margaret Barantyne before 1523. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Anne married Lionel Dymoke between 1505 and 17 Dec 1509. Lionel (son of Thomas Dymoke and Margaret Welles) was born in of Ashby, Lincolnshire, England; died on 17 Aug 1519; was buried in Horncastle, Lincolnshire, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: Katherine Willoughby. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

The History of Parliament article about her son Clement Paston correctly calls her "da. of Sir Henry Heydon of Baconsthorpe", but the link on Henry Heydon's name mistakenly goes to Henry Heydon (<1507-1559) of Watford, Hertfordshire, once thought to have been a great-great grandfather of PNH's immigrant ancestor Francis Heydon (d. 1694). This is obviously chronologically impossible. The irony is that the William Heydon who was her actual father was a son of a man who changed his name to Heydon because he thought it sounded more upmarket, and who stole his arms from the Watford Heydon family of whom the Henry Heydon who d. 1559 was a member.

Family/Spouse: William Paston. William (son of John Paston and Margery Brewse) was born about 1479; died on 20 Sep 1554 in Paston, Norfolk, England; was buried on 26 Sep 1554 in St. Margaret's, Paston, Norfolk, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

From the Catholic Encyclopedia (1913), citation details below:

Knight of St. John, martyr, b. about 1476, executed 10 July, 1539. He belonged to the Salden branch of the great Devonshire family of Fortescue, and was a true country gentleman of the period, occasionally following the King in the wars with France (1513 and 1522), not unfrequently attending the court, and at other times acting as justice of the peace or commissioner for subsidies. He was knighted in 1503 (Clermont; but D.N.B. gives 1528), attended the Field of the Cloth of Gold (1520), and late in life (1532) became a Knight of St. John. When Anne Boleyn became queen, Sir Adrian (whose mother, Alice Boleyn, was Anne's grand-aunt) naturally profited to some extent, but, as we see from his papers, not very much. The foundations of his worldly fortunes had been laid honourably at an eartier date. He was a serious thrifty man painstaking in business, careful in accounts, and a lover of the homely wit of that day. He collected and signed several lists of proverbs and wise saws, which, though not very brilliant, are never offensive or coarse, always sane, and sometimes rise to a high moral or religious level.

All of a sudden this quiet, worthy gentleman was overwhelmed by some unexplained whim of the Tudor tyrant. On 29 August, 1534, he was put under arrest, no one knows why, but released after some months. On 3 February, 1539, he was arrested a second time and sent to the Tower. In April he was condemned untried by an act of attainder; in July he was beheaded. No specific act of treason was alleged against him, but only in general "sedition and refusing allegiance". The attainder, however, went on to decree death against Cardinal Pole and several others because they "adhered themselves to the Bishop of Rome". Catholic tradition was always held that Sir Adrian died for the same cause, and modern Protestant critics have come to the same conclusion. His cultus has always flourished among the Knights of St. John, and he was beatified by Leo XIII in 1895.

Family/Spouse: Robert Clere. Robert (son of Robert Clere and Elizabeth Uvedale) was born in of Ormesby, Norfolk, England; died on 10 Aug 1529; was buried in Ormesby St. Margaret, Ormesby, Norfolk, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

1st Earl of Wiltshire. 1st Earl of Ormond. 1st Viscount Rochford.

Family/Spouse: Elizabeth Howard. Elizabeth (daughter of Thomas Howard and Elizabeth Tilney) was born about 1480; died on 3 Apr 1538. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Knight of the shire for Norfolk, 1529. Chancellor of the household of his neice, Anne Boleyn, 1533-36. Knight of the body to Henry VIII by 1533.

Family/Spouse: Elizabeth Wood. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: of Beddington, Surrey, England

Notes:

Nicholas Carew was a courtier and diplomat, knight of the shire for Surrey, sheriff of Surrey and Sussex 1518-19, and Master of the Horse to Henry VIII. A close friend and rousting partner of the king's for many years, he was eventually brought down by Thomas Cromwell. Accused and convicted of having been part of the Exeter Conspiracy, he was attainted and executed at Tower Hill on 3 Mar 1540. One of the jurors who convicted him was his wife's brother Francis Bryan, rake, libertine, trimmer, close friend of Henry VIII, remembered to history, for his efficient lack of any perceptible principle, as the "Vicar of Hell."

Nicholas married Elizabeth Bryan in Dec 1514. Elizabeth (daughter of Thomas Bryan and Margaret Bourchier) died between 21 May 1546 and 17 Jul 1546; was buried in St. Botolph's, Aldgate, London, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Mary married Thomas Dorne alias Thorne on 28 Oct 1540 in Shalstone, Buckinghamshire, England. Thomas (son of William Thorne and Alice Stotesbury) died before 9 Nov 1588 in Yardley Hastings, Northamptonshire, England; was buried on 9 Nov 1588 in Yardley Hastings, Northamptonshire, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Or Anne.

Agnes married John Knyvet about 1538. John (son of Edmund Knyvet and Jane Bourchier) was born about 1517 in of Ashwellthorpe, Norfolk, England; died before 1556. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Margery married Everard Digby before 1518. Everard (son of Everard Digby and Jacquetta Ellis) was born before 1472 in of Tilton, Leicestershire, England; died on 11 Apr 1540. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

See our entry on her husband Thomas Tyndall for a brief discussion of her death date.

Family/Spouse: Thomas Tyndall. Thomas (son of John Tyndall and Amphyllis Coningsby) was born about 1505 in of Hockwood, Norfolk, England; died about 25 Dec 1583. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Erasmus married Mary Wyndham after 22 Oct 1521. Mary (daughter of Thomas Wyndham and Eleanor Scrope) was born about 1508; died on 1 Jan 1597; was buried in Paston, Norfolk, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Knight of the shire for Norfolk, 1563.

Clement married Alice Pakington after 1567. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: of London, England
• Alternate birth: of Norwich, Norfolk, England

Notes:

Burgess for Bramber. Burgess for Thetford. Knight of the shire for Norfolk. Vice Admiral. Treasurer for the Army in France.

From the History of Parliament:

Rarely on good terms with his neighbours, above all the Pastons, Clere was not infrequently in the Star Chamber, where one complainant criticized his ‘covetous appetite and ungodly disposition’. At least in Henry VIII’s time he could treat such attacks the more lightly in that he enjoyed the patronage of the Howards: the 3rd Duke of Norfolk had been overseer of his father’s will and his younger brother Thomas, a servant of the Earl of Surrey, was to be commemorated in one of Surrey’s sonnets after dying from wounds received when he saved the earl’s life in France in 1545. It was during this phase of Clere’s career that he attended his first two Parliaments as Member for Bramber, one of the Howard boroughs in Sussex. He was one of a group around Surrey arrested during the second session of the Parliament of 1542 for eating flesh in Lent.

If it was as a courtier and a dependant of the Howards that he first came to public notice, it was as a naval captain and an administrator that Clere made his name. Early in 1548 he commanded a patrol in the North Sea and two years later he served in the Channel. His service at sea commended him to the admiral John Dudley, Viscount Lisle, whom in 1546 he accompanied to France to negotiate peace. Presumably he served under Dudley’s successor as admiral, Thomas, Baron Seymour of Sudeley, but nothing has come to light about his part in the Scottish war. Clere’s plundering of West Somerton church perhaps helped to foment Ket’s rebellion during 1548: he answered the Marquess of Northampton’s call for support from Norfolk gentlemen and after Northampton’s replacement by Dudley, then Earl of Warwick, he assisted in restoring order. Dudley rewarded him with lands said to have been promised to him by Henry VIII and with the treasurership of the army stationed in northern France until the surrender of Boulogne in 1550. His closeness to Dudley probably accounts for his Membership of the Parliament of March 1553 as much as his friendship with the leading resident at Thetford, Richard Fulmerston. During the succession crisis Clere seems to have declared for Lady Jane Grey and to have prevented a military force from Great Yarmouth from reaching Mary. When the tide turned in Mary’s favour his arms were impounded but he is not known to have been imprisoned. […]

[H]is appointment as vice-admiral at Portsmouth in the following year shows that he was regarded as politically reliable as well as professionally competent. His first mission, to escort Charles V on his voyage to retirement in Spain, brought him a gold chain from the ex-emperor, but his second was to prove fatal. In July 1557 he was given command of a fleet against Scotland which on 21 Aug. was surprised by an enemy force in the Orkneys, and in the engagement which followed he was drowned. Following his death the Council ordered an inquiry to be held into alleged disorders committed by his men in churches and religious houses in Scotland.

John married Anne Tyrrell before 19 Aug 1529. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Mary married William Carey in 1520. William was born about 1495; died on 22 Jun 1528. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Anne married Henry VIII, King of England in Jan 1533. Henry (son of Henry VII, King of England and lord of Ireland and Elizabeth of York, Queen Consort of England) was born on 28 Jun 1491 in Greenwich, Kent, England; died on 28 Jan 1547 in Hampton Court Palace, Richmond upon Thames, London, England; was buried in St. George's Chapel, Windsor, Berkshire, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Arthur Darcy and Mary Carew were both descendants of Edward III and Philippa of Hainault, he as a 6Xgreat-grandson and she as a 5Xgreat-granddaughter. By those descents they were, to one another, sixth cousins once removed. But in fact they were slightly more closely related than that: fifth cousins once removed by shared descent from Ralph de Greystoke and Katherine Clifford, and fifth cousins twice removed by shared descent from John de Welle and Maud de Ros.

Family/Spouse: Arthur Darcy. Arthur (son of Thomas Darcy and Dowsabel Tempest) was born in of Brimham, Yorkshire, England; died on 3 Apr 1561; was buried in St. Botolph's, Aldgate, London, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Also called Susanna Thorne.

Susanna married Capt. Roger Dudley on 8 Jun 1575 in Lidlington, Bedfordshire, England. Roger died before 29 Oct 1588. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Abigail married Martin Sedley in 1577. Martin (son of Martin Sedley and Elizabeth Mounteney) was born about 1531 in of Morley, Norfolk, England; died about 1609; was buried on 10 Feb 1610 in St. Peter's Chapel, Morley, Norfolk, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Knight of the shire for Stamford, 1539, and for Rutland in 1545, 1547, Mar 1553, Oct 1553, 1555, 1558, 1559, 1571, 1572, and 1584. Educated at Brasenose College, Oxford and at the Middle Temple. Sheriff of Rutland 1541-42, 1549-50, 1553-54, 1561-62, 1567-68, 1575-76, and 1585-86.

"Whatever knowledge of the law Digby had acquired at the Middle Temple, an inn with which he retained a connexion for many years, was put to both public and private use: regularly named to commissions of oyer and terminer for the midlands, he was also consulted on legal matters by his friends and relatives, for whom he often acted as a feoffee. It was perhaps his legal bent which in 1572 prompted his demand to see the 3rd Earl of Huntingdon’s patent of lieutenancy before acknowledging Huntingdon’s standing in the county, a piece of officiousness which incensed the earl. With so ardent a Puritan as Huntingdon, however, Digby can have felt little at ease: in 1564 he was reported to be ‘indifferent’ in religion but towards the end of his life he was described as unsound in faith and one of his sons was a notable Catholic." [History of Parliament]

Family/Spouse: Anne Cope. Anne (daughter of Anthony Cope and Jane Crewes) died after 1591. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Sheriff of Norfolk and Suffolk in 1565-66.

“He played little part in national affairs but took a prominent role in the government and political life of his native county and was known as a careful administrator and a ‘just and painstaking magistrate’ [...] A supporter of Edmund Freake, bishop of Norwich (1575–84), Paston was involved in the bitter conflict between the bishop and the puritans for control of the chancellorship of the diocese in 1578. He was described by Bishop Scrambler as an ‘observer of law’ which has been taken to mean that his religious views were either conformist Church of England or impartial (Smith, 214). In 1597 he moved to the new house which his uncle, Sir Clement Paston, had built at Oxnead. Known for his liberality, hospitality and benefactions, Paston is chiefly remembered for the founding and endowment of North Walsham grammar school (the Paston School), in 1606.” [Oxford DNB, citation details below.]

As he lived through her entire reign, presumably he was aware that queen Elizabeth was his third cousin, both of them being great-great grandchildren of London mayor Geoffrey Boleyn and his wife Anne Hoo.

William married Frances Clere on 5 May 1551 in St. Margaret's, Paston, Norfolk, England. Frances (daughter of Thomas Clere and Ann Gyggs) was born in 1531; died in 1610. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate death: 3 Jun 1606, London, England

Notes:

Burgess for Thetford 1557-58, 1562-63. Burgess for Grampound 1571. Sheriff of Norfolk and Suffolk 1567-68. Sheriff of Norfolk 1580-81.

From the History of Parliament (citation details below):

Though a younger son, Clere succeeded to an extensive patrimony on the north-east coast of Norfolk, being licensed to enter his lands on 22 Feb. 1558. In May of that year he purchased further property at Wymondham, and in 1561, on the death of his great-uncle Sir James Boleyn he inherited Blickling, which he made his chief seat. On the death of his father-in-law (Sir) Richard Fulmerston in 1567, Clere and his wife came into possession of most of his extensive estates in and around Thetford as well as inheriting most of his personal property.

Thus, after 1567 Clere was one of the greatest landowners in Norfolk, appearing in 1588 on Lord Burghley’s list of ‘knights of great possessions’ able to support a peerage. He was a second cousin to the Queen and to Lord Hunsdon, and brother-in-law to Walter Haddon, the master of requests. His connexion with the Duke of Norfolk through his father-in-law Fulmerston, the Duke’s servant, caused him to be among those questioned on Norfolk’s arrest in October 1569, and in September 1571 he and others were ordered to take an inventory of the Duke’s goods at Kenninghall. In 1570 he was made collector in Norfolk of the forced loan. This inevitably made him unpopular with his fellow gentry, and gave rise to probably well-founded accusations of fraud and extortion. He was also in conflict with his manorial tenants, and at loggerheads with the Thetford corporation. He had to attend upon the Privy Council for a while after the forced loan episode, but he never lost the Council’s confidence. In 1578 he entertained the Queen during her Norfolk progress, ‘worthily feasted’ her retinue, and was knighted by the Queen at Norwich. In 1583 he signed a petition on behalf of certain puritan ministers and four years later was noted by the bishop of Norwich as a ‘favourer of religion’.

Clere’s election at Thetford to the Parliaments of 1558 and 1563 was due to the local influence of his father-in-law, Fulmerston. Clere succeeded to Fulmerston’s land in 1567 and what made him resort to Grampound for a seat in 1571 is not evident, nor is it clear who was his patron there. Possibly there was a court connexion with the 2nd Earl of Bedford. Clere’s committee work concerned the continuance of statutes (20 Mar. 1563), priests disguised as servants (1 May 1571), and tillage and the navy (25 May 1571). He spoke on the treasons bill (9 Apr. 1571), the anonymous diarist commenting, ‘Mr. Clere of Norfolk, a gentleman of great possessions, made hereupon a staggering speech: his conclusion I did not conceive’. Of another speech, again on a religious topic (11 Apr.), he wrote ‘such was my ill hap I could not understand what reason he made’. D’Ewes records Clere as speaking on the bill for Bristol, also on 11 Apr. In the discussion on Strickland’s case on 20 Apr., he defended the prerogative of the Crown.

In 1572 Clere decided to try for the county seat, Sir Thomas Cornwallis reporting just before the election that Clere ‘leaveth no stone untouched that may further his part’, and that ‘a great number of the shire’ were ‘evil affected towards him’. Unsuccessful, he wrote a series of letters to Richard Southwell, whom he had addressed as ‘loving cousin and friend’ when canvassing support beforehand, describing his ‘found falsehood’, and contrasting Southwell’s ‘overt action in so great an assembly’ with his ‘former pretended opinion’.

In October 1586 he and his fellow deputy lieutenant Sir William Heydon were ordered by the Privy Council to ensure that at the new election of knights of the shire ‘fit men may be chosen, known to be well affected to religion and the present estate’, and Clere wrote to his friend, Bassingbourne Gawdy, suggesting that he stand, adding that if he himself were not incapacitated by a rupture, he ‘should be willing to be with you there’. The Norfolk gentry at this time were divided. In the north of the county Clere and Sir William Heydon, after initial quarrels over the rights of Clere’s second wife to the Heydon manor of Saxlingham, had united against Nathaniel Bacon, the Knyvet and Wyndham families and others of their neighbours. Soon after the 1586 election they apparently persuaded the lord lieutenant, Hunsdon, to replace Sir Thomas Knyvet by their friend Sir Arthur Heveningham as a deputy lieutenant, and had several of their opponents turned off the commission of the peace. During the next few years Clere can generally be found on the side of Heveningham in the latter’s quarrels with the Bacon faction over such contentious matters as the organisation of county musters.

Clere’s eldest son Edward, already in 1585 ‘in peril divers ways of imprisonment and shame’, was accused in the next reign of sheltering a seminary priest and from 1606 spent much of his life in prison. Clere therefore did his best to keep his property out of his eldest son’s hands, though he could not break the entail on the Fulmerston estate. By various settlements and by his will, made in April 1605, he divided the rest between the younger sons, Sir Francis and Robert, and his grandson Henry. Most of the land eventually reverted to Henry, who became a baronet in 1620 and died s.p. in 1622. Clere’s will contained bequests to other relatives, and arranged for the foundation of a fellowship and scholarship at St. John’s, Cambridge. Most of the personal property was left to the widow, the sole executrix, who had a life interest in Blickling. One of the two supervisors was his ‘old well tried friend’ Dru Drury. Clere died in London on 3 June 1606, and was buried at Blickling.

Edward married Frances Fulmerston about 16 Dec 1554. Frances (daughter of Richard Fulmerston and Alice Lonzam) died on 20 Mar 1580 in Blickling, Norfolk, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Katherine married Francis Knolles on 26 Apr 1540. Francis was born about 1512; died on 19 Jul 1596; was buried in Rotherfield Greys, Oxfordshire, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: Katherine Tyrwhit. Katherine (daughter of Robert Tyrwhit and Elizabeth Oxenbridge) died in 1567. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: Elizabeth Conyers. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Edward Darcy was Groom of the Privy Chamber to Elizabeth I, 1583-1603. He graduated from Trinity College, Cambridge in 1561, and was admitted at the Inner Temple in Nov 1561. Special ambassador to Francis, Duke of Anjou and William of Orange in 1583. Burgess (M.P.) for Truro, Cornwall, in 1584; justice of the peace in Kent from 1604 to his death.

His lifelong cupidity appears to have been notable even by the standards of Elizabethan court society. From his entry in the History of Parliament: "In 1594 the attorney-general protested at the nomination of one Wiseman to the post of clerk of the outlawries, after Darcy had virtually put up the office for auction, and in 1600 the widow of Edward Denny petitioned against Darcy's attempt to obtain part of the proceeds of the sale of her late husband's office. He had little need, she wrote, 'to suck this small portion of her Majesty's favour from the hungry mouths of my children'. [...] His patent for searching and sealing leather, which he was granted in 1592 (or 1593), led him to commit 'such exactions and outrages as disquieted all England', and his privileges were first reduced (in 1595) and then (before May 1598) replaced by a new patent for the monopoly of importing and manufacturing playing cards." Sometime between then and 1602, Darcy sued Thomas Allin (also spelled Allain, Allein, Allen, etc.), haberdasher of London, for infringing on his playing-card patent. In what came to be regarded as a landmark case in English law, known to history as the "Case of Monopolies," the King's Bench ultimately ruled against Darcy, declaring his patent void because monopolies are ultimately damaging to the public good. The arguments set forth in the verdict were later much quoted in the various deliberations leading to the creation of modern antitrust and competition law.

His loss in court can't have broken his stride too badly; he was knighted the next year, on 23 Apr 1603, and retired to live the comfortable life of a wealthy man.

——

Edward Darcy (1543-1612) = Elizabeth Astley
Robert Darcy = Grace Reddish
Edward Darcy = Elizabeth Stanhope [1]
Katherine Darcy (d. 1713) = Erasmus Phillips (d. 1697) [2] [3]
Elizabeth Phillips (b. abt 1664) = John Shorter [4]
Catherine Shorter (1682-1737) = Robert Walpole (1676-1745) [5]
Horace Walpole (1717-1797)

[1] Daughter of Philip Stanhope, 1st Earl of Chesterfield.

[2] Erasmus Phillips and Katherine Darcy were parents of Sir John Phillips of Pembrokeshire, a leading Welsh social and religious reformer.

[3] Through his mother, Elizabeth Dryden, Erasmus Phillips was a first cousin of the poet John Dryden, a second cousin once removed to Jonathan Swift, and a first cousin once removed to Mrs. Ann Marbury Hutchinson, the antinomian religious reformer who was famously cast out of the early Massachusetts Bay colony.

[4] John Shorter was a son of John Shorter (1625-1688), Lord Mayor of London.

[5] Robert Walpole is generally considered to have been the first Prime Minister of England in the modern sense.

——

Edward Darcy (1543-1612) = Elizabeth Astley
Catherine Darcy (1581-1646) = William West (b. 1575)
Elizabeth West (1606-1669) = Francis Vane (1617-1680)
Francis Vane (1643-1691) = Hannah Rushworth (1646-1705)
Henry Vane (1669-1726) = Anne Scrope (1673-1721)
Thomas Fane (1701-1871) = Elizabeth Swymmer (1708-1782)
Mary Fane (1739-1809)= Charles Blair (b. 1735)
Charles Blair (1776-1820)
Thomas Richard Arthur Blair (1802-1867) = Frances Catherine Hare (1823-1867)
Richard Walmesley Blair (1857-1939) = Ida Mabel Limouzin (1875-1943)
Eric Blair (George Orwell) (1903-1950)

Family/Spouse: Elizabeth Astley. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]