The Evolution of an English Town Part 12

of Sir Marmaduke Constable of Flamborough.

Sir Roger knighted 5th of Henry VIII., when English had a great victory over the Scots; died April 28th, 1538; bought Roxby.

[4]

Sir Richard, Called "The Great Black Knight of the North"; inherited property; knighted at battle of Musslebury Hill, 5th of Edw. VI.; m. 1st Margaret, d. of Wm. Lord Conyers.

[5]

John, Slain in his youth.

[6]

Anne, m. to the Earl of Westmoreland.

[7]

Margaret, m. Henry Gascoigne of Ledbury, near Richmond.

[8]

Francis, m. Mrs. June Boulmer; died without issue.

[9] and [10]

Richard and Roger, m. 2 b.a.s.t.a.r.d daus. of Dallrivers.

[Both set on one side.]

[11]

Margaret.

[12]

Jane.

[13]

Elizabeth.

[14]

Marmaduke.

[15]

Purchased many lands in Yorks, Manors of Whitby, Whitby lithe, and Stakesby purchased in 1555; lived at Roxby; m. 2nd Katherine (d. 1598), dau. of Henry, 1st Earl of c.u.mberland, widow of Lord John Scrope of Bolton.

[16]

Katherine.

[17]

Sir Henry, m. Margaret, dau. of Sir Wm. Babthorpe; succeeded Francis.

[18]

Sir Richard Cholmley, Born 1580, succeeded 1617, died 1632.

[19]

Sir Hugh Cholmley, the defender of Scarborough Castle.

Born 1600, succeeded 1632.

GENEALOGICAL TREE OF THE CHOLMLEYS OF ROXBY, NEAR PICKERING.

(Taken from the details given in the memoirs of Sir Hugh Cholmley.)

"I was," he says, "the first child of my dear mother, born upon the 22nd of July, being a Tuesday, and on the feast day commonly called Mary Magdalen's day, in the year of our Lord G.o.d 1600, at a place called Roxby, in the country of York, within the Hundred of Pickering lythe near to Thornton, now much demolished, but heretofore the chief seat of my great-grandfather, and where my grandfather, Sir Henry Cholmley, then lived, which place (since I was married was sold by my father and self, towards the payment of his debts)."

Sir Hugh then describes his weakness as a child due to the fault of his nurse. This gave him such "a cast back" that he was a weak and sickly child for many years.

"At three years old, the maid which attended me let me tumble out of the great chamber window at Roxby, which (by G.o.d's providence) a servant waiting upon my grandfather at dinner espying, leaped to the window, and caught hold of my coat, after I was out of the cas.e.m.e.nt. Soon after I was carried to my father and mother, who then lived with her brother Mr John Legard, at his house at Ganton nine miles from Roxby, where I continued for the most part until I was seven years old; then my father and mother going to keep house at Whitby, went with them, and beginning to ride a little way by myself, as we pa.s.sed over a common, called Paston moor [?

Paxton, above Ellerburne] one of my father's servants riding beside me, I had a desire to put my horse into a gallop; but he running away, I cried out, and the servant taking hold of my arm, with an intention to lift me from my horse, let me fall between both, so that one of them, in his gallop, trod on my hat; yet, by G.o.d's protection, I caught no harm."

When his father was living at Whitby he had another narrow escape. "The next year," he writes, "being 1608 upon my very birth-day, being the feast of Mary Magdalen, and I just eight years old, by G.o.d's great Providence, I escaped as great, if not greater danger than this; which was, that, at my Father's house, at Whitby aforesaid, there was a great fierce sow, having two pigs near a quarter old, which were to be reared there, lying close together asleep, near to the kitchen door, I being alone, out of folly and waggery, began to kick one of them; in the interim another rising up, occasioned me to fall upon them all, and made them cry; and the sow hearing, lying close by, came and caught me by the leg, before I could get up, and dragged me half a score yards, under the window of the room now called the larder, and what in respect of the age and the amazement I was in, could not help myself; from the leg she fell to bite me in the groin with much fierceness; when the butler, carrying a gla.s.s of beer to my father (then in his chamber) hearing me cry, set down the beer on the hall table, and running out, found the sow pa.s.sing from my groin to my throat."

Another famous name connected with this period is that of George Villiers, second Duke of Buckingham. After the death of Charles II. the royal favourite retired to his seat at Helmsley, his strength being very much impaired by the vicious life he had led at Court. He seems to have devoted himself to hunting and open-air sports. Certain stories connected with the Duke and mixed up with the usual superst.i.tions were told to Calvert nearly a hundred years ago.

"Near the Checkers' Inn at Slapstean," he says, "there stood until a few years agone the cottage in which there lived many years sen one Isaac Haw, who in his day did hunt the fox with George Villiers, and many a queer story did he use to tell. Here be one. There lived on the moor not over an hour's ride from Kirkby Moorside, one Betty Scaife, who had a daughter Betty, a good like wench." George Villiers seeing this girl one day is said to have induced her to become his mistress either by force or with her mother's consent. After having a dream she told Villiers to come near her no more, foretelling at the same time the time and death he would die.

He was so affected by this that he is said to have ridden away and never seen her again.

Haw also tells how he once rode on the moor with the spirit of the Duke of Buckingham, being not aware at the time that his Grace was dead. Villiers made an arrangement that when both were dead and the devil gave them a holiday they would both hunt together on a certain moor.

"There be those whose word has been handed down to us," continues Calvert, "who sware to having seen these two ahunting of a spirit fox with a spirit pack of a moonlight night. I know one who hath in memory a song of that day anent these two but it be so despert blasfemous that for the very fear of injuring the chance of my own soul's salvation I do forbear to give it, but if it be that you wish to copy on't, one Tom Cale a cobbler living in Eastgate Pickering hath to my knowledge a copy on't."

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE HOUSE AT KIRBY MOORSIDE IN WHICH THE 2ND DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM--THE FAVOURITE OF CHARLES II.--DIED.

The window of the bedroom is shown in the ill.u.s.tration. It is on the first floor at the right hand side of the house.

The Duke lived to the age of sixty in spite of his life of unbridled vice, and it seems that a sudden illness seized him after a hard day's hunting, and he died at the house in Kirby Moorside where he was taken instead of to Helmsley. The house is still standing, and one may even see the room in which the reckless Duke expired. As may be seen from the ill.u.s.tration the house is a good one, and at that time must have been, with one exception, the best in the village. The lines by Pope descriptive of the favourite's death are, therefore, quite unwarranted:--

"In the worst inn's worst room, with mat half hung, The floors of plaster and the walls of dung."

It never was an inn, and the Rev. R. V. Taylor[1] has discovered that the house was in the occupation of one of his tenants. I have carefully examined the house without finding anything to suggest that such squalor could have ever existed there. The staircase is very picturesque, and one of the bra.s.s drop handles on the bedroom doors shows that the building was a good one. The bedroom in which the Duke died has the fireplace blocked up; there is a recessed window containing a seat, and the walls, where they are panelled, are of fir, although the larger beams throughout the house seem to be of oak.

[Footnote 1: "Yorks.h.i.+re Notes and Queries," May 1904, p. 68.]

The sudden demise of this famous man must have created a sensation in the village, and although the body was not buried at Kirby Moorside, the parish register of that time has this illiterate entry[2]--

_"buried in the yeare of our Lord 1687 Marke Reame ..... Aprill y^e 12 Gorges viluas Lord dooke of bookingam etc. 19"_

[Footnote 2: The third volume of the registers at the top of page 4.]

A letter from Lord Arran to the Duke's late chaplain, dated April 17th, 1687, says, "I have ordered the corpse to be embalmed and carried to Helmsley Castle and there to remain till my Lady d.u.c.h.ess her pleasure shall be known. There must be speedy care taken; for there is nothing here but confusion, not to be expressed. Though his stewards have received vast sums, there is not so much as one farthing, as they tell me, for defraying the least expense." From this it appears that he died on or before the 17th of April, and that after the embalming process had been performed the intestines were buried at Kirby Moorside on the 19th and not on the 17th, as stated by Gill in his "Vallis Eboracensis."

One of the tattered registers[1] of Kirby Moorside also contains the following remarkable entry:--

"Dorythy Sowerbie of Bransdales (slayne with 6 bullett by theeves in the night) was buryed the 23th (sic) Day of May 1654." A few years before this in 1650 the burial is recorded of "a stranger that y^t sold stockins."

[Footnote 1: Vol. ii. p. 2]