[Illustration] Vitalis Lovett of Rushton, in the county of
Northampton, who lived in the reign of Henry II., appears to be the
first proved ancestor of this venerable family, said to be of Norman
origin. William Lovett of Rushton, the son of Vitalis, held certain
lands in Henwick, also in Northamptonshire, of Richard Engaine and
his heirs by the service of finding two horsemen to follow the said
Richard to hunt the wolf in any part of England. This service was
remitted to John Lovet, son or grandson of William, in the reign of
Edward I., and in lieu thereof an annual rent-charge of ten
shillings was imposed. Soon after this period, viz: in 1304, (33
Edw. I.) Liscombe in the parish of Soulbury came into the family,
being in the possession of Robert Lovett and Sarah his wife,
daughter and heir of Sir Roger Turvile, from the second marriage of
their son Thomas, descended the Lovetts of Astwell in
Northamptonshire, since the reign of Elizabeth represented in the
female line by the Shirleys Earls Ferrers. Liscombe has from the
beginning of the fourteenth century remained the inheritance of the
elder branch of the Lovetts, though the direct descent has been
often interrupted. In 1781, Jonathan Lovett, the representative of
the family, was created a baronet by King George III. His Majesty's
remark on this occasion is preserved in Betham's Baronetage. "In the
summer of 1781, the Earl of Chesterfield having been some time
absent from court, was asked by the King where he had been so
long? 'On a visit to Mr. Lovett of Buckinghamshire,' said the
Earl. 'Ah,' said the King, 'is that Lovett of Liscombe? They are of
the genuine old Norman breed, how happens it that they are not
baronets? would they accept the title? Go tell him,' continued the
King, 'is that the title is much at his service; they have ever
stuck to the Crown at a pinch.'" The same work also gives a very
curious, and to an antiquary very tantalizing, account of the
ancient armour and documents once preserved at Liscombe, and
describes their melancholy fate. Sir Jonathan Lovett having died
without surviving male issue in 1812, the title of Baronet became
extinct and the property descended to his daughters; on the decease
of the survivor, Miss Eliza Lovett, in 1861, the ancient seat of
this venerable family reverted by her will to the next male heir,
the present representative of the family, descended from a younger
brother of Sir Jonathan Lovett, baronet.
See Baker's Northamptonshire, i. p. 732; Lipscombe's
Buckinghamshire, iii. p. 457; Stemmata Shirleiana, pr. pr., 1841, p.
58; Collectanea Topog. et Genealog. vi. p. 300, and Betham's
Baronetage.
ARMS.--Evidently allusive to the name, and to the service of hunting
the wolf, _Argent, three wolves passant in pale sable, armed and
langued gules_.
Present Representative, Jonathan Vaughan Lovett, Esq.