to imply that Joyce, as well as Katharine, had married an Edkins. I
have made careful researches in every possible direction, but have been
unable to trace a Joyce Edkins, except the sister of William Hill. I
am inclined, therefore, to think that either Adam Palmer or the clerk
slipped in giving the name of Edkins to Joyce, as well as to Katharine.
She should have been Joyce Arden with her share in the other property.
The fate of Joyce has yet to be discovered, if she was not buried, as
I suggested was possible, in Pedmore, in 1557 (see my “Shakespeare’s
Family,” p. 181).
Perhaps Adam Palmer’s responsibilities had worn him out, and he had
begun to mix things up, though in other points his testimony was clear.
It was well for Robert Webbe that he was then alive. He was buried at
Aston Cantlow, 13th July 1584.
Though this Chancery case does not yield us much new matter, it makes
real our somewhat hazy notions of the property settled on Shakespeare’s
aunts. But the whole series of documents, taken together, teach
us a great many important points regarding the poet’s family and
surroundings. It lets us picture the house abutting on the High Street
where John Shakespeare was doubtless born, the extent of the united
properties, and the stretches of the common fields which the poet
doubtless haunted in his youth to catch the conies, permitted to the
freeholders. But, above all, it answers conclusively the question,
so mockingly put by the Baconians, Where did the Stratford man learn
his law? There are more legal documents concerning this Snitterfield
property than were drawn up for any other family of the time in
Warwickshire, as anyone may test who wades through the “Feet of Fines,”
and as few of his relatives could write, it is possible they could not
read. William Shakespeare may have had but little Latin, but he was
very likely esteemed as the scholar of the family, and doubtless had
all these deeds by heart, through reading them to his anxious and
careful relatives when they were brought out of the “box of evidences,”
to strengthen the case for the defendant against Thomas Mayowe. The law
papers of the Ardens, and the litigation of his father, prepared him
alike for his many later personal associations with the law, and for
the conduct of the Chancery case which he hugged to his heart during
ten years at least. I trust soon to follow this out.
_“Athenæum,” 24th July and 14th August 1909._
FOOTNOTES:
[1] The very first entry in the Bearley Register, now kept at Wootten
Wawen, is that of the marriage of Agnes Hewens, widow, to Thomas
Stringer, 15th October 1550. It may be noted that this was three months
_after_ she was called “wife of Thomas Stringer” here.
[2] The Registers of Aston Cantlow parish church only begin in 1560.
[3] Endorsed with memoranda of assignment, by Robert Webbe, to Will
Cookes of Snitterfield, yeoman, before the delivery of the deed of
bargain and sale by Edward Cornwell, to the said Robert Webbe, in
presence of John Dafferne, Hastings Aston, Thomas Chamberlain, Thomas
Nicholson, and Henry Talbot.
[4] A writ was issued for Robert Webbe to appear before the Court of
Exchequer for _alienation_ without licence of lands in Snitterfield,
12th November 21 Eliz. (1579), Misc. Doc., vii, 51.
[5] In this there was either a mistake in the Christian name or the
original intention was to make the arrangement in the name of the
grandfather instead of the father of Mary Perkes.
[6] After the will of John Scarlett of Newnam, 10th December 1581, is
an inventory of goods valued at £23. The inventory of Adam Scarlett of
Wilmecote, with the will proved 1st September 1591, was £117, a very
large amount for the period.
III
SHAKESPEARE AND ASBIES
A NEW DETAIL IN JOHN’S LIFE
The story of Shakespeare’s lost inheritance is the clue to the shaping
of the poet’s life, and therefore it is worth gleaning every scrap
of information concerning it. What is commonly known is, that Robert
Arden, of Snitterfield and Wilmecote, had made his will in 1556,
leaving the first (or the reversion of it after his wife’s death) to
be divided among six of his daughters.[7] Another daughter, Elizabeth
Scarlet, seems to have been otherwise provided for, and the youngest
daughter Mary, either because she was his favourite, or because of the
old Saxon preference for the youngest child, was given the sole right
in the freehold at Wilmecote called Asbies. There is no record of its
purchase. My own opinion is that Thomas Arden, the father of this
Robert, was the second son of Sir Walter Arden of Park Hall, who was
to receive, by his father’s will in 1502, ten marks a year for life,
his younger brothers receiving five marks a year. They all seem to have
been provided for beyond this meagre allowance. At the date of the will
Thomas was already resident in Wilmecote. How and why he went there is
the question. Aston Cantlow had long been part of the inheritance of
the Beauchamps, who intermarried with the Nevilles, and some connection
of the Beauchamps with the Ardens can be proved by the family pedigree.
Elizabeth Beauchamp was godmother to Elizabeth Arden, Thomas Arden’s
sister (as French believes), and it is quite probable this little
farm was given to, or bought for, the settlement of, Thomas Arden.
What I wish to suggest is that Asbies was to the family the cherished
heirloom, the visible link of connection between their branch and the
historic family from which they sprang, and that some family jealousy
may have arisen through its being absolutely left to the youngest child.
We know little about this Thomas, but much more about his younger
brother Robert. He was yeoman of the King’s Chamber in Henry VII’s
reign, and received many royal patents and grants during the reigns of
Henry VII and Henry VIII. Leland mentions him: “Arden of the Court,
is younger brother to Sir John Arden of Park Hall” (“Itin.,” vi,
20). Among the Feet of Fines for Warwickshire, Trinity Term 18 Henry
VIII, is an entry to the effect that Robert Arden, Arm., settled an
annuity on Antonio Fitzherbert “from the Manor of Ward Barnes, formerly
Wilmecote”; whether this refers to the uncle, “Robert, of the Court,”
or the nephew, Robert of Wilmecote, it refers to the district.
Now, it is not a little remarkable that the Shakespeares’ little
property had only “a local habitation and a name” of _Asbies_, during
the life of Mary Arden and her immediate Arden relatives. It is not
known before, it has not been known since. Either it changed its name,
or was swamped in a larger estate. We cannot give its boundaries.
Halliwell-Phillipps shows that it could not have been by the cottage
_now_ called Mary Arden’s Cottage[8] at Wilmecote, for he had traced
other owners back to 1561, but he seems to think that Robert Arden had
lived in Asbies. Now it is quite clear from his will that his widow
Agnes was to have his _copy-hold_ in Wilmecote, so that she allowed his
daughter Alice quietly to enjoy half, and it seemed they had occupied
that property. This copyhold was probably for three lives, as it lapsed
at Agnes Arden’s death in 1581, _after_ the trouble at Asbies.
On Mary’s marriage an interest in Asbies would accrue to her husband,
which by the courtesy of England he would retain for life. During
Shakespeare’s youth it would be the basis of his father’s farming
industries, and perhaps, after the common fashion of the time, the
prospective source of support for the family, in a manner stigmatized
by the Earl of Leicester as lazy, selfish, and without public spirit
or family pride.[9] It is perfectly certain it was intended to be the
inheritance of William Shakespeare, and that he was prepared to be a
small farmer, for which reason he was not trained to any profession,
nor apprenticed to any trade. (All “traditions” on this question are
untrustworthy.)
John Shakespeare had purchased in 1556, the year of the settlement of
Asbies, a house and garden in Greenhill Street, Stratford-upon-Avon,
and another in Henley Street, where he had been living since 1552 (see
View of Frankpledge, Borough of Stratford, P.R.O., Portfolio 207), so
he had a town home to offer the heiress of Asbies when he married her
the following year. He seemed, having been Bailiff and Chief Alderman,
to go on in prosperity till October 1575, when he again purchased two
houses in Stratford, one of them also in Henley Street. From that date
his fortunes declined. Whether it was failure in the wool industry, or
the misfortunes of his brother Henry at Ingon, or special losses of his
own, John Shakespeare was in money trouble by 1578. Some have suggested
it was through recusancy, because a much later State Paper list gives
his name among recusants. I have elsewhere shown the John Shakespeare
there mentioned was much more likely to have been the shoemaker who
disappeared shortly after from the town. That the ex-Bailiff John’s
difficulties were well known, and that his fellow aldermen sympathized
with him, is shown in the Chamberlain’s accounts, where John is
excused by his brethren from the burdens they put on themselves. He
required money, and must have it somehow. His nephew Robert Webbe had
been prospering in Snitterfield while he was declining, was, indeed,
stimulated by the ambition and help of a prospective father-in-law,
beginning to buy up the shares of his aunts in Snitterfield. Mary Arden
had been left no share there, as Halliwell-Phillipps suggests, but
apparently by this date, through the death of her two next youngest
sisters, had become possessed of the share of the one by will, and of
the share of the other, without a will, by partition.
It is nearly certain that John and Mary Shakespeare would have gone
to Robert Webbe first for a loan on the security of Snitterfield, or
even to sell it outright. But he had just bought in the share of the
Stringers (see Feet of Fines, Easter, 21 Eliz.), and would be short of
money. They turned to their brother-in-law Edmund Lambert, who had
sufficient money, but he would not trust it with John Shakespeare in
his depressed state on any lesser security than that of the family
jewel, of Asbies. He drew up an indenture, purporting to be an absolute
sale, for £40, with this condition, that if the money was repaid on
Michaelmas Day 1580 at Barton-on-the-Heath the sale was to be void.
But in the final concord, as preserved among the Feet of Fines for
Warwickshire, Easter 1579, there is no allusion to this condition.
Hence arose the trouble. When he had secured the money, John made a
very complex arrangement. Asbies had evidently been leased to George
Gibbes. He found Thomas Webbe and Humphrey Hooper willing to buy the
lease from John and Mary Shakespeare and George Gibbes for twenty-one
years from 1580, and to hand it back to George Gibbes. There must have
been money paid down for that lease, as it was clinched by a fine in
Feet of Fines, Hilary Term 1579 (230).
Though John had received the £40 from Lambert, plus the fine from
Webbe and Hooper, he was evidently still in need, as we may learn from
Roger Sadler’s will. Among the debts due to him were “Item of Edmonde
Lamberte and ---- Cornish for the debte of Mʳ John Shaksper £5” (Prin.
Prob. Reg. Som. House 1 Bakon. 17th January 1578-9). We have had no
information concerning the events of the following two years. But it
appears that John must have committed some indiscretion about that
time, which must seriously have affected his fortunes. Many years ago
I had discovered a fine against his name in the Coram Rege Rolls,
but laid it aside until I had leisure to work up the case. Not long
since, with the help and advice of Mr. Baildon, I spent some weeks
investigating likely papers, but found no further facts than those
first gleaned, two separate yet connected cases among the unnumbered
pages of the “fines” at the end of Coram Rege Roll, Trinity 22 Eliz. (a
few pages from the end, half way down “Anglia” on the right). There we
are told that John Shakespeare of Stratford super Avon in Co. Warr.,
yeoman, because he had not appeared before the Lady the Queen in her
court at Westminster, as summoned, to be bound over to keep the peace,
at a day now past, was due to pay £20, and that his two sureties were
to pay a fine of £10 each, for not having produced him. His sureties
were John Awdley of the town of Nottingham, co. Notts, Hatmaker, and
Thomas Colley of Stoke in co. Stafford, yeoman. This becomes more
serious, because the next case is against John Awdelay Hatmaker of the
town of Nottingham co. Notts. Because he did not appear before the
Court of the Queen when summoned at a day now past, bringing sufficient
security, to be bound over to keep the peace, he was to be fined £40.
And John Shakespeare of Stratford on Avon yeoman, one of the two
securities for John Awdelay, because he had not brought him before the
Queen on the day appointed, was to pay £20, and Thomas Colley, another
of the securities, was also to be fined £20.
I looked through several terms before and after to see if there were
any suit in the Coram Rege Rolls on which this may have been based, a
difficult job, as I had no clue to the name of a plaintiff or a county
to guide me. The only further reference was in the Exchequer accounts,
where, under “Anglia,” “Warr.,” “Villa Notts,” and “Staff.” the same
parties are entered for the same fines, Exchequer K. R. accounts
109/13, m. 22. d. Fines and Amerciaments Coram Regina Trinity Term 22
Eliz. Here, then, John had another £40 to pay, evidently unexpectedly,
in association with two men who have not yet been connected with his
biography. Whether he did not appear as defendant, or as witness in
some case when summoned, or whether he had committed some trespass, or
had a free fight with some one, as his brother Henry had with Edward
Cornwall in 1587, I have not been able to prove. In searching the
Controlment Rolls, Mich. 22 Eliz., I had a surprise. Among a number of
names from various counties of persons who “indicati sunt de eo qud
Corpes felonici interfecere et murderfare” was “John Shakespeare.” The
very date. It was a relief to see that he was “late of Balsall, co.
Warr.” I was allowed to get out some bundles of “ancient Indictments”
which had not been searched, and found in No. 650 that the said John
Shakespeare, by the instigation of the Devil, and his own malice, made
a noose of rope fast to a beam in his house and hanged himself on 23rd
July 21 Eliz. He had goods only to the value of £3 14_s._ 4_d._ which
John Piers, the Bishop of Winchester, as chief almoner to the Queen,
granted by way of alms to the widow, Matilda Shakespeare. (In the
inventory of the goods are included some painted cloths.)
Though John of Stratford’s fortunes were nothing so tragic as those
of John of Balsall, he was in a bad enough way. His fine was money
entirely _lost_, through some folly; and he seems to have lost money
otherwise. He had to sell both the Snitterfield shares to Robert Webbe
outright, and he went down on Michaelmas 1580 to Barton-on-the-Heath
with the redemption money of Asbies in his pocket. Edmund Lambert
refused to receive it and release the mortgage until John paid him
also other debts he owed him; but we know from later litigation that
he had promised, when these other debts were paid, to take the £40 and
release the mortgage at any time. And again John Shakespeare trusted
his brother-in-law’s word.
The last implicit sign of the family possession of Asbies is preserved
in a little book among the State Papers, April 1580 (which none of
the Baconians appear to have noted). This is a list of “the Gentlemen
and Freeholders of the County of Warwick.” Among these appear John
Shakespeare of Stratford on Avon (the name spelt so) and Thomas
Shakespeare of Rowington. In another list the contracted form of the
name is used. But the freehold was slipping from him. He could not find
sufficient money to pay _everything_ at once. There is no doubt that
his son’s impulsive marriage would increase his money difficulties.
So time passed on, and he was fighting from hand to mouth, until on
1st March 1587 Edmund Lambert died, still holding Asbies. Though John
Lambert, the heir, seems to have been offered the money, he refused
it, and took possession. He was not going to be bound by a mere verbal
promise of his father, even if it had ever been made. There seem to
have been family councils, friendly, logical, and legal pressure
applied. John Lambert refused to give up the desirable family property.
But a counter proposition was made to him, and under pressure, to
secure peace, he seems to have agreed on 26th September 1587, at
the house of Anthony Ingram, gent., at Walford Parva, to pay £20
extra by instalments, beginning on 18th November 1587, and again the
Shakespeares trusted a Lambert’s word.
Now it cannot be too carefully considered, that it was the private
discussions and decisions about the return of Asbies, that were the
deciding factors in John and William Shakespeare’s life. Then they
learnt that John Lambert was determined not to give up Asbies; they
knew they could not go to Common Law, having for testimony only the
word of a dead man. And William Shakespeare, already the father
of three children, felt that he must make a career somewhere, and
determined on trying London. Why not? Many of his friends had gone
there and prospered. His father would have the £40 he was ready to
pay for Asbies. He would have introductions enough, and he probably
reckoned on the £20 that John Lambert was to pay to make up the
sale-value of Asbies to a more just proportion as likely to come to
himself. We know that he suffered disillusionment; we know that John
Lambert did not pay that £20, denied even that he had promised it, and
the next step taken was the commencement of proceedings against him for
£20 at the Common Law. It is certain that, however it might be entered
in his parents’ name, William Shakespeare, as the heir apparent, was
associated formally with it, probably instructed the attorneys, and did
all the personal duties of a “complainant.” And thus, by a peculiar
combination of circumstances, the first time William Shakespeare’s name
was written in London, the first time it was spoken in London, _was in
the Law-Courts_![10] The case teaches us certain details, which have
not yet been made the most of, but it seemed to die out, possibly from
lack of funds among the complainants. Lambert did not pay. And the
fierce fight with fate which Shakespeare made took place during the
next few years.
“There’s a divinity that shapes our ends.” Fortune turned in time.
Shakespeare found work at the theatre, seems to have been liberally
treated, though at first servitor or apprentice, and soon had a house
in Bishopsgate Street, on which he was assessed higher than either
of the Burbages. So it may reasonably be inferred he had his family
by him at least by 1594, for a time. He never forgot Asbies. So when
he did prosper he applied for arms for his father, bought the best
house in Stratford for his wife and got his father and mother to have
another fight for Asbies, this time in a court in which he thought he
had a better chance of success. The Complaint on 24th November 1597
of John Shackespeare and Mary his wife and Answer have been printed
among Special Proceedings in Chancery, Halliwell-Phillipps has them,
and also the Decrees and Orders, but the details have not been worked
out. Again John Shakespeare committed an indiscretion. Either his
attorney mistook, or John, thinking that William was putting himself
in power too much, had put forward a second complaint in _his own name
only_. Of course, Lambert complained of this, and was supported. John
had to withdraw one of his complaints and pay the expenses of both
parties in it, and Lambert had permission to change his commissioners
if he pleased. In Decrees and Orders, 18th May 1598, John Lambert’s
Counsel said that John had exhibited a bill in the name of himself
and his wife, and then a bill in his own name, had taken out his
commission but examined no witnesses (D. and O. A. 1598, Trin. 706).
On 27th June they had powers given to elect a commission to examine
witnesses by the octaves of Michaelmas, directed to Richard Lane, John
Combes, William Berry and John Warner. On 6th July 1598 (B. Book,
133), a new commission was appointed, and John Lambert changed his
commissioners, probably finding those chosen first too much in favour
of the Shakespeares. The new commission reads, Richard Lane, John
Combes, Thomas Underhill, and Francis Woodward. The interesting part in
such cases is the examination of witnesses. But the depositions have
not been preserved; (I have sought for them very carefully both in
Stratford and P.R.O.). That they had been taken, and had been in favour
of the Shakespeares may be inferred by the entry,
“John Shakespeere and Mary his wife:--Yf the defendant shew no cause
for stay of publication by this day sennight then publication is
granted” (23rd October, Mich. 41 & 42 Eliz. D. and O. B. 1599).
This is the last word concerning the case, and we are left to surmise
the sequel. Whether John Lambert, finding himself about to be beaten,
put as a bar the Coram Rege case, and the Shakespeares’ offer to accept
£20 in lieu of the property, and acknowledged his willingness to pay
it _now_; or whether the waning fortunes of the Essex party withdrew
what court influence might have come through the poet, we know not.
But we know that there was never more a “Shakespeare of Asbies”; and
that even on the death of his father in 1601 (curiously enough at the
very time of the end of the twenty-one years lease he had drawn up from
1580), William instituted no further proceedings in his own name, and
contented himself by purchasing other lands and leases of tithes.
One point I should have noticed is, that the final concord which Edward
Lambert had drawn up in 1578, and had enrolled in 1579, was endorsed
with the records of _fifteen proclamations_. The first could only have
been at the Easter Assizes 1581, at Warwick, after the forfeiture of
Michaelmas 1580; it was repeated every year, until the Shakespeares
began to take proceedings in Chancery. It was stayed while the case was
running, and never resumed, for John Lambert remained in possession at
the now-vanished Asbies.
_“Athenæum,” 14th and 21st March, 1914._
FOOTNOTES:
[7] See the paper reprinted above, p. 17.
[8] The illustrations in my “Shakespeare’s Family,” including one of
this cottage, were put in by Mr. Elliot Stock, without my knowledge,
and against my will.
[9] See the Book of John Fisher of Warwick. “Every man is only careful
for himself ... given to easy trades of life, providing for themselves,
not having consideration for their posterity, which should not so be.”
[10] John Lambert had licence granted him till the Octaves of
Michaelmas 1589 (Coram Rege Roll, 1311, f. 516, Mich. Term 31-32 Eliz.
Westminster).
IV
MARY ARDEN’S ARMS
There has been much discussion concerning Shakespeare’s descent
from the Ardens of Park Hall, and, through them, from the heroes of
national legend. In some of the objections brought forward against his
assumed pedigree, prejudice has been treated as proof, and opinion as
reasoning. The critical strictures are best summed up in Nicholls’s
“Herald and Genealogist,” 1863, vol. i, p. 510, and in “Notes and
Queries,” 3rd Series, vol. v, p. 493: (1) That the relationship
is imaginary and impossible, and those who assert it in error. (2)
That the Ardens were connected with nobility, while Robert Arden was
styled “husbandman.” (3) That the heralds knew the claim was unfounded
when they scratched out the arms of Arden of Park Hall, and inserted
the arms of Arden of Alvanley, in Cheshire. Though this was equally
unjustifiable, the family being further off, there was less likelihood
of complaint.
French, in his “Shakespeareana Genealogica,” p. 431 _et seq._, opposes
these statements by others; and the interesting reproduction of the
drafts and patents of Shakespeare’s arms, with the accompanying
letterpress by Mr. Stephen Tucker, Somerset Herald, puts a student in a
position to estimate them at their true worth. (See “Miscell. Geneal.
et Herald.,” 1886, Ser. II, vol. i, p. 109.) I would now bring forward
some arguments which may act as cumulative evidence to determine
wavering opinion on the question.