Shakespeare's family

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SHAKESPEARE'S FAMILY

[Illustration]

[Illustration: William Shakespeare from the Drocshout painting now in
the Shakespeare Memorial Gallery at Stratford-on-Avon.]




SHAKESPEARE'S FAMILY


BEING


A Record of the Ancestors and Descendants
of William Shakespeare


WITH

_SOME ACCOUNT OF THE ARDENS_


BY

MRS. C. C. STOPES

AUTHOR OF
"THE BACON-SHAKESPEARE QUESTION ANSWERED," "SHAKESPEARE'S WARWICKSHIRE
CONTEMPORARIES," "BRITISH FREEWOMEN," ETC.


LONDON
ELLIOT STOCK, 62, PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C.
NEW YORK
JAMES POTT & COMPANY
1901


Transcriber's note: Minor typos have been corrected. Footnotes have been
moved to the end of the chapter. Letters that are preceeded by a caret
(^) are superscripted in the text.




PREFACE


When I was invited to reprint in book-form the articles which had
appeared in the _Genealogical Magazine_ under the titles of
"Shakespeare's Family" and the "Warwickshire Ardens," I carefully
corrected them, and expanded them where expansion could be made
interesting. Thus to the bald entries of Shakespeare's birth and burial
I added a short life. Perhaps never before has anyone attempted to write
a life of the poet with so little allusion to his plays and poems. My
reason is clear; it is only the genealogical details of certain
Warwickshire families of which I now treat, and it is only as an
interesting Warwickshire gentleman that the poet is here included.

Much of the chaotic nonsense that has of late years been written to
disparage his character and contest his claims to our reverence and
respect are based on the assumption that he was a man of low origin and
of mean occupation. I deny any relevance to arguments based on such an
assumption, for genius is restricted to no class, and we have a Burns as
well as a Chaucer, a Keats as well as a Gower, yet I am glad that the
result of my studies tends to prove that it is but an unfounded
assumption. By the Spear-side his family was at least respectable, and
by the Spindle-side his pedigree can be traced straight back to Guy of
Warwick and the good King Alfred. There is something in fallen fortune
that lends a subtler romance to the consciousness of a noble ancestry,
and we may be sure this played no small part in the making of the poet.

All that bear his name gain a certain interest through him, and
therefore I have collected every notice I can find of the Shakespeares,
though we are all aware none can be his descendants, and that the family
of his sister can alone now enter into the poet's pedigree with any
degree of certainty.

The time for romancing has gone by, and nothing more can be done
concerning the poet's life except through careful study and through
patient research. All students must regret that their labours have such
comparatively meagre results. Though sharing in this regret, I have been
able, besides adding minor details, to find at last a definite link of
association between the Park Hall and the Wilmcote Ardens; and I have
located a John Shakespeare in St. Clement's Danes, Strand, London, who
is probably the poet's cousin. I have also somewhat cleared the ground
by checking errors, such as those made by Halliwell-Phillipps,
concerning John Shakespeare, of Ingon, and Gilbert Shakespeare,
Haberdasher, of London (see page 226). I hope that every contribution to
our store of real knowledge may bring forward new suggestions and
additional facts.

In regard to his mother's family, I thought it important to clear the
earlier connections. But it must not be forgotten that until modern
times no Shakespeare but himself was connected with the Ardens. Yet,
having commenced with the family, I may be pardoned for adding to their
history before the sixteenth century the few notes I have gleaned
concerning the later branches.

The order I have preferred has been chronological, limited by the
advisability of completing the notices of a family in special
localities.

Disputed questions I have placed in chapters apart, as they would bulk
too largely in a short biography to be proportionate. Hence the Coat of
Arms and the Arden Connections are treated as family matters, apart from
John Shakespeare's special biography. I have done what I could to avoid
mistakes, and neither time nor trouble has been spared. I owe thanks to
many who have helped me in my long-continued and careful researches, to
the officials of the British Museum and the Public Record Office, to the
Town Council of Stratford-on-Avon and Mr. Savage, Secretary of the
Shakespeare Trust, to the Worshipful Company of the Haberdashers, for
allowing me to study their records; to the late Earl of Warwick, for
admission to his Shakespeare Library, and to many clergymen who have
permitted me to search their registers.

                    CHARLOTTE CARMICHAEL STOPES.




CONTENTS

                       PART I

CHAPTER                                                 PAGE

   I.