Page:Devon & Cornwall Notes & Queries.djvu/139

 94 Devon Notes and Queries. Leach in Cadeleigh Church, as I am nearly connected with the Leach family, my great aunt, Miss Elford, of Bickham, Roborough, having married in 1777 Mr. George Leach, who resided at Spitchwick, near Ashburton. In the notes there is a singular discrepancy in the dates, as Sir Simon Leach*& will — a long extract from which is given — is said to have been proved in 1637, but on the monument he is said to have been buried on the 30th of June, 1708. There were evidently two Sir Simons', but which erected the monument is not very clear. I have in my possession the Leach pedigree from 1558, which commences with John Leach, Rector of Talaton, wha about 1582 was made a Canon of Exeter Cathedral and Archdeacon of Totnes, and in 1587 he became Chancellor of the Cathedral of Exeter. He married Elizabeth, daughter of Sir Alexander Napier, and had a large family. The pedigree comes down to George Leach, who married Miss Elford, but I cannot find Sir Simon in it ; but in a short supplemental pedigree I find John Leach, of Crediton, whose son Simon married Elizabeth Rowe, and their son was Sir Simon, who is said to have been living in 1620, but it does not appear when he was born. He is said to have been made a Baronet at the coronation of King Charles the Second in 1660, but whether that was so or not does not appear, but he had sons, none of whom seem to have been Baronets. Why his father became a blacksmith I cannot imagine, or how he came to be a member of the Leach family, whose pedigree I have, I cannot make out, but the arms are the same, viz. — Ermine, on a chief indented gtdes — thru ducal coronets or, and the crest — out of a ducal coronet a forearm issuing erect, habited prober holding a serpent entwined thereon. George Leach, who married Miss Elford, had four children, neither of whom ever married, viz. — ^Jane, born in October, 1780; George in "May, 1782; Jonathan in March, 1784; and William Elford in February, 1790. Jane died about 1858. George, who was well known in South Devon, was a great sportsman and a very popular man in society. The latter part of his life he resided at Crapstone in Buckland Monachorum, which property now belongs to me. He died in 1861. Jonathan was a Lt.-Colonel in the Army, and served throughout the Peninsular War in the Rifle Brigade, and at Waterloo, where he commanded his battalion, and was