Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 44.djvu/372

 Pepys married, first, Judith, a daughter of Sir William Cutte, knt., of Arkesden, Essex; secondly, Mary (d. 1660), daughter of Captain Gosnold. He left four sons and two daughters. His eldest son, Richard, married Mary, daughter of John Scott of Belchamp-Walter, Essex, and, with his wife and daughter Mary, migrated to New England in 1634, but returned in 1650 and settled at Ashen Clare, Essex (, Researches among British Archives;, Genealogical Dictionary of the First Settlers of New England, iii. 393).



PEPYS, SAMUEL (1633–1703), diarist, was born 23 Feb. 1632–3. His birthplace was either London or (according to, Life of Colet, App.) Brampton, Huntingdonshire. His father, John Pepys, born in 1601, belonged to a family long settled at Cottenham in Cambridgeshire. He was son of Thomas Pepys, whose sister Paulina married Sir Sidney Montagu, and became the mother of (1625–1672), afterwards first Earl of Sandwich [q. v.] John Pepys became a tailor in London, and was concerned in some trade with Holland. As in August 1661 he had only 45l. in money, and debts to about the same amount, he cannot have been very prosperous. In that year he retired to a small property, worth about 80l. a year, at Brampton, left to him by his elder brother, Robert. At this time Samuel, Thomas (1634–1669), John (1641–1677), and Paulina (1640–1680) were the only surviving children out of eleven. His wife died in 1667, and he in 1680.

References in the ‘Diary’ show that Samuel Pepys (26 Aug. 1664) was boarded out as a child at Hackney and Kingsland. He was afterwards at school (15 March 1639–1640) at Huntingdon, and finally a scholar of St. Paul's School in London. On the day of the king's execution he observed that if he preached on the occasion his text should be, ‘The memory of the wicked shall rot.’ He was much relieved on 1 Nov. 1660 to find that an old schoolfellow, who remembered that Pepys was a ‘great roundhead,’ had not heard this particular remark. On 21 June 1650 Pepys was admitted at Trinity Hall, Cambridge (Academy for 1893, i. 372), and on 5 March 1650–1 Pepys migrated as a sizar to Magdalene College, Cambridge. He probably changed with a view to a scholarship, as he was elected on the Spendluffe foundation on 3 April 1651, and on 4 Oct. 1653 he was elected to a scholarship founded by John Smith. On 21 Oct. 1653 he was ‘solemnly admonished’ with a companion for having been ‘scandalously overserved with drink’ on the previous night. Pepys, however, became the friend of several industrious fellow-students, such as [q. v.], [q. v.], and (1631–1718) [q. v.], afterwards bishop of Peterborough. He wished afterwards (18 March 1667) that his sister Paulina would marry Cumberland, as a ‘man of reading and parts.’ His later history shows that he retained a warm feeling for his college. At college he wrote a romance called ‘Love a Cheate,’ but tore it up on 31 Jan. 1663–4.

Pepys graduated as B.A. in 1653, and became M.A. on 26 June 1660. On 1 Dec. 1655, according to the register of St. Margaret's, Westminster, he married Elizabeth St. Michel—although both he and his wife afterwards believed their wedding-day to have been 10 Oct.—a pretty girl of fifteen, having been born, according to her epitaph, on 23 Oct. 1640. She was daughter of Alexandre St. Michel, a Huguenot, who came to England with Henrietta Maria on her marriage with Charles I. St. Michel had been disinherited by his father on account of his religion, and was dismissed by the queen for ‘striking a friar’ in the course of argument. He married a widow who was daughter of Sir Francis Kingsmill, and got into difficulties in the attempt to recover his property in France. His daughter when about twelve was shut up in a convent at Paris, but was afterwards recovered by a ‘stratagem.’ In later years St. Michel became a ‘projector;’ he obtained patents for curing smoky chimneys and for cleaning muddy ponds. He had also plans for raising submerged ships, and had discovered ‘King Solomon's gold and silver mines.’ Naturally, he and his wife had to live upon 4s. a week from