Page:History of the Fylde of Lancashire (IA historyoffyldeof00portiala).pdf/173

 eldest sons died in youth and unmarried, the oldest having only attained the age of twenty three, so that at his decease in 1824 he was succeeded by his fifth son, Peter Hesketh. This gentleman, who was born in 1801, espoused at Dover, in 1826, Eliza Delamaire, the daughter of Sir Theophilus J. Metcalf, of Fern Hill, Berkshire, by whom he had several children, who died in early youth. As his second wife he married, in 1837, Verginie Marie, the daughter of Senor Pedro Garcia, and had issue one son, Peter Louis Hesketh. In 1831, Peter Hesketh obtained power by royal license to adopt the surname of Fleetwood in addition to his own, and in 1838 he was created a baronet. In 1844, Sir Peter Hesketh Fleetwood vacated Rossall Hall, and the site is now occupied by a large public educational institution, denominated the Northern Church of England School. Sir P. H. Fleetwood died, at Brighton, in 1866, leaving one son and heir, the Rev. Sir Peter Louis Hesketh Fleetwood, bart., M.A., of Sunbury on Thames, in the county of Middlesex. The Rev. Charles Hesketh, M.A., rector of North Meols, is the younger brother of the late Sir P. H. Fleetwood, and consequently uncle to the present baronet.

FFRANCE OF LITTLE ECCLESTON HALL.

William, the son of John ffrance, who married the younger daughter of Richard Kerston, of Little Eccleston, was the first of this family to reside at the Hall, and he was living there at the beginning of the seventeenth century. William ffrance had two sons and a daughter—John, born 1647; Henry, born 1649; and Alice, born 1653. John, the eldest son, succeeded to the Hall and estates on the demise of his father, and married Deborah Elston, of Brockholes, by whom he had issue—Robert, who died in 1671; Anne, died 1672; Thomas, died 1672; Deborah, died 1673; John, born 1675; William, died 1680; Henry, died 1676; Mary, died 1701; and Edward, died 1703. John ffrance, sen^r., survived all his sons except John and Edward, and on his death, in 1690, was succeeded by the former and elder of the two brothers. John ffrance, like his father, resided at the Hall, and espoused Joan, daughter of John Cross, of Cross Hall, by whom he had issue—John, born 1699; Anne, died 1702; and Henry, died 1707. John ffrance died in 1762, and his eldest son, John,