Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 10.djvu/282

228 NOTES AND QUERIES. [12 s.x. 11^.25,1922. —This well-known barrister is said to have been born in Herefordshire about the year 1747. He became a K.C. and was M.P. for Abingdon, Berks. In March, 1781, he prosecuted Captain John Donellan at the Warwick Assizes for the murder of his brother-in-law, Sir Theodosius Boughton, Bart. Howarth figures in the famous 'Histories of the Tête-à-Tête' as "The Admirable Advocate" in The Town and Country Magazine, vol. xii. 121, his vis-à-vis being Miss Chippendale, a daughter of Thomas Chippendale, the furniture-maker. On May 11, 1783, he was drowned in the Thames through the capsizing of his sailing boat "within sight of his own house" at Mortlake. A brother of Miss Chippendale, who was with him, was saved. It is stated in his obituary notice that he was buried in the Temple Church (Gentleman's Magazine, 1783, i. 453). Is anything known of his ancestry?

—One of these names, LL.B., Cambridge, a layman and married man, died Nov. 20, 1558 (Cooper, 'Ath. Cantab.,' i. 185, 551).

Another was a Fellow of All Souls' College, Oxford, who was ordained exorcist at Oxford in September, 1556 (Frere, 'Marian Reaction'). Is anything known of him?

A third, LL.B., Cambridge, 1531, incorporated at Oxford in 1551, became Prebendary of York (Stillington) in 1535/6, Rochester in 1541, and Worcester (first stall) in 1544, Prebendary of Hereford (Putston Major) in 1551, Rector of Clun, Shropshire, in 1553, and Prebendary of Southwell and Rector of Bolton Percy, Yorkshire, both in 1558. He appears to have died in 1559. Is the exact date known, and was he deprived of his Southwell, Yorkshire and Hereford preferments before his death? I think that Cooper (op. cit., i. 203), the 'D.N.B.,' and Gillow's 'Bibliographical Dictionary,' throw no light on these questions, but am unable to consult any books of reference at present.

JOHN AND CHRISTOPHER WRIGHT (GUN- POWDER PLOT CONSPIRATORS). According to Poulson (' Hist, and Antiquities of the Seigniory of Holderness '), John Wright had issue. According to H. H. Spink (' Gun- powder Plot,' 1902), Christopher Wright married, and his wife's name was Margaret. The last heir male of the family (vide Poulson) appears to have been Francis Wright (died 1864), who was, however, de- ' scended from William Wright, the half- brother of John and Christopher. In W. H. Byland's edition of ' Grantees of Arms named in Docquets and Patents to the End of the Seventeenth Century,' it is stated that Robert Wright of Plowland (father of the conspirators) had gift of coat and crest and confirmation of quarterings, by Flower ('Visitation of Yorkshire,' 1563 and 1564). The arms and crest are given in ' A Com- plete Body of Heraldry ' ( J. Edmondson, 1780), " Or, a fesse, cheq. ar. and az. between three eagles' heads erased of the third. Crest, an unicorn passant regardant, quar- tered ar. and az., armed or." John and Christopher Wright were slain at Holbeache House, Staffs, in 1605. 1. Is anything known of the descendants of the conspirators John and Christopher Wright ? 2. Is anything known of the ancestry of John Wright of Plowland Hall, Holderness, grandfather of the conspirators, and Sene- schal to King Henry VIII. ? He is said to have " come out of Kent," 33 Henry VIII. (vide Poulson). G. W. W. MERCER PORTRAITS AND SEAL. -In his ' Genealogical Gleanings in England ' (2 vols., Boston, 1901), the late Henry F. Waters, A.M., abstracts the will of Francis Mercer, clerk, rector of Godmanston, Dorset, Jan. 25, 1667, proved Jan. 31, 1668 (P.C.C., Coke, fol. 8), in which are mentioned, among others, the following legacies: To his son Francis Mercer of the City of Sarum, Wilts., ironmonger, " the picture of my mother and her wedding ring of gold and one other gold ring having a coat of arms cut in the stone that is set therein, my silver seal of arms . . . the pictures of my late brother Samuel and of two gentlewomen, with all the cases that belong to them." To son Peter " the picture of my father and the case thereof." The parents whose portraits are mentioned above were Jean [Cocquiel dit Le] Merchier, native of Tournai, and Jeanne Le Clerc, native of Valenciennes, who were married in the French church at Southampton, Oct. 18, 1579. Much concerning this family may be found in Waters's ' Gleanings ' (above), in the publications of the Huguenot Society of London, and, for the earlier generations before their coming to England about 1566, in Poplimont's ' Belgique Heraldique/ The arms which should appear on the " silver seal of arms," and which may have