Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 5.djvu/177

 12 8. V. JULY, 1919.]

NOTES AND QUERIES.

171

Ills overlord. Gilbert's fellow-witness to this deed is William de Hereford (i.e., Milo of Gloucester's youngest son).

This Roger Parvus was son and heir to Hugh* Parvus (who was fellow- witness with the Abbot of Winchcomb to Roger de 'Gloucester's grant of Coin St. Andrew to the Abbey of St. Peter in 1106), and he had for his wife Margery, daughter of Ralph de 'Sudeley, with whose dower he held 6 virgates, or yardlands, at Stanley Pont Larche. Further, his mother (also Margery) was daughter to Ernulf de la Feld of the Rudge by Standish (near Brookthorpe) all places in Gloucestershire.

We now turn to 1166 and the * Liber Niger ' and ' Liber Rubeus.' Here we find a second Hugh Parvus holding 4 knights' fees of Margaret de Bohun, and Gilbert de Miners and Hugh de Cundicote jointly, -of her ^ a fee (at Condicote, near Stow-on- the-Wold). These had all been enfeoffed "in the days of her father, Milo of Gloucester (Fitz Walter), i.e., before 1143. This fief had also belonged to Durand, father of Roger of Gloucester, in 1085 ; and in 1275 ~we find the larger portion of Condicote passing from De Bohun, Earl of Hereford, to John de Stonor. Possibly this estate had descended, not (as hitherto supposed) direct from Durand to Walter his nephew, but to Roger his son (of Gloucester), from him to W r alter, and so to Milo. Again, the Bishop of Worcester was the overlord.

In the Rot, Curiae, 1199/1200, another Gilbert (III.) held a plea (co. Cambridge) as against Mabel FitzPeter, and yet another against Mabel de Barton, concerning half a yardland (mort d'ancest.}. The first Mabel (if, indeed,, these are not one and the same person) was presumably granddaughter to Lucy FitzHerbert, Milo of Gloucester's -daughter (3), and she could also claim Herbert, brother of Roger of Gloucester, as
 * an ancestor.

"Sciatis me dedisse... terrain quam Rogerus de Glocestra dedit ecolesie S. Petri de Gloc : pro anima fratris sui Herebert [i.e. at West wood in Archen- field, Herefordshire], scilicet, duos radcnihtes et unara ecclesiam cum 1 hida terre et 1 Molen- dinum."

Stephen confirmed this in 1138 (cf. ' H.C. 'St. Petri, Glos.,' i. 222-3).

Though the direct evidence of an " avus " or " pater meus " in a charter is still lacking

tenant of Walter the Sheriff before 1112, and was witness also to a charter by which Walter the Sheriff gave North Cerney to St. Peter's, Glouc., ,in,or before, 1106.
 * I may add that this elder Hugh Parvus was a

to complete the evidences here brought together, it is, the writer thinks, sufficiently presumptive that Gilbert de Miners (1) in making his claim to Coin Roger as against the Benedictines of Gloucester (albeit, in vain) had the solid tie of a near blood- relationship with the powerful Roger de Gloucester upon which to found his claim to Coin. ST. CLAIB BADDELEY.

A REVERIE IN OLD RATCLIFFE.

A CORRESPONDENT in South China has manifestly seen the local and other refer- ences in British Magazines and Miscellanies to the fact that the memory of gallant Captain John Weddell (the Ratcliffe con- temporary of Oliver Cromwell and of Maurice Thomson of Old Stepney Meeting connexions and pious posturings at Poplar as a sometime zealous Puritan politician) has been curiously revived by boding events in the limitless reserve of human " Labour " in the Furthest East. Capt. John Weddell, as many readers in the Port of London area know, was, when at home, a resident in that jumping-off place of ocean heroes and pioneers, Old Ratcliffe. And this seaman-adventurer silenced with comparatively good Stepney cannon the Chinese " batteries " near the great city of Canton in 1634 ; and by decent gunnery he effected his object of " Frightfulness " without injuring the already venerable Wall of the city. For, be it remembered, in those days gun-making of all sorts was a prospering art and mystery in Eastern London Without the Wall ; and gunnery was in almost daily practice in the Port of London, if not for the Navy Board or Lords of Admiralty, then for account of the adventuring companies who were taking the English flag into every sea, east, west, north and south, whether charted or not, in eager and frequently unscrupulous rivalry with the East India Company and many Continental combines. The place of " proof " for all ship-guns, even so late as the last of the Stuart kings, was " Ratcliff Fields." And, after the Civil War and the Restoration, we know that Master Secre- tary Pepys, supported by his seamen - coadjutors, was always " on the pounce " in East London armouries, from Limehouse Hole to the Old Artillery Ground, for a light, strong, serviceable gun even when the making was alleged to cost from 12Z. to 151. a ton a " serviceable " weapon being one that the navigators were not