Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 8.djvu/228

 182 NOTES AND QUERIES. [i2s.viii.MABCH5.i92i. in Henley Street ; on May 23 of John, son of Nicholas Lane ; and on Sept. 17 of Gieza otherwise Joyce, daughter of Master William Clopton ; the burial on Mar. 2 of Mistress Agnes Jeffreys, wife to Alderman Jeffrey of Sheep Street, and the marriage on June 21 of Nicholas Barnhurst and Elizabeth Bain ton, daughter to the late Lawrence Bainton and step -daughter of Adrian Quyny. Henry Field, the father of Richard, may have been brother to John Field of Tan worth. * He was settled in Stratford before Nov. 1556, when, it will be remembered John Shakespeare sued him for barley un delivered. His wife was named Ursula They had a daughter Margery, born about 1557, and a son Rafe, baptized on Jan. 26 1560. Nicholas Barnhurst was a yeoman and woollen-draper, living in Sheep Street. He probably came from Wotton Wawen. Like his wife's step-father he was a Puritan but more obstinate and quarrelsome. In October, 1562, John Shakespeare entered on his year as acting Chamberlain, his colleague John Taylor taking the passive part. Humfrey Plymley was Bailiff and Adrian Quyny Head Alderman. We will summarise the events of the twelve- month chronologically. On Sunday, Nov. 22, Thomas Barber married Mistress Harbage, widow of Francis Harbage, the furrier. Entering into the late Alderman's business, perhaps his late master's, he began to prosper. He may have come from Drayton, where he had a brother, Richard. Widow Harbage bore him no children but brought him two sons and two daughters by her first husband. Barber, who was a yeoman as well as a skinner, had two tenements side by side in Rother Market, for which he paid 13.9. 4c?. rent, and two barns by Bankcroft at 13s. 4df. a year. He became a leading man in Stratford and a gentleman. A few days after this wedding, on Wednes- day, Dec. 2, John Shakespeare took a second daughter to the Parish Church to be christ- ened. The ceremony differed in several respects from that of four years previously. It was Protestant instead of Catholic, Bretchgirdle and not Dyos officiated, the service was entirely in English and at the font, the anointing was omitted, and the minister concluded with an exhortation to the godparents to call upon the child, " so soon as she shall be able," to hear sermons. This second baby- Shakespeare (the first, Joan, was probably living) was named Margaret, no doubt after her mother's sister, Margaret Arden, wife of Alexander Web be,, now living in John Shakespeare's old home at Snitterfield. In January, 1563, John Shakespeare sued Richard Court alias Smith, for a debt. The case was settled out of court by arbitration,, as we learn from the entry in the Court of Record Roll of Feb. 3 : Actio debiti inter Johannem Shackspere et Ricardum Court concordata per arbitramentum. Extra. On Sunday, Jan. 31, there was another interesting wedding at the parish church of Thomas Rogers and Margaret Pace. Thomas Rogers is a man to bear in mind. He was a butcher in Com Street, and builder in his old age of the fine timber-house erroneously called "Harvard House." His first wife, whose name we do not know, bore- him a child, Anne, who lived to womanhood,, and in September, 1562, a second child, Margaret, who died two months afterwards- The mother died before or shortly after this; second child's baptism on Sept. 24. Rogers' second wife, Margaret Pace, was daughter of Richard Pace, a farmer in Shottery. She bore him nine children in the course of seventeen years. By a third wife, whom he married in 1581, Thomas Rogers became- grandfather of John Harvard, who was the founder in 1638 of Harvard University. But no Harvard had to do with the building of Thomas Rogers' house in 1596. As Chamberlain John Shakespeare was concerned in the leasing of a, number of town properties in the spring of 1563. Three of these were in Henley Street a house to Widow More, a house to Roger Greene a- miller, and a house to Gilbert Bradley the glover. The last was three doors from the Chamberlain's own, next to Richard Hornby's smithy, a dwelling of eight small bays or gables rented at 21s. per annum. Friend- ship had nothing to do with these lettings, for in each case the lease was a renewal. On Apr. 30 John Shakespeare buried his recently baptized infant, Margaret. She did not live to "hear sermons." John Bretchgirdle read over her grave the words in
 * The conjecture of Mr. T. Kemp of Warwick.
 * he revised Order for the Burial of the Dead:

"He cometh up and is cut down like a lower. " Happily the Chamberlain was busy. He uperintended the felling of trees in the Churchyard (which had now a new sacred- less for him), sold five trees for 20s. to Thomas Barber, and two elms to Richard the woollen -draper in Wood Street for