Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 7.djvu/309

 9*s. vii. APRIL 20, 1901.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

301

LONDON, SATURDAY, APRIL 20, 1901.

CONTENTS. -No. 173. NOTES : Sir James Audley and his Four Esquires, 301

Lally-Tolendal, 303" Jerrv-build ": " Jerry-built," 305 "Capacity": " Capacious "" Theodolite," 308 George Saunders, Architect The late Mr. George Murray Smith

and the Authors for whom he Published, 307.

QUERIES : J. G. Lemaistre, 307 Blanche Fane Pliny- Passage in Pope The "Flying Dutchman" Celtic Schedules of the 1901 Census " Gast " MacLeay Family W. Tierney Clark "Quod mortui noa mordent" Kwene of Sb. Eustitius Hearth- vTonev Dr. Henry Harris. 308 Coronation Stone The Barclays of Mathers 'Letters from India and Kashmir ' Richard Herne, Sheriff of London " La'iy " and "Gentlewoman" Wright of Hopsford Crosse Hall -The " Crown " behind the Royal Exchange Daniel Tuvill -'Oxford University Calendar,' 309 English Members of Parliament. 310

HE PLIES : Executions at Tyburn and Elsewhere, 310 Perelle's Etchings Glamis Mystery Latin Motto Vanishing London 'The Pilgrim's Progress': Early Edition in French-The Title of Esquire-Boca Chica, 312 Robert Johnson, Sheriff of London Breckenridge Sir Anthony Brabason, 313" Insurrection " " Clubbing the battalion " Rutter Family " Lyngell " Huitson Family Living in Three Centuries, 314 Inscription in Rinnel Church Author of Verses Wanted Crowned Heads, 315" Rouen " and " Succedaneum " Pagination Danteiana, 316 King Edward VII.'s Title in Scotland Roman Steelyard Weights The Blessing of the Throats "Sibyl or Sybil," 317 Ugo Foscolo in London Columbaria "Belongs with," 318.

NOTES ON BOOKS :-Stopes's 'Shakespeare's Family' Gooch's ' Annals of Politics and Culture ' Ferguson's 'Some Aspects of Bibliography ' Bayne's 'Poems by James Thomson* Phillipps's 'Frescoes in the Sixtine Chapel.'

Notices to Correspondents.

SIR JAMES AUDLEY AND HIS FOUR ESQUIRES.

(See under ' Dutton Family,' 9 th S. vi. 409, 517 ; vii. 54, 117, 174,293.)

IN discussing the details of the story of Sir James Audley and his four esquires at Poitiers it must always be borne in mind that the modern version in the Rev. E. Hinchliffe's ' Barthomley ' (1856), and in other local histories of Cheshire, is very different from the simple story found in the pagjes of Froissart. Froissart tells us that Edward the Black Prince on the battlefield of Poitiers, on 19 September, 1356, rewarded with 500 marks the valiant knight Audley, who there and then, in the presence of five witnesses (whose names are given), distributed the gift among his four esquires (whose names are not given), because they had served him so well, and saved his life on that notable day. Modern writers have said that the four esquires were named Sir Thomas Dutton, of Dutton, Sir John Delves, of Doddington, Sir Robert Fowleshurst, of Crewe, and Sir John Hawkestone, of Wrinehill, all of them Ches- hire knights ; also, that they received gifts of land from Sir James Audlev, and that on them was conferred the further honour of

bearing the badge of Audley, the fret or, on their coat armour, in recognition of their services in that battle. Froissart's main idea in recording the doughty deeds of the valorous knight was evidently to show Sir James Audley to have been as magnanimous as he was brave, and the original story carries with it the simplicity of truth ; but the later elaborations of the story have doubtless been invented to account for the origin of the fret or badge on the shields of four families among Cheshire's " chief of men " in ancient times ; and, consequently, these amplifica- tions, not being history, may be consigned to the lumber-room of legendary lore.

The fabulous part of the story was current long before Dr. Gower printed it in 1774 in his 'Materials for a History of Cheshire'; for there is preserved at Doddington Hall, Cheshire, a MS. folio of deeds, pedigrees, arms, &c., containing, inter alia, a " Copy or the Descent of Delves as it appeareth in a Booke sometime belonging to William Flower, Esq., Norroy King of Arms " (temp. Elizabeth), and accompanying that pedigree occurs the following memorandum :

" Gules, a Fret Or, were the Armes of the valiant James L d Audeley, Kt., Baron* Audley of Helegh, to whom the most renowned Edward, surnamed the Black Prince, gave lands to the yearly value of 500 marks, To have and to hold to him and his heirs

Regni

minded I/ Audley aforesayd, after the receipt of so bountifull a gift at the Prince his hands, did not only of his most frank and liberall disposition bestow the lands so given (of the yearly value of 500 marks) upon his four Esquiers then attendant upon him, but also some part of his Coat- Armour, in token of his liberall bounty, viz. The Fret Or.

Dutton, of Dutton, Esq.

Delves, of Doddington, Esq.

Fowleshurst, of Crewe, Esq.

Hawkestone, of Wrinehill, Esq."

The date of this memorandum and pedigree synchronizes with the rebuilding in the sixteenth century of Doddington Hall, near the ancient castellet in the park that still contains the dilapidated effigies in stone of Sir James Audley and his four esquires Dutton, Delves, Fowleshurst, and Hawke- stone, concerning which statues Dr. Gower thought " that of Lord Audley to have been original, and the others to have been made in the reign of Queen Elizabeth when the

was called baron because he held much land in South Cheshire in barony tenure, and not because he was summoned to Parliament as a peer.
 * It should be understood that Sir James Audley

t Froissart does not say Audley captured King John as his prisoner.

J The regnal year of the battle was 30 Edw. III.