Cambridgeshire

The first Cambridgeshire Brokets were 2 incomers from the Wheathampstead dynasty in the 16th C who left no descendants that stayed in the county. The Mordens clan emerged later in the mid to late 17th C and proliferated to become one of the two largest clans in the UK.

Cambridge town itself was home to 14 Broket students 1526-1761, all originating outside the County, the last becoming a Professor of Modern History there.

1. 16th Century

Two Hertfordshire Brocketts came to live in Cambridgeshire. The first was the heir to the Hertfordshire estates and while his father managed them he came to live on the land he acquired though his marriage. The second was a nephew of the first. Both were named John:

1. John of Swaffham Bulbeck Esq
2. John of Stowe & Impington Gent

i. John of Swaffham Bulbeck Esq c 1485-1526

John was born by June 1485 as shown by his mention in the will of his grandfather John Pulter. He was the son and heir of John, the first Broket Sheriff of Hertfordshire, but died before his father. His childhood was spent at Brockett Hall near Wheathampstead and his education culminated in London at the Middle Temple, admitted 1509 by William Bensted. John's heir was later to marry William's.

In 1511 John purchased land with his father, younger brother and others in Bishops Hatfield, Willian and Diggeswell from Richard and Elizabeth Fyssher (PRO CP25/2/16).

As heir to the Hertfordshire estates, John was married to a wealthy heiress: Dorothy d/o Nicolas HUGHSON Gentleman of Swaffham Bulbeck, a hamlet near Cambridge.

John and Dorothy's surviving children (Metcalfe 1886 p 30; Berry n d p 132-3; Clutterbuck 1815-27 vol 2, p 360; daughters' order of birth not certain):

1. John later Sir John I will pr 1558
2. Nicholas Esq will pr 1585
3. Edward Gent will pr 1584
4. Robert of Bramfield, Gent will pr 1582
5. Thomas, died without issue (the contemporary Glover was the only one to list Thomas). No further record has been found, except perhaps in a Dunstable will 1554.
6. Jane m William COPWOOD of Totteridge (Metcalfe 1886 p 6)
7. Lucy m Thomas HOO of the Hoo in Kimpton, or of Paul's Walden (Metcalfe 1886 pp 13, 65) issue 2 sons, 4 daughters
8. Filise or Alice m ... ASHBY

John died in his early 40s, leaving his widow Dorothy to raise 8 or more children in Swaffham Bulbeck, the oldest of whom may only have been 13 or 14 at the time. John's brief will (dated 16 Feb 1524, proved PCC 21 Jul 1526, PROB 11/22) without the title 'Esq', and leaving legacies only to his wife, 2 servants, the Vicar, the Prior of Anglesey and the Nunnery or Monastery of Deyne could give the wrong impression that they had no children or indeed lands.

Father John of Wheathampstead and wife Dorothy were co-executors. Witness Edward Brocket Gent was his younger brother. His servant Humfrey Bagshawe was a witness to John's father's deed of feoffment of the manor of Thebridge in 1525 (HALS 26948).

ii. John of Stowe & Ympington Gent b bef 1537 d 1607

John was Edward of Letchworth's youngest son, born before 1537. In 1558 his father bequeathed him all his property in the parishes of Kympton, Kings Walden, Baldock, Graveley, Sheveffelde and Hinxworth. Soon after he was involved in dealing with his eldest brother Edward's estate.

In his will (written 24 Dec 1607 proved PCC 23 Apr 1608 PROB 11/111) he called himself: John Brockett of ympington in the Countie of Cambridge, and late of Stowe in the Countie of Huntingdon gent'. He and his wife Katherine had no surviving issue, and his bequests were to her, her children from her first marriage and to his sister's daughter, wife of Mr John Poynton minister—his sole executor—and their children.

Cambridgeshire Brokets during these centuries belonged almost exclusively to the Mordens clan that flourished in the adjacent parishes of Guilden Morden and Steeple Morden on the county's SW boundary with Bedfordshire, below Dunton. Otherwise the only records were from the University and:

i. Hearth Tax 1674

Only 2 Brokets were taxed in Cambridgeshire:

• Vincent Brockett on 1 hearth in Witchford Hundred in the north of the county. No other record of Vincent has been found.
• Mr Brockett on 4 hearths in Haslingfield & Wetherley Hundred, a few miles S of Cambridge. This was Job, matriculated Queen's College 1662.

None were taxed in 1666.

ii. Bassingbourn

A family was recorded in the Bassingbourn PRs 1697-1727, probably a cadet Dunton branch.

iii. Singleton

A marriage was recorded of a John BROCKIT to Margaret WILIS on 21 Jun 1647 at St Peter Cambridge (IGI).

The details below for Cambridge Brokets up to 1751 are from Venn and Venn (1922 p 222), whose sources were various: matriculations and degrees from University sources; parentage, previous education, county of origin, often from college sources; subsequent career, death, etc from external sources. They found 14:

Apart from Francis above, who incorporated at Oxford 1666, the only Broket up till 1932 at Oxford University, according to Foster, was:

1584

John Brockett

Of Buckinghamshire, son of a gentleman—Edward Brockett of Wheathampstead—matriculated from Magdalen College 30 Oct 1584, aged 13. Student at Gray's Inn 1588. [No record of commoners were kept at Magdalen before 1850.]