Edward of Wheathampstead b bef 1417 d 1488

The progenitor of the Hertfordshire Brockett dynasty, Edward inherited the estates in 1477 late in life from elder brother Thomas. For the 50 years since his parents died and while Thomas was in Hertfordshire, Edward had most likely managed the Yorkshire Appleton estate of Brockethall Manor. Edward also bought land in Essex in 1438, so was born 1417 at the latest. His marriage to Elizabeth Thwaites in 1450 gave him half of Steton, near Appleton, and many children. The last three decades of his life were lived through the Wars of the Roses. Brockethall Manor was less than an hour on horseback from York, the stronghold of the Yorkists, and even closer to Towton where one of the decisive early battles was fought. His lands are detailed in the inquisition on his death and in his will.

1. Early years

Imagine Edward growing up in the manor house in Appleton, being sent to school in York, and perhaps as a late teenager accompanying his father on one or more of his trips to Westminster. He was much younger than brother Thomas, who would have been down in London during Edward's childhood and then on his Hertfordshire estates by the early 1430s.

As a younger son, Edward most probably stayed in Yorkshire, so when his father and mother died 1435 and 1437 he probably deputised for brother Thomas as Lord of Brockethall Manor in Appleton. The Hertfordshire Brockett Hall did not exist in Edward's lifetime, yet Glover called him 'of Brokethall'.

Nonetheless, in 1438 Edward acquired the manor of Hooks and half the manor of Pinnacle with 2 others (VCH Essex vol 5, p 160). Pinnacles is at grid reference TL4209 and there is a Hook End at grid reference TQ5899 (Ordnance Survey Gazeteer). The land was near brother Thomas' estates and was perhaps a foothold for Edward in the south during this time of decline in York (Pollard 1990 pp 48-52). There was no Broket family at the time able to acquire such landholdings other than that of Thomas and Dionisia. Edward would have had to have been 21 for this acquisition, placing his birth by 1417 at the latest.

The handsomely written and sealed parchment charter (E 326/9183) names the coholders as Robert Symond and Walter Gorfen. Fine and Patent Rolls between 1399 and 1509 show that the joint venture was with an older, established man and a younger, up-and-coming one in the king's household. Robert Symond acted as mainpernor to land commitments in Essex 1417 and 1422—probably how Edward's father met him—and Walter Gorfen became King's Steward of the lordship of Neuport, Essex in 1441 and rose to be Auditor for South Wales 1450-56.

Edward later sold his interest in these Essex manors, since neither his testament nor IPM 50 years later mentioned land in Essex. The deed:

Edward married Elizabeth THWAITES in 1450 in his mid 30s; in keeping with the system of primogeniture perhaps, where only the first born was usually able to marry before c 25. Elizabeth would have been younger, dying 19 years after Edward in 1507. They had 7 or 8 known children.

The marriage brought Edward half of Steton, which John Thwaites gave as a marriage dowry with his daughter, thereby making an alliance with the leading local family (BL Harley 794 ff 73r, 74—notes taken by Roger Dodsworth antiquarian, d 1654, from mss of Thomas 3rd Lord Fairfax, d 1671; MJ Harrison 2000 pp 73, 257):

1. Know &c' that I John Thwaites have given &c' confirmed to Edward Brocket
2. & to Elizabeth Thwaites my son & to the heires of their bodyes all the landes &c' which
3. I late had of the gift of John Gra knight in Steueeton neare Bolton Percy
4. To have &c' And if it happen the foresaid Edward & Elizabeth to die without heire
5. of their bodyes Then all &c' should returne for ever to mee the foresaid John
6. and to my heires Witnesses William Rither knight John Stapleton William ffairfax William Thwait
7. William Norton Esquires and others 29 h 6. page 265 of my Lord ffairfax evidences
8. Elizabeth daughter of John Thwaites was marryed to Edward Brocket with whom he
9. had half of Steeton in le Ainsty intayled vpon them

In return for such dowries, the groom's family guaranteed the bride a juncture, an annuity in case of her widowhood (L Stone 1977 p 72), as mentioned in Edward's will.

Glover says Elizabeth was of 'Loftes in Yorksh', presumably the Lofthouse near Wakefield, c 15 m SW of Appleton. The brief will of John Thwaytes of Lofthouse, bur Harwod 22 Jan 1461, pr Oct 1469 leaves the residue to his co-executors (one being his wife Isabelle) and otherwise mentioning only their unmarried daughter Alice (York Registry Wills vol 4, microfilm 914 f 140). The pedigree of Thwaytes of Marston at the back of BL Harley 794 does not correspond with this John, nor with the arms given to Elizabeth in Harley 807: Argent 3 fleur de lys gules a fesse gules 3 rings argent.

1. Thomas. All evidence suggests that this Thomas died unmarried. The alledged marriage of Joan, daughter of Sir William Neville, Lord Fauconberg to a 'Mr. Thos. Brocket, of co. Herts' is to be rejected, compared and perhaps linked with a flawed attempt to make Dionisia more explicitly a Fauconberg heiress.
2. John. Edward's heir, becoming head of the dynasty in Hertfordshire after Edward died in 1488.
3. Thomas. Recorded as marrying Elizabeth CALTHROP or Calthorpe, heiress, Thomas appears to have stayed in Yorkshire. Calthrop is not a Hertfordshire name—there are no old Hertfordshire wills of that name—whereas one of the coats of arms in the windows of 16th C Steeton Hall were of Calthorpe (another was of Thwaites, MJ Harrison 2000 p 263). They had a daughter Margaret, but who apparently had no issue.
4. Elizabeth. According to Harley 807 Elizabeth married DOCRAY, but according to the Hertfordshire Berry and Clutterbuck she married Thomas FISHER of Hertfordshire.

   The Visitation of Hertfordshire 1572 and 1634 for 'Docwra of Putteridge' (Metcalfe 1886 Appendix II 139) recorded Roger, 2nd son of Peter Docwra of Yorkshire, marrying Elizabeth 'daughter to Edward Brocket of Brocket Hall, co. York'. The 1860 Gateshead Pedigree followed Metcalfe. But the chronology is problematic. According to Metcalfe, between Roger and John (d 1531) there were 3 generations: Roger, Reignold, Richard, James, John. Even assuming as little as 21 year generation gaps, this would place Roger's birth in the early 1400s, while Elizabeth could not have been born before 1451. Two solutions could be: 1. The Elizabeth who married Roger Docwra was the daughter of an earlier Brocket of Brocket Hall. There was only one—Edward's father Thomas (c 1370-1435), but if he had a daughter Elizabeth, she probably married a Hesylrigg. Thomas, however was probably himself not born much before Roger, so perhaps Elizabeth was a Yorkshire relative of the line that established Brocket Hall, and Metcalfe's 'of Brocket Hall' was a heraldic improvement. 2. To follow Harley 807 which simply said, 'Elizabeth married unto Docray' and conclude that Elizabeth married another Docwra after 1450.

5. Elizabeth—a second one?—who married HAZELRIGG. Harley 807 placed her as Edward's sister.
6. Robert. While his brothers were bequeathed land in Hertfordshire, Robert was bequeathed the manor of Jewleas, near Appleton. Harley 807 dubbed him 'sine prole' (without issue), but his son and descendants were local lords of the main Broket manor there till 1565. Harley 807's frequent sine prole is genealogically unreliable and reflects inheritance concerns of 3 generations later.
   
7. William. Bequeathed the Manor of Herons in Wheathampstead. Although dubbed 'sine prole' by Glover like his brother Robert, William was probably the father of William Brockett, yeoman of Hitchin, died 1556.
8. Alice married to Thomas PERIENT Esq.
   

Much of the 2nd half of Edward's life was lived through the Wars of the Roses (1453-1485) 32 years of civil war between the Houses of Lancaster and York, and of Percy and Neville. Although some describe it as a squabble rather than a war, arguing that armies were in the field for only 13 weeks in total, Brokets of Bolton Percy could not have been unaffected.

Edward's home, Brockethall Manor in Appleton, was less than an hour on horseback from York, the stronghold of the Yorkists and a mere 4 miles across the river Wharfe from Towton, where a major Yorkist victory occurred in 1461 under the command of Sir William Neville Lord Fauconberg. Although many of the 'battles' were little more than skirmishes, the 18 months preceding Towton was the longest during which the warfare was in any sense continuous and the Lancastrian-Yorkist rivalry in Yorkshire was hottest during the 6 months before Towton (Kingsford 1926 pp 51-2).

The Brokets were the main rivals of the Abbots of Westminster in Wheathampstead from the mid 15th C (Munby 1974 p 50). But Edward figures very little in Chancery documents, perhaps because he lived his life on the estates up in Appleton till very late in life. In 1477 elder brother Thomas died and Edward inherited his Hertfordshire estates and moved south. Edward died 25 Jul 1488 (IPM).

Edward's will is a strong, confident statement from a leading gentlrman of Tudor Hertfordshire. His great grandsons—probably owning not much more land than Edward himself—were Sheriffs of Herts and Essex. Edward was therefore of similar social status a century before them. The will was proved at the PCC 1488 (PROB 11/8), with wife, 3 sons and 3 daughters surviving. His wife and 2nd son Robert were executors. There were no overseers. Edward would have been buried in the Brockett Chapel in Wheathampstead and a month later the whole church was to be given over for a day's chanting and praying in his memory (ll 13-16).

The will concerns 3 manors and an advowson. They illustrate well the current system of primogeniture. Half the manor of Almshoe and half the advowson were left to eldest son John. The other halves were left to wife Elizabeth for term of her life and then to devolve to John. Although Almshoe was the largest of the 3 manors in the will, it was not the main Wheathampstead Broket estate—that was Simonside, which would have already been entailed to the eldest son (IPM; Chauncy 1826 vol 2 pp 16, 183).

The other 2 manors for the 2 younger sons were small; Herons possibly larger than Jewleas. To compensate perhaps, Robert was to take over the lordship in Appleton. The ancient moated site at Jewleas was low-lying and prone to flooding (MJ Harrison 2000 p 70).

In the testament Edward made the following bequests:

A mark was two-thirds of a pound (13s 4d). The chantry priest's monthly salary was two thirds of a mark—nearly 9s. The bequests to other godchildren show that a sheep was worth less than 3s 4d. Edward also bequeathed a large amount for the health of his soul and those of his parents, brother, sister-in-law and wife.

Inquisition Post Mortem 1488—C142/4: pdf file. Compare the IPMs of Thomas and Elizabeth.

Edward's Yorkshire lands were not held in chief so they did not require a second inquisition on his death. Edward bequeathed the small Yorkshire manor of Jewleas to his second son and co-executor Robert in his will, but ownership of the main Appleton manor would have descended by entail down the eldest line till sold by Sir John II in 1565. Meanwhile descendants of Robert occupied it as local lords in Appleton.