♂Sir James Shirley

James Shirley (died about 1278) was an English knight, lord of Ettington in Warwickshire and of Shirley in Derbyshire in the reigns of Henry III and Edward I. His first marriage ended in scandal: his wife, Agnes de Wauton, was abducted by Henry Fown, who kept her with him for more than five years, and she died while still with him. He was the twenty-second great-grandfather of Nancy Jane Blanchard (1929–2006) by two separate lines of descent, both through his son Ralph Shirley (died 1326).

Marriage and inheritance

James was the son and heir of Sewallis Shirley, lord of Ettington. He married Agnes de Wauton about 1247, and by a fine made that year his father settled the manor of Shirley on James to provide Agnes’s dower, with Ettington to come to James after him. Agnes is said to have been a niece of Simon de Walton, bishop of Norwich. James and Agnes had a son, Ralph, who became his father’s heir, and probably another son, Simon.

His father was dead by 1255, and that year James is said to have been granted free warren^W, the right to hunt small game, over his own demesne lands at Ettington.

Agnes and Henry Fown

In February 1278 the bishop of Worcester, Godfrey Giffard^W, wrote to the king’s justices about Henry Fown, “who abducted Agnes, the wife of Sir James de Etyndon, knight, and for five years and more publicly detained her in adultery”. The bishop named James for Ettington. By then Agnes had died, still in Henry’s keeping. A sentence on Henry followed in July 1278.

Debts and death

In his last years Sir James was deep in debt. In 1276 he pledged his rents and villein lands in Shirley, Hollington and Bupton to Richard Foun for a loan of 84 marks, and acknowledged a debt to him of 144 marks. By February 1277 he had made Ettington over to his son Ralph by a quitclaim, and that month Ralph took on the 144 marks himself, to free the lands his father had mortgaged.

Sir James married again, to a wife named Isabella. He most likely died in 1278, and by 1279 Ralph was lord of Ettington. Isabella had married John de Brumston by November 1280, when the two gave up her dower third of Shirley and Longford to Ralph for 35 gold marks.

Lines of descent

Both lines run through his son Ralph Shirley, Ralph’s son James Shirley, James’s son Ralph Shirley (died 1342), Ralph’s son Thomas Shirley, Thomas’s son Hugh Shirley (died 1403), Hugh’s son Ralph Shirley and Ralph’s daughter Beatrix Shirley (died 1483), and from her through the Bromes, Dentons, Purefoys and Thornes to Thomas Dudley^W (1576–1653), later governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and his son Samuel Dudley (1608–1683). One comes down through Samuel’s son Stephen Dudley (1654–1735) to Nathaniel Dudley (1763–1844), and the other to Nathaniel’s wife, Anna Smith (1764–1825); the two lines meet again in their daughter Sarah Dudley (1795–1839).

Notes

The marriage settlement and the family

The fine of 1247 (31 Henry III) is printed in Stemmata Shirleiana (2nd ed., 1873), pp. 362–363, from Dugdale’s manuscript collections: it settles Shirley “ad dotandum inde Agnetam de Wauton ux ejusd. Jacobi”, and Ettington is to remain to “Jacobo fil. et hered. ipsius Sewalli”. The Victoria County History of Warwickshire (vol. 5, 1949, pp. 78–79) gives the same settlement “on his son James, on his marriage with Agnes de Wauton”, the grant of free warren in 1255, and the reasoning for his death: “Sir James probably died in 1278, as in 1279 Ralph de Shirley was lord of Ettington”. Stemmata Shirleiana says that Sewallis died before the thirty-ninth year of Henry III (1254–55), makes Agnes a niece of Simon de Walton, and gives Ralph a brother, Simon, from the family’s Great Family Pedigree and a King’s Bench roll of 1289.

The debts and the widow

The debts are in the Calendar of the Close Rolls, Edward I, vol. 1 (1272–1279), pp. 332, 351 and 413; on p. 332 he is “James de Shirl[eye], knight”. Whether Richard Foun was kin to the Henry Fown who abducted Agnes is not known. The 1280 fine is among the Shirley deeds at the Record Office for Leicestershire, Leicester and Rutland (26D53/336, 18 November 1280): John de Brumston and Isabella his wife against “Ralph son of James de Shirle”. A deed of about 1282 there (26D53/1105) calls Ralph “son and heir of James de Shirley”.

The generations after him

A modern website of the Shirley Association makes Ralph Shirley (died 1342) a son of James by Isabella. A bond of 1311 and the settlement of 1316 name that Ralph as the son of a James who was himself the son of the elder Sir Ralph, and this page follows the Victoria County History, which makes the younger Ralph the great-grandson of the James of this page, not his son.