♂John St. Leger

John St. Leger (died 19 August 1326) was an English landholder who held lands at Wartling and Bucksteep in Sussex and the manor of Offley in Hertfordshire, and whose daughter and heir, Isabel, carried his estates into the Hoo family. He was the nineteenth great-grandfather of Nancy Jane Blanchard (1929–2006) by two separate lines of descent, both through his daughter Isabel St. Leger (1320–1393).

Family and lands

John was the son of Geoffrey St. Leger, a Sussex landholder who on 29 March 1265 was granted free warren^W, the right to hunt small game, in his manor of Wartling. Thomas de Warbleton gave Geoffrey the manor of Bucksteep as the marriage portion of his daughter Agnes de Warbleton, the land to return to Thomas if she died without children, and Agnes was most likely John’s mother. On 20 December 1301 John, named in the charter as Geoffrey’s son, and his wife Isabel were granted free warren in Wartling, Bucksteep and other lands. He also had lands in Northamptonshire, and his daughter Isabel was born about 1320 at Hulcote, near Towcester.

Death and heir

John died on 19 August 1326. On 4 September the king ordered an inquisition post mortem^W into his lands, and on 23 September a Hertfordshire jury found that he had held the manor of Offley of Roger Mortimer of Wigmore by the service of half a knight’s fee^W, and that his daughter Isabel, aged seven, was his next heir. As a child heiress she passed into wardship, which is said to have been granted to that same Roger Mortimer^W, who leased it to Richard St. Leger.

On 31 May 1335, when Isabel was fifteen and already the wife of Thomas Hoo, the king ordered her estates delivered to her, and fresh inquisitions into her father’s lands were taken in Northamptonshire and Hertfordshire. In 1342 the manors of Offley and Wartling were settled on Thomas and Isabel and their children.

Lines of descent

Both lines run through his daughter Isabel, her son William Hoo (1335–1410), William’s daughter Margaret Hoo, Margaret’s daughter Edith Saint Clair (born about 1423), Edith’s daughter Alice Harcourt (died 1526), Alice’s daughter Elizabeth Bessiles, Elizabeth’s daughter Anne Fettiplace, Anne’s daughter Mary Purefoy, Mary’s daughter Susanna Thorne, Susanna’s son Thomas Dudley^W (1576–1653), later governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and Thomas’s 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

Sources for his life

The Hertfordshire inquisition of 23 September 1326 (Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem, vol. 6, Edward II, no. 737) followed a writ of 4 September; it found that he held Offley “of Roger de Mortuo Mari of Wygemor” by service of half a knight’s fee and that “Isabel his daughter, aged 7, is his next heir”. It names no widow. The day of his death comes from the later Hertfordshire inquisition of 10 July 1335 (Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem, vol. 7, Edward III, no. 664): “He died on 19 August, 20 Edward II”. The Northamptonshire inquisition of the same year gives Isabel’s birthplace as “Hulcote by Toucestre”.

The charters of 1265 and 1301 and the grant of Bucksteep are known from the Harleian roll of Hoo deeds as quoted in the Complete Peerage (2nd ed., vol. 6, under Hoo, Note A, p. 566), which also gives the settlement of Offley and Wartling by a fine of Hilary term, 16 Edward III. The wardship, its lease to Richard St. Leger, the writ of 31 May 1335, and his estates in Sussex, Northamptonshire and Hertfordshire are from W. D. Cooper, “Notices of the Family of Hoo”, Sussex Archaeological Collections 8 (1856), p. 105.

His parentage

The charter of 20 December 1301 names him “John, s. of Geoffrey de St. Leger”. No record names Agnes de Warbleton as his mother. She is taken to be so because Bucksteep, given with her in marriage and due to revert to her father if she had no children, was in John’s hands in 1301. An online family tree makes him the son of another John St. Leger; the charter naming Geoffrey is followed here.

His wife

The charter of 1301 names his wife as Isabel. His daughter Isabel was born about 1320, nineteen years later, and the records do not say whether the wife of 1301 was her mother. Some online trees name the daughter’s mother as Joan de Baddington, without a source.

His daughter’s age

The 1326 inquisition makes Isabel seven, and the 1335 inquisitions fifteen, so she was born about 1319 or 1320. Cooper (p. 105) gives her birth as 25 May 1319.