HOBY FAMILY.
(Vol. ix., p. 19.)
Many years have passed away since I went over Bisham Abbey; but I was then informed that any family portraits belonging to the old House had been taken away by the widow of Sir John Hoby Mill, Baronet, who sold the property to Mr. George Vansittart in 1780, or shortly afterwards. I am not aware that there are any engraved portraits of the Hobys, excepting those mentioned by your correspondent Mr. Whitborne, which form part of the series of Holbein's Heads, published in 1792 by John Chamberlaine, from the original drawings still in the royal collection. In the meagre account of the persons represented in that work, Lady Hoby is described as "Elizabeth, one of the four daughters of Sir Antony Cooke, of Gidea Hall, Essex," and widow of Sir Thomas Hoby, who died in 1566, at Paris, whilst on an embassy there. The lady remarried John Lord Russell, eldest son of Francis, second Earl of Bedford, whom she also survived, and deceasing 23rd of July, 1584, was buried in Bisham Church, in which she had erected a chapel containing splendid monuments to commemorate her husbands and herself. The inscriptions will be found in Ashmole's Berkshire, vol. ii. p. 464., and in Wotton's Baronetage, vol. iv. p. 504., where the Hoby crest is given as follows; "On a chapeau gules turned up ermine, a wolf regreant argent." The armorial bearings are described very minutely in Edward Steele's Account of Bisham Church, Gough MSS., vol. xxiv., Bodleian, which contains some other notices of the parish.
Braybrooke.