[265] A Jone Ley was buried in St. Nicholas, Warwick, the same year. The administration of the goods of Mary Shakespeare, Warwick, was granted 1723.
CHAPTER XIII
SHAKESPEARES IN OTHER COUNTIES
The Warwickshire Shakespeares overflowed into the surrounding counties. There were Shakespeares in Stafford,[266] Worcester,[267] Gloucester,[268] Northampton,[269] Leicester,[270] Berkshire[271] and Oxford.
The three latter are worth noting. In 1597 there resided at Lutterworth, only a few miles from Stratford, a Thomas Shakespeare, who was employed by William Glover, of Hillenden, in Northamptonshire, gent., as his agent to receive and give an acquittance for a considerable sum of money.[272] It is not clear whether it was this same person or a son who was the Thomas Shakespeare, gent., of Staple Inn, Middlesex, who presented a certificate to some unnamed court, October 12, 1604, accounting for his non-appearance in a case.[273] John Perkyns was the plaintiff; Thomas Shakespere, William Perkyns, William Teery and others, defendants. He had been summoned at the suit of Perkyns to appear, in the Octaves of Trinity, but he had been required to be seventy miles out of London on the Saturday of the Octaves of Trinity in a Chancery Case. He only rested on the Sabbath at home, started on the Monday, and appeared in court on Wednesday. The other defendants were allowed the explanation; that it was denied to him seemed to be of malice. I cannot find the decision. I searched the Lay Subsidies of Leicester,[3] in Lutterworth and elsewhere, for this Shakespeare in vain; but I find that in 1594 a William Perkins paid in bond for Richard Perkins in Wigston Parva.[274] A bond of Thomas Shakespeare, of Lutterworth, November 27, 1606, to James Whitelocke for 26s. 8d., is mentioned in the Historical MSS. Com.[275] A letter addressed to the Mayor of Leicester by certain leading inhabitants of Lutterworth about the plague is signed first by Thomas Shakespeare,[276] and Mr. French found in the Admission Books of Staple Inn,[277] "Thomas Shakespeare, of Lutterworth, in Com. Leic., gent., etc., 15th Feb., 5 Jac. I., 1607." Does the following entry refer to him or to Thomas Shakespere of Warwick? "John, son of Thomas Shakespeare, gent., baptized July 18th, 1619."[278]
John Shakespear (1774-1858),[279] Orientalist, was born at Lount, near Ashby, in Leicestershire, son of a small farmer there. He became Professor of Hindustani, and gave £2,500 towards preserving the birthplace at Stratford-on-Avon. He did not marry, and his property came to his nephew, Charles Bowles, who took the surname of "Shakespeare."
A William Shakespeare was convicted at Leicester Assizes of night-poaching.[280]
The Oxford Shakespeares deserve fuller attention than they have yet received. The Saunders alias Shakespeare, already mentioned,[281] was possibly a native of another county. But we find some in the shire, contemporary with the poet. Among the "Original Wills at Somerset House there is one of Thomas Shackspeare, Innkeeper," in the suburbs of Oxford. He wished to be buried in the Church of St. Giles, Oxford, bequeathed property to his four children—Robert, Ellen, Mary, and Elizabeth, £10 each when they came of age—and left his wife Elizabeth residuary legatee and sole executrix; overseers, Mr. Ralf Shillingworth and Henry Hedges. A remembrance was left to the preacher of his funeral sermon, and to his loving friend Mr. Harris, of Yarnton, and he "set his hand and seale thereto," May 27, 1642;[282] witnesses, Thomas Champe and Nathaniel Harris. It is curious that the seal used should represent a winged heart bleeding, surmounted by a ducal coronet.