1592, Oct. 3.—Lancelot, son of Philip Turner.
1593, Nov. 3.—Frances, daughter of Philip Turner.
1594, Feb. 26.—Martha, daughter of Philip Turner.
1796, April 14.—Katherine, daughter of Philip Turner.
1597, June 7.—William, son of Philip Turner.
1598, Oct. 9.—Philip, son of Philip Turner.
1603, Dec. 4.—John, son of Philip Turner.
In the spring of 1604, that dreadful scourge, the “Pestilence of the Plague,” which, in the preceding year, had almost desolated the metropolis, made its appearance at York, and continued to rage with unabated violence in every part of the city for several months.[24] Edith, the wife of Philip Turner, and three of his children, were victims of this fatal visitation. The mother died first: the register of All Saints Pavement records her burial on July 9, 1604. The death of her daughters, Martha and Katherine, quickly followed. Both were buried on the 23rd of the same month. John, her infant son, did not long survive his mother; he was buried on the 19th of December.
After this period I have not met with the slightest trace of Philip Turner, or of any of his surviving children, except William, who, we now discover, was not his first-born son. From the christian-name given to Philip’s eldest boy, it is pretty certain that he was the godson of his uncle Lancelot, and had he lived to the age of maturity would have been preferred to his younger brother. We must conclude, therefore, that his early death made way for William to become the oldest surviving son of his father, and the heir presumptive of his uncle, who, as we learn from your pages,[25] having no children of his own, ultimately by his will established this nephew in the possession of the bulk of his fortune.
It was but a short time previous to the occurrence of the calamity which deprived Philip Turner of his wife and three of his children, that Lancelot Turner became the owner of Towthorpe.