Pope, His Descent and Family Connections: Facts and Conjectures

by Joseph Hunter

Of gentle blood, part shed in honour’s cause,— Each parent sprung.

In the note on this passage, Pope expresses a kind of preference for his descent on the mother’s side, calling the Turners an ancient family, which means that they possessed hereditary wealth through many generations.

Families of really ancient gentry, which, like birth, is but a relative term, are generally found recorded in the Visitation Books of the Heralds for the counties in which they dwelt. Whatever antiquity may be claimed for this family, who resided in the county of York, it is certain that no pedigree of them was recorded at any of the Visitations of that county, of which three were held during the time of the Turners’ residence, viz., in 1585, 1612, and 1665; in which last year, too, the large list of “Disclaimers” does not contain them. The only assistance we derive from the labours of the heralds is this. In a manuscript lately added to the British Museum (Additional, No. 12,482) a list of persons whom, in 1665, the heralds summoned to appear, or intended to do so, contains the name of “Mr. Turner, of the parish of St. John del Pike, York,” who is unquestionably the Poet’s grandfather. This indifference to the advantage of making a public record of many facts, interesting at least to their posterity, is not peculiar to this family, but deposes rather unfavourably to the taste and judgment of the persons in whom the representation of a family at such a time vested. It manifests also some want of a disposition to co-operate in an important public institution, unhappily now fallen into desuetude.

There can be no question that the heralds of old time did sometimes record matter, even then of early date, which will not bear the test of comparison with contemporary evidence; but of the generations then existing, or but just passed away, they may be taken as worthy witnesses. And fortunate are those families who have a few generations recorded in the Heralds’ books. They are saved thereby a vast amount of research into miscellaneous papers, which, after much labour and expense, may yield data sufficient for the construction of a genealogical system, without security against error. The difficulty of recovering lost portions of family history is far greater than is imagined by those who have never made the attempt.

In the case before us, it could not be easy to ascend beyond the reign of Queen Elizabeth, the period, emphatically, when the really ancient gentry of the kingdom were either pushed from their pedestals, or obliged to admit new men to share with them the honour and influence which belong to the possession of broad lands and powerful family alliances. In the forty-fifth year of Elizabeth, February 10, 1603, within a few weeks of the close of her reign, a grant was made by the Crown to Lancelot Turner, of the Manor of Towthorpe, in the county of York. He was then residing at Towthorpe, for on the 12th of December, in that year, 1603, it was certified by William Bainbrigg and R. Aldborough, that “Lancelot Turner, of Towthropp, gentleman, in the wapentake of Bulmer,” was for the most part of the year preceding the taxation of the subsidy, and ever since, residing at Towthropp with his family, and is there assessed on goods estimated at £8.

This certificate is valuable, inasmuch as it enables us to decide which of the two Towthorpes in the county of York is the one to which Pope’s ancestry in his mother’s line is to be traced: Towthorpe, in the wapentake of Buckrose, in the East Riding; or Towthorpe, in the wapentake of Bulmer, in the North Riding. The Turners’ Towthorpe is a few miles to the north-east of York, near to Huntingdon, once the abode of Wilfrid Holme, who left the curious metrical account of the Pilgrimage of Grace; and its vicinity to York brought it within reach of the civilization of the northern counties, of which that city was the chief seat.

It is just possible, though hardly probable, that we may ascend a generation above this Lancelot; for, on January 20, 1626, the will of Robert Turner, of Towthroppe, was proved in the court of the Archbishop of York: its date does not appear. He desires to be buried in the churchyard at Huntingdon. He gives to his son Anthony the two younger oxen, with certain husbandry utensils; to his son Richard the red whie, which came from Stockton; and to his grandchild, William Turner, the little brown whie. He makes his wife and his younger son executors. There is no mention of Lancelot, who was, however, dead; but the grandson William may be he whom we shall soon meet, as the nephew of Lancelot, and the father of Edith.

In all probability this Robert was an inferior member of the same family, a small agriculturist, Lancelot being the great man of the family, whose connection with the Popes is quite in proof. He is described as of the city of York, in some documents of the reign of King James. On the 10th of October, 5 James I., 1607, Robert Harrison, Lord Mayor of York, certifies that Lancelot Turner, of the city of York, gentleman, was residing there, and assessed on £10, goods. A like certificate was granted on the 6th of April, in the 8th of James, 1610, signed by Henry Hall, Lord Mayor, and William Robinson, Alderman.

The wapentake of Bulmer is, as respects minute and accurate information, part of the terra incognita of Yorkshire. Any tolerable account of the manor of Towthorpe would have shown us something at least of the history of the family who possessed it, and we might reasonably have expected to find some account of the means by which this Lancelot Turner gained the fortune with which he made this and other purchases, and appeared in the rank and position in which we see him by the light afforded by his last will, for we can hardly believe that all he had, came to him by descent. Perhaps as probable a conjecture as is likely to be made is, that he was connected with the Council of the North, or a successful practitioner in that court.

But we go at once to his will, which is dated December 23, 1619. He describes himself Lancelot Turner, of Towthorpe, in the county of York, gentleman. He was then in his last sickness, for the will and a codicil were proved on the 17th of January, 1620, and administration was granted to the executor named therein, on the 20th. He sets out, in the laudable practice of the time, with a profession of faith, and then proceeds to dispose of his temporal estate. He gives, first of all, to his sister, Margaret Stephenson, an annuity of £30, to issue out of his lordship of Towthorpe, and also the use (interest) of £100, which, on her death, is to go to his niece, Elisabeth Huggeson, wife of Nicholas Huggeson. Then, to William Turner, son of his brother Philip Turner, he leaves all the manor of Towthorpe, and lands there; and also a rent-charge of £70 a year, which he has issuing out of the manor of Ruston. He gives £200 to his nephew, Thomas Martin, an apprentice in London, on condition that he release whatever claim he may have to the testator’s house in Leeds; and he gives £30 to Margaret Moor, sister of the said Thomas, and wife of William Moor, of Beverley; and £10 to John Hustler, son of his sister Elizabeth Hustler.