The Arundells do not, however, seem to have regularly established themselves at Tolverne until a son of Sir John of Lanherne and his wife Annora Lambourne—Sir Thomas Arundell of Tolverne—settled here with his wife, Margery Lerchdekne. They had no children, and, on the lady's death, Sir Thomas took unto himself a second wife, Elizabeth Paulton, from whom the Tolverne Arundells may be said to have descended. Sir Thomas himself died in 1443; but I do not know where he was buried; probably at Philleigh.
Of the lives of the Tolverne Arundells, whose current seems to have been as tranquil as that of the sylvan Fal, which ebbed and flowed round their domain, I find little to record, except that they intermarried with many of the old Cornish families—with the Courtneys of Boconnoc, with Reskymer, Trelawny, Carminow, St. Aubyn, their neighbour Trefusis, Chamond, Godolphin, and, as we have seen, Carew. We have traces of the will of Thomas Arundell, Esq., of Talverne, dated 22nd May, 1552, which shows that he possessed tenements in Truro borough and elsewhere, also the passage and passage-boat of Talverne. The inventory of his property was sworn at £224 5s. 9d. There is also extant the will of John Arundell, 7th February, 1598, but it contains little of interest, except that he bequeaths to his mother his 'little guilt sack-cup with a cover,' and that his executors were Richard Carew of Antony, and Richard Trevanion of St. Gerrans.
One of the sons of the latter Arundell, namely Thomas, who was knighted by James I., sold Tolverne; having seriously impaired his fortune, it is said, by endeavouring to discover an imaginary island in America, called 'Old Brazil;' he afterwards lived at Truthall in the parish of Sithney. One of the Truthall Arundells, John, was Colonel of Horse for Charles II., and a Deputy-Governor of Pendennis Castle under his relative Richard, Lord Arundell of Trerice. He was buried at Sithney on 25th May, 1671; but I have hitherto been unable to trace anything further of interest of his history, or of that of his descendants. One of the latest members of this branch married William Jago, of Wendron, whose children took the name and arms of Arundell in 1815; and it may be added that Hals the historian descended from the Arundells by the female line.
THE MINOR ARUNDELLS.
The story of the Arundells of Cornwall is nearly told. There were, as I intimated at the commencement of this chapter, some minor branches, who perhaps deserve a passing notice: the most noteworthy of whom appears to be the branch that settled at the manor[43] and barton of Menadarva (== the hill by the water), in the parish of Illogan, near the sea-coast, and about three miles north-west of Camborne. This branch seems to have been founded by Robert, a natural son of that Sir John Arundell of Trerice, Vice-Admiral of Cornwall, 'Jack of Tilbury,' who died in the third year of Elizabeth's reign. Robert took to wife Elizabeth Clapton, and they had numerous descendants.
I must once more be indebted to Hals, for the following bit of gossip about the Arundells of Menadarva: 'The last gentleman of this family dying without issue male, his sisters married to Tresahar and others, became for a time, possessed of this lordship; but it happened that a brother of theirs also, who was a merchant-factor in Spain, who married an innkeeper's widow there, in Malaga or Seville, of English extraction, was said to be dead without issue; but it seems, before his death, had issue by her an infant son, who was bred up in Spain till he came of age, without knowledge of his relations aforesaid; who being brought into England with his mother, temp. William III., delivered ejectments upon the barton and manor of Menadarva and the occupants thereof, as heir-at-law to Arundell, and brought down a trial upon the same at Lanceston, in this county, where, upon the issue, it appeared, upon the oaths of Mr. Delliff, and other Spanish merchants of London, that the said heir was the legitimate son of Mr. Arundell, aforesaid, of Spain, and born under coverture or marriage. He obtained a verdict and judgment thereon for the same, and is now in possession thereof. He married Tremanheer of Penzance, and hath issue. The arms of this family are the same as those of the Arundells of Trerice, with due distinction.'
An offshoot, as I take him to be, of the Menadarva Arundells, one Francis, who was born about the year 1620, is said to have settled at Trengwainton, near Penzance, where they lived for some generations; and one of them, Francis Arundell, served with some distinction on the side of the Parliament during the Civil War, ranking as captain. I fancy it must be his son who mourned in Latin verse, after the fashion of the time, the deaths of two Queens of England, while, as a Commoner of Trinity College, Cambridge, he was under the tuition of Isaac Barrow.
Yet another minor branch of the Arundells remains to be noticed, viz. a younger branch of the Arundells of Lanherne, descended from that Sir John Arundell who married Elizabeth Danet, of Danet's Hall. They had their seat at Trevithick, some two miles west of the town of St. Columb Major, and not much farther from Lanherne itself. The representative of the family who was alive at the time of the Herald's Visitation in 1620, was named Thomas, who married Rachel, the daughter of Sir Giles Montpesson, Knight, and who, Hals tell us, died 'without issue, but not without wasting a great part of his estate.'