After the death of William Becon, an 8 x great uncle of mine, in 1661 there was a dispute between his brother Thomas and Margaret Steed, probably William’s fiancee, about some land in Mersham which William had inherited from his grandfather, Basil Becon<\/a>.<\/p>\n The Bill for this Court of Chancery case is in the National Archives at TNA ref. C 6\/585\/23<\/a>, with no answers or reply; there is an entry in a Decrees and Orders index but I couldn’t find the entry!<\/p>\n The top corner of the bill is missing, which would probably have had a date. In the absence of this we can get an idea of the date from who was the Chancellor named and the date of death of William Becon, as a result of whose death the complaint arose. The date must be between death of William and of his brother Thomas i.e.<\/em> between May 1661 and 1686; the reference to ‘Edward Earle Channcellor of England’ must be to the Earl of Clarendon, Edward Hyde, who was Chancellor from 1658 – 1667, so this bill must have been brought between May 1661 and 1667. The bill refers to William entering into an agreement at ‘Michaelmas last past’; the last Michaelmas William was alive was Michaelmas 1660, and so it seems this bill must have been brought between May and Michaelmas 1661. Basil Becon died in 1638, leaving a will. Unfortunately it is in Latin, limiting my ability to understand it. A summary of what I believe it says can be found on his page<\/a> on this website. (I need to spend a bit of time getting my head around the legal and \/ or archaic phraseology in the bill, so this is what I think<\/em> it is saying).<\/p>\n Basil Becon passed on 22 acres of land to grandsons Theodore and William Becon. The previous Michaelmas they, Theodore and William, had come to an agreement to split the land between them, 11 acres each to them and their heires. William then settled his part for him in his life and after his decease to his brother Thomas<\/a> and his heires for ever. [I don’t understand why William would do this, rather than keep it to be inherited by any children he might have – I guess Thomas paid him for this, and that he needed the money]. However, there was one Margaret Steed with whom William enjoyed ‘great familiarity’, who got hold of the deeds, possibly through a treaty of marriage. She wouldn’t let Thomas see the papers, and was preventing him from occupying the land. She and William hadn’t actually married, and if the land was for her it was only in trust. I find the reference to potential witnesses being overseas interesting. Although Thomas’s great grandfather, the ‘theologian’ Thomas was quite extremely protestant in some of his views, he was very much for remaining within the Church of England, headed by the monarch. Some of descendants may have shared his keen protestantism but without the same allegiance to church and monarch.<\/p>\nDate?<\/h2>\n
\nThe entry in the Decrees and Orders should add weight to this – but the index entry for Becon con. Steede is in the section for Michaelmas 1660! Perhaps this is why, when I looked at the book of decrees and orders, I couldn’t find it. Most entries have pages numbers which follow in order, but at the end of the entries for each letter are one or two entries which appear to have been added later and have numbers which don’t follow in order. This index entry is one of 2 such in the ‘B’ section of Michaelmas 1660. Maybe it should have been added to Michaelmas 1661. (Just to make it worse, the first digit is unclear – or crossed out, the next two are ’91’, but I couldn’t see the entry on any folio with a number ending ’91’ in the volume for the year from Michaelmas 1660. I think I need to look at the decrees and orders for the following year.<\/p>\nBackground<\/h2>\n
\nThomas<\/a>, Basil’s eldest son, had had 8 children by the time of Basil wrote his (last) will, a couple of months before his death. Two daughters and a son had died in infancy, of the other 5, a daughter and 4 sons, all the sons are mentioned. Two, Thomas, the eldest, and Basil, the third, were left bequets directly while Basil specified that his lands in Mersham should go to his son Thomas, but then after Thomas’ death to his sons, Theodore<\/a> and William<\/a>. Thomas senior died in 1659, which I guess is why it was only in 1660 (judging by the bill) that an agreement was made about dividing this lands, and why a dispute could then arise when William’s death followed shortly after, in May 1661.<\/p>\nSummary<\/h2>\n
\nThose who could witness Thomas’s claims were dead or overseas.<\/p>\nComment<\/h2>\n