Warwickshire Westleys
Westley origins about Birmingham open with the death of Walter Wesley in 1537 at Warwick, most likely the great-grandfather of Henry Westley born ca 1550 from about Warwick or Kenilworth, akin to Sir Herbert Westley born 1565 only son of Sir Walter Westley at Westleigh in Devon. Moreover, the Throckmorton dynasty has a marital connection to Westleys of Devon, inviting conjecture as to their Protestant, Puritan and Nonconformist involvement across England dating from early Tudor times, allied with prominent statesmen.
Alice Tracey, great-granddaughter of Sir Thomas Throckmorton, High Sheriff of Warwick and Leicester (1412-1472) of Coughton in Warwickshire, married ca 1560 Walter Westley of Westleigh in Devon. Their son and heir to Westleigh estates, Sir Herbert Westley born ca 1565, is thus 3rd cousin to Job Throckmorton (Snr) whose son Job is a grandnephew to Ambassador Sir Nicholas Throckmorton (1515-1570) of Paulerspury in Northamptonshire, who with a brother Clement (1517-1573) of Haseley in Warwickshire, were both Puritan MPs.
The Throckmorton dynasty held estates widespread between Coughton in Warwickshire, Luffield in Buckinghamshire and Tortworth in Gloucestershire. No less than a dozen of its descendants sat in the House of Commons over a 50 year interval ending in 1586, while Job Throckmorton (1545-1601) son of Clement Throckmorton (1516-1573) of Haseley in Warwickshire was ‘Martin Marprelate’ who authored the Puritan-sponsored Marprelate tracts, circulated illegally in the years 1588 and 1589 in a focused attack on the Elizabeth’s episcopacy of the Anglican Church.
Lord Robert Dudley 1st Earl Leicester (1532/3-1588) of Kenilworth and Warwick earlier assumed the role of leader of the Puritan movement in England and was closely aligned with the Throckmortons. Sir Nicholas Throckmorton’s sister Elizabeth married the Devon-born Puritan Sir Walter Raleigh (ca 1552-1618) Lord Warden of Cornwall and Oxford, while Raleigh is closely related to Sir Francis Drake (1540-1596) also born in Devon to a Protestant preacher and godchild of Protestant statesman Sir Francis Russell.
The so-called Puritan Classical Movement of 1580-1590, was an administrative form of presbyterianism organised in secret within the Church of England, as its Puritan ministers set up local chapters to express concerns on various religious matters, having the ‘support of magistrates and merchants of certain towns as well as the larger patronage offered by such aristocrats as Sir Francis Russell 2nd Earl Bedford (1527-1585) and Lord Robert Dudley (abovementioned) who in about 1564 was told of 28 ‘godly preachers’ and others in Protestant chaplaincies or Lectureships which were supported by private individuals’ (Anglican theologian Dr Peter Toon ‘Puritans/Calvanism’ 1973).
Sir Herbert Westley’s great-grandson Samuel Wesley married Susannah Annesley (1669-1742) daughter of Dr Samuel Annesley, son of John Anslye at Kenilworth near Haseley in Warwickshire; Dr Annesley born in 1620, in 1644 became chaplain of His Majesty’s ship ‘Globe’ under Robert Rich (1587-1658) 2nd Earl Warwick and Lord High Admiral.
Lord Rich procured a diploma of LL.D for Annesley, whom the Parliamentarian leader Oliver Cromwell made lecturer of St Paul’s and in 1658 vicar at St Gile’s Cripplegate in London. Cromwell had married Elizabeth Bourchier at St Gile’s in 1620 and their daughter Frances married Robert Rich and remarried Sir John Russell 4th baronet. Rich’s grandson is a grandnephew of Alice Rich, wife of Richard (Robert) White (1540-1600) of South Petherton in Somerset, a 3rd cousin to Reverend John White ‘Patriarch of Dorchester’ (1575-1648) father-in-law of Reverend John Westley of Westleigh in Devon.
Sir Nicholas (Ambassador) Throckmorton’s son Sir Arthur Throckmorton (died 1626) of Paulerspury and Silverstone, Sheriff of Northamptonshire, inherited Cosgrove Manor;
Sir Arthur’s daughter Anne in 1614 married Sir Peter Temple 2nd Baronet Temple of Stowe (died ca 1653) who held the grandiose Stowe Estate in Stodfold Hundred about Buckingham, neighbouring the Cleley Hundred manors of Cosgrove, Paulerspury, Silverstone and Tiffield, within the vast Grafton Estate and Luffield Priory acquired from the Crown by Sir Nicholas Throckmorton in 1551.
We find a Lord Littleton Westley who in 1747 jointly held Cosgrove Manor from 1747 through Mary Gurney whom he married in 1740 at Dunchurch in Warwickshire - he is apparently unrelated to Throckmortons but descends from the justices Lord Littleton of Shropshire and Worcestershire, while Edward Westley was Rector of Littleton in Hampshire ca 1670 since the Manor of Littleton was granted by Henry VIII in 1541 to the Dean and Chapter of Winchester Cathedral.
The ancient hundred of Stodfold in medieval society about Stowe included 13 manors embracing many localities southward of Cleley hundred, including the manor or grange of Heybarne about the manor of Lillingstone, which by the end of the 16th century passed to Sir Nicholas Wentworth (1482-1557) and his ardent Puritans sons Paul and infamous parliamentarian Sir Peter Wentworth (1529-1596) both colleagues of the abovementioned fellow Puritan neighbours Throckmorton.
On Sir Peter Wentworth’s death in 1597 Heybarne was described as a cottage in the tenure of George Westlye and four closes (small fields) in Lillingstone Dayrell called ‘Heybarne feylde’. George is contemporary to Benjamin Westley who married an Eleanor about 1575 at Lillingstone Dayrell and Richarde Westley who married Ann Iveringham in 1595 at Stowe, forefathers to William, George, and Joseph Westley born in the years 1599 to 1603 at Lillingstone Dayrell whom we believe is our forefather by Joseph Westley born ca 1765 in Buckinghamshire.
Alice Tracey, great-granddaughter of Sir Thomas Throckmorton, High Sheriff of Warwick and Leicester (1412-1472) of Coughton in Warwickshire, married ca 1560 Walter Westley of Westleigh in Devon. Their son and heir to Westleigh estates, Sir Herbert Westley born ca 1565, is thus 3rd cousin to Job Throckmorton (Snr) whose son Job is a grandnephew to Ambassador Sir Nicholas Throckmorton (1515-1570) of Paulerspury in Northamptonshire, who with a brother Clement (1517-1573) of Haseley in Warwickshire, were both Puritan MPs.
The Throckmorton dynasty held estates widespread between Coughton in Warwickshire, Luffield in Buckinghamshire and Tortworth in Gloucestershire. No less than a dozen of its descendants sat in the House of Commons over a 50 year interval ending in 1586, while Job Throckmorton (1545-1601) son of Clement Throckmorton (1516-1573) of Haseley in Warwickshire was ‘Martin Marprelate’ who authored the Puritan-sponsored Marprelate tracts, circulated illegally in the years 1588 and 1589 in a focused attack on the Elizabeth’s episcopacy of the Anglican Church.
Lord Robert Dudley 1st Earl Leicester (1532/3-1588) of Kenilworth and Warwick earlier assumed the role of leader of the Puritan movement in England and was closely aligned with the Throckmortons. Sir Nicholas Throckmorton’s sister Elizabeth married the Devon-born Puritan Sir Walter Raleigh (ca 1552-1618) Lord Warden of Cornwall and Oxford, while Raleigh is closely related to Sir Francis Drake (1540-1596) also born in Devon to a Protestant preacher and godchild of Protestant statesman Sir Francis Russell.
The so-called Puritan Classical Movement of 1580-1590, was an administrative form of presbyterianism organised in secret within the Church of England, as its Puritan ministers set up local chapters to express concerns on various religious matters, having the ‘support of magistrates and merchants of certain towns as well as the larger patronage offered by such aristocrats as Sir Francis Russell 2nd Earl Bedford (1527-1585) and Lord Robert Dudley (abovementioned) who in about 1564 was told of 28 ‘godly preachers’ and others in Protestant chaplaincies or Lectureships which were supported by private individuals’ (Anglican theologian Dr Peter Toon ‘Puritans/Calvanism’ 1973).
Sir Herbert Westley’s great-grandson Samuel Wesley married Susannah Annesley (1669-1742) daughter of Dr Samuel Annesley, son of John Anslye at Kenilworth near Haseley in Warwickshire; Dr Annesley born in 1620, in 1644 became chaplain of His Majesty’s ship ‘Globe’ under Robert Rich (1587-1658) 2nd Earl Warwick and Lord High Admiral.
Lord Rich procured a diploma of LL.D for Annesley, whom the Parliamentarian leader Oliver Cromwell made lecturer of St Paul’s and in 1658 vicar at St Gile’s Cripplegate in London. Cromwell had married Elizabeth Bourchier at St Gile’s in 1620 and their daughter Frances married Robert Rich and remarried Sir John Russell 4th baronet. Rich’s grandson is a grandnephew of Alice Rich, wife of Richard (Robert) White (1540-1600) of South Petherton in Somerset, a 3rd cousin to Reverend John White ‘Patriarch of Dorchester’ (1575-1648) father-in-law of Reverend John Westley of Westleigh in Devon.
Sir Nicholas (Ambassador) Throckmorton’s son Sir Arthur Throckmorton (died 1626) of Paulerspury and Silverstone, Sheriff of Northamptonshire, inherited Cosgrove Manor;
Sir Arthur’s daughter Anne in 1614 married Sir Peter Temple 2nd Baronet Temple of Stowe (died ca 1653) who held the grandiose Stowe Estate in Stodfold Hundred about Buckingham, neighbouring the Cleley Hundred manors of Cosgrove, Paulerspury, Silverstone and Tiffield, within the vast Grafton Estate and Luffield Priory acquired from the Crown by Sir Nicholas Throckmorton in 1551.
We find a Lord Littleton Westley who in 1747 jointly held Cosgrove Manor from 1747 through Mary Gurney whom he married in 1740 at Dunchurch in Warwickshire - he is apparently unrelated to Throckmortons but descends from the justices Lord Littleton of Shropshire and Worcestershire, while Edward Westley was Rector of Littleton in Hampshire ca 1670 since the Manor of Littleton was granted by Henry VIII in 1541 to the Dean and Chapter of Winchester Cathedral.
The ancient hundred of Stodfold in medieval society about Stowe included 13 manors embracing many localities southward of Cleley hundred, including the manor or grange of Heybarne about the manor of Lillingstone, which by the end of the 16th century passed to Sir Nicholas Wentworth (1482-1557) and his ardent Puritans sons Paul and infamous parliamentarian Sir Peter Wentworth (1529-1596) both colleagues of the abovementioned fellow Puritan neighbours Throckmorton.
On Sir Peter Wentworth’s death in 1597 Heybarne was described as a cottage in the tenure of George Westlye and four closes (small fields) in Lillingstone Dayrell called ‘Heybarne feylde’. George is contemporary to Benjamin Westley who married an Eleanor about 1575 at Lillingstone Dayrell and Richarde Westley who married Ann Iveringham in 1595 at Stowe, forefathers to William, George, and Joseph Westley born in the years 1599 to 1603 at Lillingstone Dayrell whom we believe is our forefather by Joseph Westley born ca 1765 in Buckinghamshire.