Shakespeares abounded in Warwickshire: they were settled there as early as the fourteenth century; and, soon after, they spread themselves, in various branches, through the county: but genealogical inquiry has as yet been able to throw little light on the pedigree of the dramatist. We have every reason to believe that his father, John Shakespeare, was the son of Richard Shakespeare, a substantial farmer at Snitterfield.3 In 1552 we find John Shakespeare resident in Henleystreet, Stratford-upon-Avon; but his employment at that period is not recorded. In 1556 he was carrying on the business of a glover.5 He did not, however, con than to furnish the slightest illustration of his character. It is not the register of his baptism, or the draft of his will, or the orthography of his name that we seek. No letter of his writing, no record of his conversation, no character of him drawn with any fullness by a contemporary has been produced.-Note. I am not much inclined to qualify this paragraph in consequence of the petty circumstances relating to Shakespeare which have been lately brought to light, and which rather confirm than otherwise what I have said." Hallam's Introd. to the Liter. of Europe, ii. 176, ed. 1843. Three miles from Stratford.-Richard Shakespeare of Snitterfield was a tenant of Robert Arden, whose daughter John Shakespeare married at Snitterfield, too, lived a Henry Shakespeare; and John Shakespeare had a brother named Henry. (Mr. Collier first offered the conjecture, that Richard Shakespeare was the poet's grandfather.) As is shown by a Court Roll, dated April 29th, 1552, in the Carlton Ride Record Office: "Item [juratores] præsent. super sacramentum suum quod Humfrudus Reynoldes (xij.) Adrianus Quyney (xij.") et Johannes Shakyspere (xij.") fecerunt sterquinarium in vico vocato Hendley Strete contra ordinationem curiæ. Ideo ipsi in misericordia, ut patet." This is proved by the following extract from the register of the proceedings of the bailiff's court; "Stretford, ss. Cur. Philippi et Mariæ, Dei gratia regis et reginæ Angliæ, Hispaniarum, &c. secundo et tercio, ibidem tent. die Marcurii, videlicet xvij die Junii, anno prædicto [1556], coram Johanni Burbage ballivo, &c. "Thomas Siche de Arscotte in com. Wigorn. queritur versus Johan fine himself to glove-making,—he was also engaged in agricultural pursuits:6 and it would seem that eventually he abandoned the glove-trade entirely; for he is styled "yeoman" in a deed dated 1579,-his name occurs in a list of" the gentlemen and freeholders" in Barlichway hundred, 1580,-and he is again called "yeoman" in a deed dated January 1596-7.-According to Aubrey, he was "a butcher;" according to Rowe, "a considerable dealer in wool:"8 and perhaps these several traditions are not utterly at variance either with each other or with what has been just mentioned; for if he was a yeoman, he might have raised for the market both sheep and cattle, which might occasionally have been killed on his own premises; and, in that case, he would have had wool to sell. But such an hypothesis is unsatisfactory: and, as John Shakespeare appears to have tried sundry occupations, it is not unlikely that at one period he was a butcher, and at another a wool-stapler. nem Shakyspere de Stretford in com. Warwici glover in placito quod redd. ei octo libras," &c. (i.e. Thomas Siche brings an action against John Shakespeare glover for the sum of £8.) • In 1556 he brought an action against a certain Henry Fyld [Field] for unjustly detaining eighteen quarters of barley (" quæ ei injuste detinet"); and in 1564 he was paid by the Corporation "for a pec tymbur, iij8." "His [William Shakespeare's] father was a butcher." Aubrey's Mss. Mus. Ashmol. Oxon.—What Aubrey immediately adds to these words will be afterwards cited.-We shall presently see, too,—and it is not a little remarkable,—that in 1693, the parish-clerk of Stratford, who was then more than eighty years old, asserted that our poet was "bound apprentice to a butcher." Rowe's Life of Shakespeare. "Ralph Cawdrey, one of the aldermen of Stratford, at the time our poet was born, was a butcher, and was bailiff of the borough the very year before Mr. John Shakespeare filled that office." Malone's Life of Shakespeare, p. 71. Malone, however, thinks that in Aubrey's account John VOL. I. On April 30th, 1557, he was marked one of the jury of the court leet, but not sworn; and on Sept. 30th, 1558, he was one of a like jury. In the former year he was also appointed an ale-taster; and soon after Michaelmas he was chosen a burgess. On Sept. In 30th, 1558, and again on Oct. 6th, 1559, he was elected constable. On the day last mentioned, and again in May 1561, he was made an affeeror. Sept. 1561, he was elected one of the chamberlains, and filled the office two years. On July 4th, 1565, he was chosen an alderman. From Michaelmas 1568 to Michaelmas 1569 he served as high-bailiff. On Sept. 5th, 1571, he was elected chief alderman for the ensuing year. It may be added that in those days few of the Corporation of Stratford could write their names, and that among the markmen was John Shakespeare. He married Mary,10 the youngest daughter of Robert Arden, of Wilmecote,11 then deceased; who, though described in documents of the time as "husbandman," was a considerable landed proprietor, and descended from a family of long standing and of no mean note in War Shakespeare and his son William have been confounded with Thomas Shakespeare, a butcher at Warwick, and his son John, who in March 1609-10 was bound apprentice to William Jaggard the stationer, and who was admitted to his freedom May 22, 1617, &c. : but it is altogether unlikely that tradition should have mistaken the far-famed dramatist for Jaggard's insignificant apprentice. 10 She was the youngest of the seven daughters of Robert Arden by his first wife, whose maiden name is not known. His second wife, Agnes Arden, was the widow of a person named Hill: her maiden name was Webbe. "A hamlet, partly in the parish of Stratford, and partly in Aston Cantlowe." Halliwell's Life of Shakespeare, p. 7, folio ed. wickshire.12 The marriage, it would seem, took place towards the close of 1557; for Mary Arden was unmarried on Nov. 24th, 1556, the date of her father's will (which was proved on the 16th of the Dec. following), and her first child Joan was baptized Sept. 15th, 1558,-her first child, at least, of whom there is mention in the Stratford baptismal registers, which do not commence till March of that year. Mary Arden inherited, under her father's will, a small estate at Wilmecote called Ashbies,13 and the sum of six pounds, thirteen shillings, and four-pence: she also brought to her husband the interest in two tenements at Snitterfield; and, besides the estate of Ashbies, she appears to have had an interest in certain other land at Wilmecote.14 There can be little doubt that, during the earlier part of his career, John Shakespeare's circumstances were easy, though not affluent. On October 2d, 1556, the copyhold of a house in Green-hill-street, and that of another in Henley-street, were assigned to him; the former house having a garden and croft attached to it, "There is no good proof that the Robert Arden, Groom of the Chamber to Henry VII., and rewarded by that sovereign, a fact which appears from the Patent Rolls of that reign, was related to the Ardens of Wilmecote; but there can be little doubt, from the identity of coatarmour, that the latter were connected with the John Arden, Esquire for the Body to Henry VII., whose will, dated in 1526, would appear to show that the king had honoured him with visits." Ibid. p. 17. Ashbies is variously described in different records as consisting of fifty, fifty-four, and fifty-six acres, but the probability is that it comprised fifty-four acres. The balance of evidence seems to be in favour of that estimate. There was also a residence upon this property, and, according to a fine dated 1579, there was two houses and two gardens," &c. Ibid. p. 28. "See note of a fine in the Chapter House, printed by Mr. Halliwell, Ibid. p. 53. VOL. I. the latter a garden only.15 In 1564, when Stratford was visited by the plague, his donations towards the relief of the poor "seem to denote a moderate, though not the lowest, rank among the contributors."16 In 1570 he rented a farm of about fourteen acres, known by the name of "Ingon, alias Ington meadow ;" and in 1575 he purchased for forty pounds a property consisting of two freehold houses 17 in Henley-street, with gardens and orchards annexed. But before 1578 his affairs had become greatly embarrassed. In that year he and his wife mortgaged to Edmund Lambert 18 for forty pounds the estate of Ashbies. They also sold to Robert Webbe their interest in the tenements at Snitterfield: according to the indenture of sale, dated October 15th, 1579, the purchasemoney was four pounds; but from a fine preserved in the Chapter House, Westminster, dated in Easter Term, 22 Eliz. 1580, it appears that the reversionary interest19 on the same property was parted with to the same Robert Webbe for forty pounds. We find, too, in the notes 15 It is not known how long he remained possessor of the premises in Greenhill-street: but as late as 1590 he certainly owned the copyhold in Henley-street, as well as another copyhold tenement in the same locality, for they are mentioned in a survey made during that year. See Halliwell's Life of Shakespeare, pp. 24, 31, folio ed. 16 Malone's Life of Shakespeare, p. 83. 17 Mr. Halliwell thinks "it admits of a doubt whether Shakespeare's father did not occupy the whole as one tenement. A minute examination of some deeds relating to the property has nearly convinced me that this must have been the case, and that it was not formed into two houses until long after the birth of Shakespeare." Life of Shakespeare, p. 32, folio ed. 18 Joan Arden, the sister of Mary Shakespeare, was married to an Edward Lambert. 19 On the death of Agnes Arden: see note 10, p. iv. |