Inheritance Disputes Index - Examples of Disputed Estates in the Index

Estates in the Americas which have already been abstracted

• Margaret Hubbersty alias Holland, was the owner of a plantation in Maryland. She was a recusant who, during the Civil War in England, assigned her property to her brother-in-law, a Member of Parliament, to save it from confiscation: see C10/97/55, Hubbersty v. Bell, also C9/27/83. (National Genealogical Society Quarterly Vol. 66, No.3, p.221 (Sept. 1978);
• Arthur Spicer of Sittingbourne, Richmond Co., Virginia: see C5/312/47 Spicer v. Battaile 1701, also C9/261/75. (NGSQ Vol. 67, No. 3, p. 212 (Sept. 1979);
• William Pennoyer of London and Bristol, benefactor of Harvard College, New England. The papers show that he was a son of Robert Butler of Bristol and cousin of Thomas Pennoyer of New England: see C8/375/47, 416/76, Eedes v. Loton 1685. (NGSQ Vol. 60, No. 4, p. 243 (Dec. 1972);
• Dr. Thomas Hobbs of Lincolns Inn Fields, Middlesex, brother of Elizabeth Hobbs who married Francis Weeks of Middlesex Co., Virginia: see Hobbs & Weekes v. Hawles 1699, C5/200/15 & 39. (NGSQ Vol. 62, No. 1, p. 38 (Mar. 1974).

Disputed estates of famous persons
Those in search of the histories of even more illustrious or infamous personalities, including traitors and lunatics, will find plenty of material here to engage their interest. Amongst the more colourful are:

• Ben Jonson (1573?-1637), the playwright who was buried in Westminster Abbey after dying with an estate valued at just over £8;
• Sir Anthony Van Dyck (1599-1641), the Flemish painter who made his name in the Court of King James I and was buried in St. Paul's Cathedral in London;
• William Laud (1573-1645), the controversial Archbishop of Canterbury, who was beheaded by the Puritans for his support of King Charles I;
• Sir Peter Lely (1618-1680), noted portrait painter who amassed a large fortune and married a beautiful Englishwoman;
• Nell Gwynn (1651-1687), illiterate mistress of King Charles II and mother of Charles Beauclerk who was created Duke of St. Albans;
• Judge George Jeffreys (1648-1689), chiefly remembered for presiding over the "Bloody Assizes" in the West of England in 1685 which was instrumental in sending many hundreds of convicted "rebels" to the Americas and West Indies.

A detailed example of using the Chancery Court records
To illustrate some of the ways in which the references given in the database may be used to obtain information from the public archives and as a pointer to additional resources, it may be helpful to summarise data obtained from the first and last entries in the index; those for Thomas Abbis of Stotfold, Bedfordshire, (C5/44/6, 1662), and the series of actions relating to the Zouch family of Woking, Surrey.

In the first suit dating from 1662, Thomas Abbis of Cambridge City, gent, alleges that his kinsman Thomas Abbis of Stotfold, Bedfordshire, in about 1655 bequeathed £300 to him by his will from moneys held by Robert Yarway, citizen and merchant tailor of London. However, Yarway claimed that the testator's estate was subject to sequestration following his service in the Army of King Charles I. During the testator's lifetime the defendant had supplied him and William Abbis, the plaintiff's father now deceased, executor to Thomas Abbis and guardian to the plaintiff, then an infant, with several sums exceeding the value of the bequest. The progress of this case from its inception in 1662 until its conclusion in the Michaelmas Term of 1664 may be followed through the Chancery Decree and Order Books (C33).

The various cases concerning the Zouch family of Woking describe in considerable detail the descent of the estates of James Zouch in Surrey and Hampshire after his death testate in 1644. The claims and counter-claims, which continued until at least 1710, were made more complex by the fact that Beatrice, the wife of James Zouch Sr., married a second husband John Lloyd; and James Zouch Jr. at his death in 1708 left only natural children by Katherine Wood of Woking who later took as her husband a man named Richard Bird.

There are a number of outstanding advantages conferred by the examination of Chancery records in relation to compiling family histories. Identification of particular lawsuits will usually provide the key to a wide range of associated documents at The National Archives, such as: Decree and Order Books (C33 - already referred to); Depositions by witnesses taken in London (C24) or in the Country (C21 & C22); Affidavits (C31 & C41); Reports by Chancery Masters (C38); Masters' Papers and Exhibits (C117-C126); Enrolled Chancery Decrees (C78). Moreover these documents and the suits to which they refer will always present a detailed and unvarnished account of the events they describe, which is true of few other sources

Presented in association with Peter Coldham.