u 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 141. 



because they may furnish a clue to the time the 

 spoon was manufactured. I presume that tlie 

 spoon ori^jinally beUmged to the mess of the Royal 

 New Enghvnd Regiment, and was perhaps trans- 

 ferred to some otlier British regiment; and I send 

 this Query in hope tlmt some of your readers may 

 furnish information upon the subject. Tliere 

 were several regin\ents rai.sed in the American 

 colonies befctre the revolutionary war. In 1744 

 Massachusetts and the New England colonies 

 raised a regiment which was commanded by Col. 

 Wm. Peppered, an American, and tlie troops 

 under his direction succeeded in capturing Louis- 

 burgh or Cape Breton in 1745. After the peace 

 negotiated at Aix-la-Chapelle, Cape Breton was 

 surrendered to tlie French, and in 17oS again 

 captured by forces of which New England troops 

 were a part. Regiments from the same colonies 

 assisted in taking Carthagena, in the attack upon 

 Havanna, and in the capture of Canada. Notices 

 and references to the " King's American Regi- 

 ment" are frequently to be met with during this 

 war, but I have seen n(me bearing the name con- 

 cerning which this Query is made. In Sabine's 

 History nf the American Loyalids. the titles of the 

 various provincial regiments and c<mipunies which 

 took the part of the mother-country during the 

 revolution are given : there is none bearing.' the 

 title in question. I conjecture that the " Royal 

 New England Regiment" was that of Colonel 

 Pepperell raised in 1744, because subsequently 

 each colony riiised its own regiment; and in 

 hopes that some of your readers may ho. able to 

 throw light on the subject, I ask for information 

 of its history, and should like to know to what 

 modern British regiment the mess service of the 

 N. E. Regiment was transferred. 



T. Wjbstcott. 

 Philadelphia, U. S. A., June 5, 1852, 



WILTON CASTLE AND THE BRIDGES FAMILY. 



In Rees' Cyclopoedia, article " Ross," is the fol- 

 lowing passage : — 



" The ruins of Wilton Castle above mentioned stand 



on the Western bank of the Wye Its present 



ruinous condition is to be attributed to the royalist 

 governors of Hereford, l)y whose orders the whole of 

 the interior was destroyed by fire." 



If it be true that this castle was destroyed by 

 the royalists, it would seem probable that it was 

 burnt during the siege of Hereford in 1645, and 

 that the then inhabitants of the castle were Par- 

 liamentarians. 



George, sixth lord Chandos of Sudeley, the head 

 of the noble family of Briilges during tli3 great 

 rebellion, was an active royalist. He was buried 

 ?,t Sudeley in the year 1654. His uncle. Sir 

 Giles Bridges, in his will dated, 1624, mentions hia 



own brother William Bvidae?!, of London, Esq., 

 and that the said William had then two sons living. 

 Another Sir Giles Bridges, of Wilton Castle, 

 Bart., to whom the above-mentioned William was 

 first cousin once removefl, mentions, in his will 

 dated 1634, Robert and Pf/Wiam Bridges, of Wil- 

 ton, gentlemen, brothers. 



The late Mr. Beltz, Lancaster Herald, in his 

 Review of the Chandos Peeras^e Case, states these 

 genealogical facts, and inquires — 



"Who were these Robert and William, and what 

 became of them? Were they the two sons of William 

 of London mentioned in 1624?" 



I would inquire further — 



1. Is anything known respecting William 

 Bridges, who was a lieutenant in the Lord Brook's 

 rerriment in the army under the Earl of Essex in 

 1642 ? 



2. What were the political opinions of Sir John 

 Brydires, of Wilton Castle, Bart., who died in 

 Brydges Street, Cbvent Garden, in February, 

 1651-2? 



3. Whence is the statement in Rees derived, 

 and where may be found a. full account of the 

 circumstances which led to the destruction of 

 Wilton Castle? 



An oM chair, said to have been saved from the 

 fire at Wilton Castle, was in the possession of the 

 housekeeper at Thornbury Castle, in Gloucester- 

 shire, five-and-twenty years since. Is this chair 

 still in existence, and is any tradition preserved 

 respecting it at Thornbury ? 



J. Leweltn Curtis. 



WHY WAS THE DODO CALLED A DRONTE ? 



Naturalists must all be much indebted to 

 Messrs. Strickland and Melville's excellent (I 

 might, almost say, perfect) monograph on The 

 Dodo and its Kindred. In that charming and 

 scientific volume the authors have given us almost 

 all the information that could be collected relative 

 to that curious extinct bird. I had the pleasure, 

 however, subsequent to its publication, of com- 

 muniirating to Mr. Strickland a passage from 

 Randle Holme's Academie of Armory (p. 289., 

 Chester, 1688), which he had overlooked. Mr. 

 Strickland published this as a Supplementary Npte 

 in the Annals of Natural History (Second Series, 

 No. 16., for April, 1849). Holme says: "He 

 beareth sable a Dodo or Dronte, proper, by the 

 name of Dronte," and then gives an account of the 

 bird. 



Now it has always puzzled naturalists why the 

 Dodo was called a Dronte. Mb. Strickland asks 

 in an early Number of your publication whether 

 any family of this name was known to exist; and, 

 if so, where ; and what were their arms : as much 

 light might be thrown upon the subject in this 

 way. I ain afraid that it only existed ia Holme's 



