THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF LEONARD WHEATCROFT. 27 



At the head of his autobiography, on the first page, we 

 have — 



" A history of the Life and Pilgrimage of 

 Leonard Wheatcrofte of Ashover." 



" I was through God's Providence borne upon May day in the 

 yeare of our Lord God 1627, in the Raigne of King Charles 

 the First. My father's name was also Leonard, son to John 

 Wheatcroft and Mary his wife, who was daughter to William 

 Daine. My mother's name was Anne. She was daughter to 

 John Harrison and Mary his wife, and I was the firstborne to 

 them both, who had in all 6 sonns and 3 doughters. 



" Then did it please God that at forty years of age my father 

 dyed of a fever, and was buried in Ashover Chirch yard on Saint 

 Tantru's day [St. Andrew's] in the year 1648, — witnes his 

 Toumbe [vol. xix. 42] . I was then almost 20 years ould ; 

 part of which time I was a Tayler with my father, and after his 

 death I tought 4 of my brothers that trade." [He appears to 

 have been impressed with a sense of duty to his widowed mother 

 and her charge as long as he might safely remain at home.] 



" Then was there wars in Ingland betwixt King and Parl- 

 ment : then was father against son, and son against father, and 

 brother against brother. Then did I run vp and downe the 

 cuntry to save myselfe from being a soulger, but at last I was 

 forced to take vp armes, and was a soulger ffor the space of 8 

 or 9 years. I shall say little of soulgers now, but tell you what 

 I did, and what hap'ned in the Intrim [i/iferim] and so go on. 



"In the yeare 1649 I set y" Horse medow hedge, and the 

 whiging \j]uickset\ before the doore, and the first Sabath in May 

 1650, I began to be Clarke of the Church, in which place I 

 continued for the space of 13 years. I was also the Parrish 

 Regetr [Registrar], on both which offices I waited, but when 

 occasion of soulgery tooke me off; for about 1653 I began to 

 be a soulger. 



" And in 1655 I went a wooing to my wife, and was above two 

 years before I was married to her. I shall not tell you heare 



