By the Rev. Canon J. E. Jackson F.8.A. 169 
gleaned about those who lived before us is derived from the brittle 
record of a bit of coloured glass. And so, what often happens ? 
The window wants mending, and the glazier, knowing nothing 
about the rules of heraldry, brings the window back again with the 
family memorial turned topsy-turvy or inside out ; and by and by 
comes the inevitable small boy, who sbies a stone through it, and 
away for ever goes the fame of the once potent landlord, squire, 
knight, earl and all, unless some thoughtful member of an Archzo- 
logical Society had taken the precaution to secure it in his note-book, 
We have not time now to go into all the minutiz of the history 
of Old Wootton, which would indeed almost require a small volume. 
And there is the less occasion for it, as a number of very careful 
papers on the subject have been written by one of our Members, 
Mr. Parsons, which we hope may pass from their newspaper form 
into that small volume. I can only deal with a few principal points 
about the town and neighbourhood. 
As you go along the railway from Wootton towards Chippenham, 
about two-and-a-half miles from Wootton, you may notice, nestling 
among trees on a high ground on the left-hand side, a rather 
picturesque old house. This about a century ago was the home of 
the Jacob family, now represented by Sir Robert Buxton. But there 
were two families connected with Wootton whose names stand out 
prominently above the rest, the Churchills and the Hydes, Earls of 
Clarendon. Sir Winston Churchill, father of the great Duke of 
Marlborough, was living at Wootton Basset about the year 1648, 
and John, the great duke, ought to have been born there, but his 
father being a Royalist in the Civil Wars of Charles I., and 
having suffered largely in his fortune from that cause, sought refuge 
with his wife among her friends in Devonshire; so to that county 
the hero of Blenheim belongs. The name of Churchill is familiar 
at Liddington. Of the Hydes there is more to our purpose. They 
were originally of Cheshire, but one Lawrenee Hyde, a lawyer, was 
brought into Wiltshire under the patronage of Sir John Thynne, 
the builder of Longleat, and settled at Dinton, in South Wilts, 
afterwards at Purton. His grandson, Edward Hyde the great Lord 
Chancellor, and another of the family, the Earl of Rochester, made 
