Communicated by Mr. James Waylen. 79 
Westminster he was ever a favourer of their proceedings, but when 
Wiltshire was overrun by the King’s forces he was compelled to go 
to Oxford, from which he took the first opportunity of escaping, and 
reaching the quarters of the Parliament. The fine was at first 
calculated at £960, on the supposition that his estate was inheritance, 
as coming from his father; but if Sir Theobald could make it 
appear that he held but for life, then £230 was to be deducted. 
This estimate was “at a third,” but the sum eventually paid was 
£209, or a tenth. 
Sir Ricuarp Gurney, the Lord Mayor of London in 1642, whose 
attachment to Royalty induced him so seriously to cripple the 
Parliament’s action at that crisis. His heavy fine of £5000 was 
not levied to any great extent on Jands in Wilts, though he had 
some possessions here, amongst others, Titherton manor or farm, 
worth £100 a year, and other lands let to Vincent and Thomas 
Smith at £200. It also appeared that he had recently purchased 
East or Great Chalfield, the seat of Sir William Eyre, for he com- 
plains in petition that he had lost at least £2000 there by the 
cutting down of his woods and injury done to the house (no doubt 
referring to the siege of that place. See above, under the article 
Robert Eyre). 
Benevict Hatt, Esq., a recusant (Romanist). The same person, 
presumably, as described in Dring’s List as “ Bendish Hall,” whose 
children paid through their trustee, Edward Perkins, £266 13s. 4d. 
In the House of Commons, 2nd August, 1648, it is ordered, on the 
petition of Colonel Nicholas Devereux, of Malmesbury, that the 
wife and daughter of Benedict Hall, with their solicitor, have leave 
to come to London to attend the business of his delinquency, not- 
withstanding the ordinance prohibiting papists and delinquents from 
abiding in Town. 
Sir Tuomas Hatt, of Bradford, Kt., accepted in December, 1643, 
the office (with others) of commissioner to press men in Wilts for 
the King’s service. He declares that he was compelled so to act by 
written menaces from the King and from the Earl of Forth. That 
his neighbours also believed he might mitigate the oppression of 
free quarters by accepting a prominent position ; and with this end 
