280 History of the Priory of Monkton Farley. 



whilst there. The ground of the matter was, that one John Tay- 

 lor, a woolcomber, of Melksham, made oath before Mr. Montague, 

 that he heard another person, viz., one Ealy, that is a clothworker 

 also at Melksham, say that he saw arms enough for five hundred 

 men in Mr. Webb's house. We had some talk with pleasure of 

 the matter. It is to be noted that the Government has had some 

 notice of plots and conspiracies now on foot, and so has ordered all 

 the forces to encamp in several places, as in Hyde Park, by Salis- 

 bury, Hounslow Heath, near Hungerford, and in our neighbourhood 

 by Chippenham, in several small encampments. The Duke of Nor- 

 folk has been seized, and Habeas Corpus suspended." This was 

 one of the alarms to which George I. was periodically subject from 

 the favourers of the Pretender; so that the search for arms at 

 Monkton Farley may fairly be taken to indicate that the politics 

 of Mr. Webb's family were Jacobite.^ 



Monkton Farley now returned into the same family to whom it 

 had been first granted after the dissolution of monasteries. Mary, 

 sole daughter and heiress of Mr. Daniel Webb (being also niece 

 and heir to Edward Somner, of Seend) married, in 1717, Sir Edward 

 Seymour, of Maiden Bradley, who, in 1749, succeeded to the title 

 of Duke of Somerset, and died in 1757. 



The second son of the marriage was Webb Seymour, Esq. (after- 

 wards Lord Webb Seymour), on whom this property was settled, 

 and who resided here in 1744. He succeeded to the title as 10th 

 Duke of Somerset in 1792, and died in December, 1793 ; being 

 grandfather of the present Duke. 



Monkton Farley was next purchased by John Long, Esq., of the 

 Eood Ashton family, uncle to the present member for North Wilts. 

 About the year 1840 it was again sold, and became the property 

 of the late Mr. Wade Browne. 



REMAINS OF THE PRIORY. 



Of the buildings of the Priory very little is left, and of the Con- 

 ventual Church nothing but the site. In its original condition, 

 having been completed about the middle of the 12th century, the 



» The name of Mr. Daniel Webb is on one of the bells of Monkton Farley Church. 



