ORLINGBURY HUNDRED 



LAMPORT 



baptized at Bow, and succeeded his father at the age 

 of 30,' had been blind since a great sickness he had 

 at 14. He died at the age of 50 in 1605, his death 

 hastened by a fall from an unruly horse. He married 

 Elizabeth Nicholson in 1576, and it is to him that the 

 credit of founding the Lamport library belongs. 



The inquisition taken after the death of Thomas 

 records the purchase of the manor by John Isham and 

 states that it never belonged to the monastery of Bury 

 St. Edmunds nor had it ever been granted by Henry 

 VIII in 1 541 to Sir Edward Montagu^ — a suggestion 

 of disputed claims, to which a reference in his father's 

 will to losses by 'a great suit at law' supplies the clue. 

 John Ishara succeeded his father at the age of 23, and 

 in 1607 married Judith youngest daughter and ulti- 

 mately co-heir of William Lewin, D.C.L. and LL.D., 

 of Otteringden, Kent, Judge of the Prerogative Court, 

 and sister to Sir Justinian Lewin.' He was knighted in 

 1608, high sheriff i6ii-i2, and made baronet on 

 30 May 1627. Though a Royalist, Sir John was 

 allowed to remain undisturbed at Lamport until he died 

 in 1651. His accounts show he paid a total of £1,202 

 to the Parliament, and contain an application under the 

 royal sign manual from the king for a loan of ;^500 

 in 1642. •♦ 



His son Justinian, who was dealing with the manor 

 in 1653,' the year in which he married his second wife 

 Vere daughter of Sir Thomas Leigh, first Lord Leigh 

 of Stoneleigh, was a person of culture and learning. 

 It was he who employed Webb to re-build the west front 

 of the Hall, and the masons worked under his instruc- 

 tion. He also built the chancel of the church at Lam- 

 port, and the Isham chapel (q.v.). He was a friend 

 and correspondent of Seth Ward, later Bishop of Salis- 

 bury, and was one of the earliest Fellows of the Royal 

 Society in 1663. As a widower with four daughters 

 he courted the youthful Dorothy Osborne, who 

 amusingly describes in her letters to Temple, her 

 future husband, the elaborate suit of the baronet whom 

 she christened 'the Emperor'. He suffered imprison- 

 ment many times as well as fines for his Cavalier prin- 

 ciples, but was rewarded at the Restoration by his 

 election to the Parliament of 166 1. He died at 

 Oxford where he had gone to place his two sons at 

 Christ Church on March 2, 1675, and was buried 

 at Lamport. 



The detailed pedigree of the family of Isham with 

 biographical accounts of its members to the present 

 day is to be found in the Genealogical volume for 

 this county,* and their succession can be summarized 

 briefly. Sir Thomas, who succeeded his father while 

 still a minor in 1675, and has left a Latin diary 

 written by his father's commands, died, aged 23, 

 in London on the point of marriage in 1681. His 

 brother and heir Justinian, who succeeded him, was 

 M.P. for Northampton and for the county in many 

 parliaments, and one of the guard formed at Notting- 

 ham for Princess Anne of Denmark to enable her to 

 desert her father James II.' He died in 1730, and was 

 succeeded by his son Sir Justinian Isham, M.P. for the 



county from 1730 to 1737, a good antiquary and lover 

 of literature, who at his sudden death s.p. in 1737 was 

 succeeded by his brother Sir Edmund Isham, bart., 

 M.P. for the count>' from 1737 until he died in 1772. 

 Sir Justinian, who then succeeded to the manor, was 

 the son of his brother the Rev. Euseby Isham, D.D., the 

 third son of the fourth baronet. When in 1794 an 

 Inclosure Act was passed for the open and common 

 fields in Lamport and Hanging Houghton, these were 

 estimated at about 539 acres, and all except the church 

 lands were his propert}'.* His son Sir Justinian, who 

 succeeded him at his death in 18 18, died at Lamport 

 Hall in 1845, and was succeeded by his son Sir Justi- 

 nian Vere Isham, at whose sudden death in 1846 Sir 

 Charles Edmund Isham his brother succeeded him. 

 Captain Sir Vere Isham, son of John Vere Isham, son 

 of Vere Isham (d. 1845), Rector of Lamport, son of 

 Sir Justinian Isham (7th bart.) (d. 1818), succeeded 

 Sir Charles Edmund Isham at his death in 1903, and 

 is the present lord of the manor. 



The Domesday Survey records i virgate i bovate in 

 Lamport among the lands of the Abbey of St. Ed- 

 mund's.' This had become half a hide in Lamport in 

 the Hundred of Mawsley of the socage of St. Edmund 

 in the 12th century,'" and by 1284 must have been 

 looked upon as part of the Trussell's manor of Lam- 

 port, being returned at that date in the Hundred of 

 Orlingbury as 3 virgates of land in Lamport which the 

 Abbot of St. Edmund's held of William Trussell, Wil- 

 liam of John de Wahull, and the latter of the king." 

 Lands in Lamport were specified in the grants of 

 1 541-2 to Sir Edward Montagu, Chief Justice of the 

 King's Bench, of all lands belonging to the abbey of 

 St. Edmund,'- and this inclusion may have led to the 

 specific statement at the death of Thomas Ishara that 

 his manor had never been part of the abbey property.'^ 



Property was also held in Lamport in 1086 by the 

 Countess Judith, who had i bovate of land with I bor- 

 dar rendering 1613'.'* The Hastings purparty of the 

 honor of Huntingdon included in 1235 half a fee in 

 Scaldwell, [Hanging] Houghton, and Upthorp held of 

 them in 1235 by Simon 'Major''5and in 1242 by Simon 

 son of Simon.'* This was modified by subsequent redis- 

 tributions into a quarter fee in Lamport, Houghton, 

 Scaldwell (q.v.), and Upthorp held by John Hastings 

 senior in 13 13," and into a third of a fee held in the 

 same places in 1325'' and in 1376 by the Hastings," 

 and under them by Thomas de Verdun and his heirs. 

 Four owners of lands appear in 

 HANGING the Houghton later known as Hang- 

 HOUGHTON ing Houghton in the Domesday 

 Survey.*" The Conqueror's half- 

 brother Robert, Count of Mortain, received an estate 

 of 2 hides less I virgate; the Conqueror's niece the 

 Countess Judith l hide and l virgate; the abbey of 

 St. Edmund i hide and J virgate; and Walter the 

 Fleming 2 virgates and i bovate of land: a total of 

 nearly 4i hides, three of whose owners were also hold- 

 ing lands in Lamport, with the result that in later 

 centuries the delimitation of lordship was sometimes 



' Chan. Inq. p.m. (Scr. 2), ccilvi, 1 13. 



' Ibid, ccxciv, 85. 



' She was buried at Lamport in 16:5, 

 the year of the great plague. 



♦ Hill. MSS. Com. Rep. ili, 'MSS. of 

 Sir Chas. Isham, Bart, of Lamport Mall', 

 p. 254. 



» Feet of F. Dlv. Co. Trin. 1653. 



' Kirlhamftonihirt Familitt (f.C.lt.), 



'4'"*7- 



' Extracts from Sir Justinian's diaries 

 are printed in Roy. Hill. Soc. Tram. (3rd 

 Scr,), i, 181-203. 



» Priv. Stat. 34 Geo. Ill, cap. 75. 

 » y.C.H. Korlhanls. i, 318a. 

 '» Ibid, i, 380. 

 " feud. AtJs^ iv, 2. 

 " L. and P. Hen. nil, ivi, g. 678 



(56);xvii,g. 220(63). 

 '^ Sec above, n. 2. 

 '« y.C.H. Nortianti. i, 350. 

 's 5*. o/F«j, 497. '* Ibid. 938. 



" Cal. Inq. p.m. v, 412. 

 " Ibid, vi, 612. 

 i» Cal. Cloie, 1374-7, p. l8q. 

 " Sec y.C.H. Noriianti. i, 318, 324, 



340. 353- 



197 



