A HISTORY OF LANCASHIRE 



Sir William RadcliiFe, made a knight in the Scottish 

 expedition of 1544,®^ appears to have added to his 

 patrimony; he died on 12 October 1568, and was 

 succeeded by his son John, then thirty-two years of 

 age, an elder son Alexander having died before his 

 father." Sir John RadclifFe ^ died on 19 January 

 1589-90 ; the inquisition describes his lands in the 

 counties of Lancaster, Chester, York, Lincoln, Notting- 

 ham, and Derby.®® He had been knight of the shire 

 in 1 571 and 1572.®' Alexander his son and heir 

 was only twelve years of age. He was knighted at 

 the sacking of Cadiz in June 1596,®^ and died on 

 5 August 1599 without issue, his brother John, 

 seventeen years of age, succeeding him.®^ 



John RadclifFe was made a knight in the following 

 year, during the Irish wars,^'' and thereby freed from 

 wardship.^* He was knight of the shire in three 

 Parliaments, 1620 to 1625,^^ but in 1627 was killed, 

 or died of his wounds, during the Duke of Bucking- 

 ham's expedition to the Isle of Rh6.®' By his wife 

 Alice daughter of Sir John Byron he left a son and 



heir Alexander, twenty years of age," Though so 

 young, he had been created a Knight of the Bath at 

 the coronation of Charles I.^* The dispersal of the 

 family estates began about this time ; a moiety of 

 Ordsall was mortgaged in 1634 to Humphrey Chet- 

 ham.^® Sir Alexander married the step-daughter of 

 Robert RadcliiFe, fifth Earl of Sussex, and had with 

 her by the earl's gift the manor of Attleborough in 1 

 Norfolk.^^ 



At the opening of the Civil War he, in conjunc- 

 tion with Lord Derby, took an active part in favour 

 of the king, and was in 1 644 committed by Parlia- 

 ment to the Tower.*® He afterwards made his 

 peace.^* He was buried at Manchester on 14 April 

 1654, leaving several children,^*^ of whom a younger 

 son, Robert, became ancestor of the RadclyfFes of 

 Foxdenton in Chadderton.*" The remainder of the 

 Lancashire estates of the RadclifFes appears to have 

 been disposed of by Sir Alexander or his son.'" 



The Chethams did not secure the whole of 

 Ordsall ; *°' their estate descended to the Clowes 



^ Metcalfe, op. cit, 77 ; the arms arc 

 given as gules, a bend engrailed argent. 



The will and inventory of Dame Anne, 

 wife of Sir William Radcllffe, 1551, are 

 in fVilh (Chet. Soc. new sen), i, 17, 226. 



^ Duchy of Lane. Inq. p.m. xiii, 33. 

 The manor of Ordsall with two water- 

 mills, a fulling-mill, &c., and 20 acres of 

 land, &c., in Shoresworth — which by this 

 time seems to have been merged in the 

 demesne — were held of the queen by the 

 sixth part of a knight's fee and a rent of 

 695. %d. Seventeen burgages in Salford, 

 100 acres of land there, twenty burgages 

 in Salford and Oldfield, and 30 acres in 

 Salford, all held of the queen in free bur- 

 gage and socage by a rent of iz^., were 

 included in his possessions ; also manors 

 and lands, &c., in Flixton, Pendleton, 

 Hope, Monton, Newcroft, Moston,Tock- 

 holes, and Livesey, Oakenrod and Spot- 

 land, and Radcli0e. In 1561 he had 

 made provision for his wife Katherine, 

 who survived him and lived at Hope ; also 

 for Richard Radcliffe, his younger son. 

 It appears that Sir William's brothers 

 Alexander and Edmund were still living, 

 the former at Ordsall and the latter at 

 Chenies in Buckinghamshire. 



The pedigree of 1 5 67 (referred to above) 

 shows that Alexander Radcliffe, the eldest 

 son, was at that date living. 



Sir William's tomb in the cathedral, 

 long ago destroyed, bore the following 

 distich : — 



* Sandbach cor retinet, servat Mances- 

 tria corpus, 

 Caelestem mentem regna supema 

 tenent.' 



^ He was dubbed at Hampton Court 

 in Feb. 1577-8 ; Metcalfe, op. cit, 131. 



86 Duchy of Lane. Inq. p.m. xv, 45. 

 There is recited his provision for William, 

 a younger son, and Margaret, Jane, and 

 Anne, his daughters, from lands at Nor- 

 manby, &c. ; John, another son, had 

 lands in Notts, and at Moston. Anne 

 his wife survived him at Ordsall. 



In religion he was regarded by the 

 authorities as a 'dangerous temporiser,' 

 i.e. he believed the old religion, but con- 

 formed to the legally-established system ; 

 see Local Glean, Lanes, and Cbes. i, 137—9. 



Sir John's will, beginning with the 

 Catholic motto * Jesus esto mihi, Jesu,* 

 orders his burial in the choir of Manches- 

 ter. He wished his sons to be well 

 brought up, and to be sent to Oxford or 



Cambridge when fourteen. One son was 

 to be a laviT^er and to be sent abroad to 

 study. The inventory shows live stock 

 and goods valued at ^^1,468 ; Piccope, 

 fVills (Chet. Soc.), ii, 68-72. 



87 Pink and Beaven, op. cit. 66. 



^ This is a statement in a pedigree of 

 1633, He is called * esquire* in the war- 

 rant for the livery of his father's lands in 

 1598 ; Dep. Keeper's Rep. xxxix,App. 558, 



89 Duchy of Lane. Inq, p.m. xvii, 35. 

 His mother, Anne, was living at Tock- 

 holes. He had in 1599 granted to Mary 

 RadclifFe and Thomas Gillibrand the 

 manor of Ashby, with various lands in 

 Lincolnshire and Derbyshire, for 2,000 

 years. His will, dated 22 Mar. 1598-9, 

 conftrms the dispositions he had made in 

 favour of his brothers John, Thomas, and 

 Edmund, and his sisters Margaret (one of 

 the queen's maids of honour), Jane, and 

 Anne ; Mary Radcliffe, his cousin, one of 

 the maids of the queen's bedchamber, was 

 an executor ; Chest. Epis, Reg. ii, 232. 



9*' On 24 Sept. 1 600 5 Metcalfe, op, cit, 

 210. 



''^ Statement in a 17th-century pedi- 

 gree. Ben Jonson wrote laudatory verses 

 on Sir John : *I do not know a whiter 

 soul,* &c. Sec also Local Glean. Lanes. 

 and Ches, i, 137, 152. There were fines 

 relating to lands in Ordsall and the Rad- 

 cliffe manors of Ordsall, &c., in 1613 and 

 1623, Sir John Radcliffe being in posses- 

 sion ; Pal. of Lane. Feet of F. bdlc. 81, 

 no. 27 ; 104, no. 51. 



^ Pink and Beaven, op. cit, 69, 70. 



^ See Mr, Letts's article above quoted; 

 and J. Palmer in Hibbert-Ware*s Manch. 

 Foundations^ ii, 288, &c. Barritt the an- 

 tiquary states that Sir John had started on 

 the expedition as the result of a quarrel 

 with his wife ; and that both his legs 

 were shot off in the fighting, 



94 Duchy of Lane. Inq, p.m. xxv, 6. 

 The manor of Ordsall, with the water- 

 mill, &c., were held of the king by the 

 twentieth part of a knight's fee and an 

 unknown rent. The date of his death is 

 given as 5 Nov. 1627, 



96 Metcalfe, op. cit. 186. 



5^ Raines and Sutton, Humphrey Cbet- 

 AdM (Chet. Soc), 114. Various sums of 

 money were advanced by Humphrey 

 Chetham and his nephew Edward to 

 members of the Radcliffe family, who 

 were reduced to great distress ; ibid, 

 115, On this obscure part of the story 



212 



see Mr. C. Roeder in Lanes, and Ches, 

 Antiq. Soc, xiv, 201-4. 



^ G.E.C, Complete Peerage, vii, 337 ; 

 his wife was Jane daughter and heir of 

 Edward Shute ; Ordsall D. no. 2. See 

 also Chester, Lond. Marriage Lie. (ed, 

 Foster), col. 1107, In spite of this it is 

 commonly believed that Jane Shute was 

 the illegitimate daughter of the earl. 



98 Ormerod, Civil War Tracts (Chet. 

 Soc), 16, 34, &c 



99 Sir Alexander's estates, apparently in 

 Essex only, were sequestered by the Par- 

 liament ; this would complete the ruin of 

 the family ; Cal. of Com. for Compounding, 

 iv, 2617. The manor of Henham was 

 sold in 1 65 1 ; W. Farrer*8 deeds. 



100 Parties to a Manchester deed of 

 1663 (in possession of W, Farrer) were 

 Humphrey Radcliffe late of Ordsall and 

 now of Oldfield within Salford, gent., and 

 Margaret his wife, one of the daughters 

 of William Radley of the Hall upon the 

 Hill ; and from another deed it appears 

 that Humphrey Radcliffe died before 

 1672. The will of his widow Margaret, 

 dated 1674 and proved 1692, mentions 

 her brother Stephen Radley, her lady 

 Jane, wife of the late Sir Alexander Rad- 

 cliffe, late of Ordsall, and her sister-in- 

 law Frances Wentworth, daughter of the 

 said Dame Jane. 



101 See the account of Chadderton, A 

 settlement by Alexander Radcliffe of 

 Foxdenton in 1652 gave successive re- 

 mainders to Sir Alexander Radcliffe of 

 Ordsall, K.B., and his sons John, Alexan- 

 der, Humphrey, Charles, and Robert ; 

 Raines D. (Chet. Lib.), bdle. 4, The 

 will of John Radcliffe, dated 1669, names 

 his mother Jane. 



103 In 1658 John Radcliffe of Attle- 

 borough, son of Sir Alexander, conveyed 

 to Edward Chetham the manor of Ordsall, 

 with the hall, water corn-mill, and lands 

 in Ordsall, Salford, Pendleton, and Pen- 

 dlebury. The price named is ^^3,600 ; 

 Clowes D, This was a mortgage ; Earl 

 Egerton's deeds show various other deal- 

 ings between 1654 and 1660, Edward 

 Chetham in 1670 assigned his interest to 

 John Birch ; ibid. no. 23. 



103 Humphrey Chetham rebuilt the barn 

 at Ordsall in 1 646. In the following year 

 he paid half the chief rent due for the 

 manor, the other moiety being due from 

 Sir Alexander Radcliffe, whose interest in 

 the manor therefore was not entirely lost \ 



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