LEYLAND HUNDRED 



CHORLEY 



Chorley Commissioners,' and is now held by the 

 Corporation. A court leet .-ind baron was held until 

 i8z8. 



The surname Gillibrand occurs in several places 

 in South Lancashire,^ but 

 nothing is known of the origin 

 of the Chorley branch. The 

 earliest to occur is one Hum- 

 phrey Gillibrand, who about 

 1430 was holding a small por- 

 tion of the Hospit.illers' land 

 by a rent of 4rt'.' Thomas 

 Gillibrand purchased a mes- 

 suage in Chorley in 1563,'' 

 but the name is not recorded 

 among the freeholders in 

 1600. Soon afterwards the 

 family became prominent. A 

 pedigree was recorded in 

 1613^; in 1628 Thomas Gillibrand, a convicted 

 recusant, was one of the more considerable land- 

 owners,^ and in 163 1 w.as called upon to pay ^^lo 

 as composition for having refused knighthood.^ The 

 residence of the family was already called Chorley 

 Hall.' The fidelity of the family to Roman 

 Catholicism was shown in many ways, and was 

 probably the reason of the sequestration ' and ultimate 

 forfeiture 1" of Thomas Gillibrand's estates during the 

 Commonwealth period. 



A pedigree was again recorded in 1664,^1 and 

 Chorley Hall descended to John Gillibrand and 

 Thomas his son, who in 1 7 1 7 registered their estates 

 as ' Papists.' The father, who, as above stated, pur- 

 chased a moiety of the manor, was living at Astley 



Gillibrand. Ardent 

 fwo iivQydi in saltire 

 sable /lilted or. 



Hall, which he had in right of his wifc.'^ He died 

 in 1732, and his will recites the settlement of the 

 moiety of the manor of Chorley made on the marriage 

 of his son Thomas with Alice Westby, and directs 

 that it should go to his grandson Thomas, with 

 remainder to another grandson Richard." 



Thomas Gillibrand the son of John had five sons 

 and three daughters. His will, dated 1733, men- 

 tions various of them, including a daughter Jane, who 

 had married John Hawarden of Lower House in 

 Widnes and had a son Thomas.''' Two of the five 

 sons, Richard (d. 1774) and William (d. 1779), 

 became Jesuit priests ; the latter, on the death of his 

 elder brother Thomas in 1775, succeeded to the 

 estate and lived at Chorley till his death.'* His 

 nephew, the above-named Thomas Hawarden, suc- 

 ceeded and took the surname of Gillibrand. The 

 house had become known as Gillibrand Hall, but the 

 owner in 1783 assured Doming Rasbotham that it 

 was rightly called Chorley Hall.^^ He did not long 

 enjoy his estate, dying in 1787 '' ; his son Thomas,'* 

 who purchased the other moiety of the manor and 

 became sole lord, died in 1828, and left a son and 

 heir Henry Hawarden Gillibrand, who in I 8 I 5 took 

 the name of Fazakerley. He fought a duel at Chorley 

 in 1832 with T. B. Crosse of Shaw Hill, but neither 

 party was injured.'' His son Henry having died 

 without issue, the inheritance went to a daughter 

 Matilda Harriet, who in 1863 married Jocelyn Tate 

 Westby, afterwards Fazakerley- Westby, of Mowbreck. 

 The later generations of the family were Protestants. 

 As already stated, the manor was sold in 1874, and 

 in 1 88 1 the hall, with 250 acres of park and wood- 

 land, was purchased by the late Henry Rawcliffe, to 



* The purchase included the manor or 

 lordship of Chorley, the market place 

 and the market and manorial rights. 



* e.g. at Astley in Leigh, Lowton, &c. 

 ^ In the year named there was a 



division of a place called Eaveshey in 

 Chorley between Humphrey Gillibrand, 

 Richard Crosse and William Woodward, 

 John the son and heir of Humphrey 

 assenting; Add. MS. 32107, no. 2587. 

 An additional agreement was made in 

 1 44 1 between Richard Crosse on the one 

 srde and Elizabeth widow of Humphrey 

 Gillibrand and John her son on the other, 

 by which the former took the north part 

 of the land and the latter the south ; 

 ibid. no. 2509, 2261, &c. 



From the Hospitallers' Rental c. 1 540 

 it appears that Eaveshey was held in 

 thirds by Henry Breres and Alexander 

 Street, 4J/. ; James Crosse, 41/. ; and John 

 Gillibrand, ^d. ; Kuerdcn MSS. v-, fol. 

 83*. 



* Pal. of Lane. Feet of F. bdle. 25, 

 m. 84 ; the vendors were Thomas Wastley 

 and Joan his wife. 



* risit. (Chet. Soc), 114. The descent 

 is given thus : John -s. Thomas -s. John 

 -s. Thomas, aged thirty-one. 



^ Misc. (Rec. Soc Lanes, and Ches.), 

 i, 171. 



' Ibid. 214. 



Of Thomas Gillibrand some interesting 

 personal details are afforded by the narra- 

 tives of two of his daughters who became 

 canonesses at Louvain in 1643. Their 

 mother, Anne Blundell of Crosby, ' was 

 always brought up a good Catholic, but 

 her husband, Mr, Gillibrand, was no 

 Catholic. When he sued to her for 

 marriage she told him plainly that he 



should never look to have her unless he 

 would become a Catholic. He then, 

 God's grace concurring, being perhaps 

 well minded before, became a Catholic, 

 so as they were married by a priest, and 

 he continued ever after a most good and 

 constant Catholic' To the convent on 

 his daughters' profession the father pro- 

 mised to give ,^4.00 a piece, but had 

 difficulty in doing so, for * after this it 

 happened that their parents were ex- 

 tremely plundered, as others at that same 

 miserable time of war in England, and 

 were fain to leave their house, which waj 

 taken from them, as also they lost their 

 estate, and Mr. Gillibrand was forced tc 

 fly into Wales. There he lived in poverty 

 yet content to suffer for God. Their 

 mother went and lived with her daughter, 

 who was then newly married, also in 

 poverty, but with content to suffer for 

 her conscience, being a Catholic' ; Chron. 

 of St, Monica's, Lowvain, ii, 192, 194. 



^ According to Kuerden it was * for- 

 merly the seat of Harrington,' which 

 would account for the name ; Loc. Glean. 

 Lanes, and Ches. i, 211. 



^ Royalist Comp. Papers (Rec. Soc. 

 Lanes, and Ches.), iii, 71 ; the estate is 

 described as the * manor of Chorley Hall,' 

 with lands, &c., lying in Chorley, Black- 

 wood, Lighthurst and Samlesbury. 



1^ Index of Royalists (Index Soc), 42. 



" Dugdale, Fisit. (Chet. Soc), 120. 

 Thomas Gillibrand was still living, aged 

 eighty-two, and his son and heir John 

 was forty-eight. Thomas Gillibrand, 

 John's eldest son (aged seven at the 

 Visitation), renounced his inheritance to 

 enter the Society of Jesus, but died at 

 the close of his novitiate in 1678 ; Foley, 



^22 



Rec. S. J. vii, 303. 'William Gillibrand, 

 another Jesuit, who laboured in Lanca- 

 shire till his death in 1722, is stated to 

 have been a younger brother j ibid, vii, 

 304. Another brother, John, succeeded 

 and is mentioned in the text. 



^* Estcourtand Payne, £'«^/. Cath. Non- 

 jurorsy 99. The father, John Gillibrand 

 (son of John son of Thomas), registered 

 an estate at Chorley, with a leasehold 

 property at Thistleton, &c., as of an 

 annual value of only ,^18 ys. lod. His 

 son Thomas regis-tered Chorley Hall, 

 with land, &c., valued at ^^40 n. 6d. ; 

 the estate was settled on male issue by 

 Alice his wife. 



" Piccope MSS. (Chet. Lib.), iii, 246, 

 from a roll of Geo. II at Preston. 



1^ Ibid, iii, 252, from R. 5 of Geo. II 

 at Preston, The will of John Hawarden, 

 dated 1742, names his brother Bryan 

 Hawarden of Wigan, surgeon ; ibid. 346, 

 from R. 15 of Geo. II. A Gillibrand 

 deed was enrolled in the King's Bench in 

 1741 ; vol, 134, Trin. 14 & 15 Geo. II, 

 R. 25. 



*5 Foley, loc. cit. ; Gillow, Bihl. Diet, 

 of EngL Catk. ii, 467. 



^^ Quoted in Baines, Lanes, (ed. 1870), 

 ii, 126. 



*' The later descents are from Piccope's 

 MS. Pedigrees (Chet. Lib.), ii, 338-9, 



*^ Thomas Gillibrand was vouchee in 

 a recovery of a moiety of the manor of 

 Chorley in 1801 ; Pal. of Lane. Aug^ 

 Assizes 41 Geo. Ill, R. 4. He quarrelled 

 with the priest for refusing to allow him 

 to smoke his 'churchwarden* in chapel, 

 &c., and his children became Protestinto ; 

 Miic, (Cath. Rec. Soc), v, 95, 



*^ PrestoH Guardian, 3 July 1875. 



