WEST DERBY HUNDRED 



NORTH MEOLS 



Bold of Bold. Ar- 

 gent, a griffin segreant 

 sabUy beaked and legged 



1576 he conveyed his estates to feoffees," for the use 

 of himself and his sons, with remainders to Richard 

 Bold of Bold and others. Having no children he in 

 1588 sold the reversion of the dower of John Augh- 

 ton's widow and the remainder just named to Richard 

 Bold. He died on 31 December, 1600, his heirs 

 being his sisters Ellen Anderton, widow, and Anne, 

 wife of Thomas Gerard.' 



Bold House seems to have been erected about 

 1550, but after the death of John Bold, when Richard 

 Bold became lord of this moiety, 

 it is unlikely that the owners 

 were in constant residence. Sir 

 Thomas Bold died here in 1 6 1 2. 

 He was a natural son of Richard 

 Bold and had a grant of this 

 manor, but dying without issue 

 by his wife Bridget, daughter 

 of Sir William Norris, his estate 

 reverted to the Bolds of Bold.' 

 It descended regularly to Peter 

 Bold of Bold, who by his will in 

 1757 settled it upon his eldest 

 daughter, Anna Maria. She died 

 unmarried in 1 8 1 3, and Colonel Peter Patten in- 

 herited it, as son of the younger daughter Dorothea, 

 who had married Thomas Patten of Warrington ; 

 he took the additional name of Bold. 



He died in 1 8 1 9, leaving four daughters as coheirs. 

 The eldest, Mary, became lady of the manor ; she 

 married the Russian Prince Eustace Sapieha, and died 

 without issue in 1824, when the estate went to her 

 sister Dorothea, who married Henry Hoghton, after- 

 wards Sir Henry Bold-Hoghton, bart. This moiety 

 of the manor was sold by him in 1843 to Charles 

 Scarisbrick of Scarisbrick ; since his death in i860 

 the manorial rights and appurtenant estates have been 

 Tested in his trustees.* 



The Kitchen moiety of the manor seems to have 

 been the more important, as the family resided in 

 North Meols. Anne Kitchen died in August, 1572, 

 and her husband Barnaby in July, 1603. They had 

 an only daughter Alice, who married Hugh Hesketh, 

 a natural son of Sir Thomas Hesketh of RufFord.' 

 Hugh Hesketh died in 1625, and was succeeded by 

 his eldest son Thomas, who in 1641 paid double to 

 the subsidy as a convicted recusant.' Next year he 

 conveyed his estates to his eldest son William, charging 

 them with annuities to himself and his other children. 

 In 1643 William Hesketh took up arms in the king's 

 service, his estates being thereupon sequestered. He 

 died the same year. 



His brother Robert, as heir male, petitioned the 

 Committee for Compounding in 1648 ; and subse- 

 quently his parents and brothers also petitioned. 

 William's wife and daughter lost their income, it 

 being declared in 1652 that the manor and other 

 lands had been sequestered ' for the popery and 

 delinquency of Mrs. Hesketh, then late of North 

 Meols.' In 1653 the sequestration was discharged.' 



Thomas Hesketh, the father, lived on till 1666. 

 Robert Hesketh had a long dispute, beginning in 

 165 1, with the widow and daughter of his elder 

 brother, but in the end retained the estate, as Anne 

 the daughter, who married Thomas Selby, died without 

 issue, and her husband then gave up the struggle." 

 Robert Hesketh died in December 1675, and was suc- 

 ceeded by his son Roger. 



The new lord appears to have occupied himself 

 with the care of his house and estate. The great 

 event of his life was the abortive Jacobite trial of 1 694, 

 in which he and his wife were among the accused ; a 

 carrier had deposed to seeing a quantity of arms dis- 

 tributed in July 1692, to a number of the gentry, 

 Roger Hesketh being one.' He died in June 1720, 

 and was succeeded by his son Robert, who held this 

 moiety of the manor less than two years, dying in May 

 1722. His son and heir, Roger, then only eleven 

 years of age, enjoyed possession for seventy years, 

 his death taking place in June, 1791 ; in 1740 he was 

 high sheriff of the county.'" His first wife was Mar- 

 garet, eldest daughter and coheir of Edward Fleet- 

 wood of Rossall. Their son and heir was Fleetwood 

 Hesketh, born in 1738, who became lord of Rossall by 

 inheritance from his mother. He married Frances, 

 daughter of Peter Bold of Bold, by whom he had two 

 sons and three daughters. The eldest son, Bold Fleet- 

 wood Hesketh, high sheriff in 1797,'° died unmarried 

 in 1 8 19, and was succeeded by his brother Robert, 

 who served as high sheriff in 1820.'° 



He had a numerous family. The story of his son 

 and successor, Peter, belongs to Fleetwood, which town 

 he created ; he was made a baronet in 1838, but dying 

 in 1866 without male issue the title became extinct. 

 The manor of North Meols he sold in 1845 to his 

 brother Charles," who thus became lord of the manor 

 as well as rector. He died in 1876, and his son 

 Edward Fleetwood Hesketh died unmarried in 

 October, 1886. 



In the lordship of the manor, however, the Rev. 

 Charles Hesketh had been followed by his widow 

 Anna Maria Alice. By her will it passed, on her 

 death in November 1898, to the son of her husband's 

 sister Anna Maria Emily Fleetwood, who had married 



1 Pal. of Lane. Feet of F. bdle. 38, m. 

 148. 



2 Duchy of Lane. Inq. p.m. xviii, «. 43. 

 It appears that there were living a half- 

 brother Henry, and a half-sister Elizabeth, 

 wife of William Muscle of London, who 

 put in claims which afford various parti- 

 culars as to the family and land ; see 

 North MeolSf 42-4. From the inquisition 

 it may be gathered that the principal 

 divisions of the township were the Church 

 Town, the New Row, and the Blowick. 



3 Lanes. Inq, p.m. (Rec. Soc. Lanes, and 

 Ches.), i, 254. 



* Farrer, North Meoh, 56. 



^ Lanes. Inq. p.m. (Rec. Soc. Lanes, and 

 Ches.), i, 23. Barnaby Kitchen's will 

 may be seen in North Meols, 44. The 

 will was questioned, but Matthew French, 



then rector, deposed that going to visit 

 him the day before he died, he being a 

 parishioner, Barnaby Kitchen desired the 

 rector to write out his will, and he did so; 

 Depos. at the Reg. Off. Chest. 



^ His wife Ellen (Molyneux) was a 

 recusant, and his sons William and Robert. 

 His brother William was reported in 

 1625 to have had a son before marriage and 

 to have been * married not known where 

 or by whom ' ; i.e. probably by a mis- 

 sionarypriest. The widow, a recusant, sub- 

 submitted in 1627 j Visit. Books at Chest. 



The Bolds had also been recusants ; 

 John Bold of North Meols was in 1590 

 among the esquires who were * in some 

 degree of conformity, yet in general note 

 of evil affection in religion, non-com- 

 municants' ; Gibson, Lydiate Hall, 245 



(quoting S.P. Dom. Eliz. ccxxxv, n. 4). 

 Henry Bold was in 1592 fined ^5 for the 

 queen's service in Ireland for his oppo- 

 sition to the legally established religion ; 

 ibid. 262 (S.P, Dom. Eliz. cclxvi, n. 

 80). 



^ Royalist Comp, P, (Rec. Soc. Lanes, 

 and Ches.), iii, 209-18. 



8 The documents are given in Farrer's 

 North Meolsy 48-53. 



« Jacobite Trial (Chet. Soc), 5 1. He had 

 probably conformed to the Established 

 religion, as he did not register his estate 

 in 1717. 



" P.R.O. List of Sheriffs, 74. 



1^ Bland, Southporty 104 ; part of this 

 share of the manor was, it is stated, sold 

 to Charles Scarisbrick, who had already 

 purchased the Hoghton moiety. 



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