Notes. 615 



between Sir William Sliarinf^ton and his brother, Sir Henry Sharington. 

 I take the meaning to be that the latter freed the demesne lands of 

 Lackham from the tithes of grain and hay that had been payable to 

 him as lay rector. Uewley Court is not mentioned at all. 



Places of the same name were not necessarily in the same manor 

 and there might be several manors bearing the same name. 



There certainly was a manor of Bewloy, of w]ii<;h liewley Court 

 must have been the manor place. 



It appears to have ha])i)ened, all over the country, that when two or 

 more manors, in the same parish or even beyond, came into the hands 

 of the same lord, the smaller manors came to be regarded as merged 

 in the larger manor and their sejjarate existence was gradually forgotten. 



Bewley Court, Avhich had been purchased from Edward Darrel, Esq., 

 by Sir William Sharington, passed after his death, in 1553, with his 

 other lands, to his })rother Henry. Sir Henry Sharington died in 1580, 

 and liewley Court, with Howden Park and a good deal more, became 

 the proj)erty of his second but eldest surviving daughter, Grace, Lady 

 Mildmay. Her only daughter, Mary, married Francis Fane, who was 

 created Earl of Westmorland, and their son, Mildmay Fane, second 

 Earl of Westmorland, appears to have sold all his Wiltshire property, 

 in the time of Charles the Second. 



To whom Bewley Court was then sold I do not at ])resent know, but 

 I think it may not improbably have been to one of the Mitchell family, 

 who api)ear to have been i)reviously living there and acting as agents 

 for Lord Westmorland. 



In the first half of the eighteenth century, Bewley Court belonged to 

 Mr. Lloyd, and, in 1764, it had recently been acquired from Mr. Lloyd by 

 >h\ Montagu, of Lackham. It continued to form part of the Lackham 

 Estate, until the sale and to a great extent the breaking up of that 

 estate, in the early part of the list century, when it bacame the 

 property of the late Mr. Huggens, who held, I believe, a mortgage on 

 part of the estate. He founded a charitable institution, called Huggens's 

 College, situated, I think, in Kent, and upon that institution he 

 bestowed his i)roperty in the parish of Lacock. 



From the Trustees of that Charity Mr. Palmer purchased those lands, 

 so that they again form part of the Lackham estate. 



1 may add that l^cwley Court was not within the limits of the forest 

 of Chippenham. Tlie forest is not recorded to hive ever e.\tended to 

 the south of the road from Xaish Hill to Key liridge, which aii])ears 

 to have been the ancient boundary. At a later period the bounds of 

 the forest were somewhat further to the north, coinciding with the 

 pn^sent bounds of tlie civil parish of Pewsham. C. H. T\i,i;>«'i'. 



Great Crested G-rebe ^/ '// -/a^; r//s/ ////.s;, on Braden 



POlld. Mr. (Jforgr Sinii>kius writes that on April i'nl, UHi', he saw 

 swinuning and diving on the o|>en water of Braden I'onil, close to the 

 public road, a (Ireat ('n^steil (Jlebe. It is greatly to be wishctl that 

 tills tiiit> bird, of whidi Smith in his liinhof Wilts records only four 

 speriinens as having oiHiirr.tl in Wiltshire, would lake up its ])ermanent 

 • luartcrs on this sheet of water, o\\v of tin' very i^-w situations in the 

 eountv snitaMe for its liabitation. 



