MEMOIR OF WILLIAM HOWITT. 
367 
estate has been in her family for many generations. She is still living at the 
age of eighty, beloved by all who know her, for the benevolence of her character 
and her Samaritan-like sympathy with all that are in suffering and distress. His 
father, Thomas Howitt, Esq., is also still living at Heanor, at an advanced age. 
The Howitts have been for many generations considerable landed proprietors 
in Derbyshire. In the reign of Elizabeth a Thomas Howitt, Esq., married a 
Miss Middleton, co-heiress of the manors of Grattan, in the Peak, and of 
Wansley and Eastwood, in Nottinghamshire. On the division of the estate, the 
manors of Wansley and Eastwood fell to the lot of Mrs. Howitt, who came to 
reside with her husband at Wansley Hall. 
The Howitts appear to have been of the old school of country squires, who 
led a jolly careless life—hunting, shooting, feasting, and leaving their estate to 
take care of itself as it might, and which, of course, fell into a steady consump¬ 
tion. The broad lands of Wansley and Eastwood slipped away piece-meal; 
Wansley Hall and its surrounding demesne followed; the rectory of Eastwood, 
which had been a comfortable berth for a younger son, was the last portion of 
Miss Middleton’s dowry which lingered in the family, and that was eventually 
sold to the Plumtre family, in which it yet remains. The Rectors of Eastwood 
appear, from family documents, to have very faithfully followed out such an 
education as they may be supposed to have received from their parents. They 
were more devoted to the field than the pulpit; and the exploits of the last 
rector of the name of Howitt and old Squire Rolleston, of Watnall, are not 
yet forgotten. 
The demesne of one heiress being dissipated, there was not wanting another 
with which to repair the waste with her gold. The great-grandfather of our 
author married the daughter and sole heiress of Thomas Charlton, Esq., of 
Chilwell, in Nottinghamshire, with whom he received a large sum in money. 
This was soon spent, and so much was the lady’s father exasperated at the 
hopeless waste of his son-in-law, that he cut off his own daughter with a shilling, 
though she had a family; and adopted a lawyer, of Lincoln’s-Inn, of his own 
name of Charlton, but of no relationship whatever; in whose descendents the 
estate of Chilwell is still vested. The disinherited man did not, however, learn 
wisdom from this lesson, unless he considered it wisdom “ to daff the world aside 
and let it passhe adhered stoutly to the hereditary habits and maxims of his 
ancestors ; and a wealthy old aunt of his, residing at Derby, getting a suspicion 
that he only waited her death to squander her hoard too, adopted the stratagem 
of sending a messenger to Heanor to announce to him her decease. The result 
justified her fears. The jolly squire liberally rewarded the messenger, and 
setting the village-bells a-ringing, began his journey towards Derby to take 
