wedding 3
Two weddings and a funeral. Margaret's death is described under Smallpox 1710, but the run up to her abortive betrothal is discussed. Jane and Eleanor follow. Note the Julian calendar applies to months and years quoted.
Stapleford Park, Stapleford, Leicestershire
Bennet Sherard, 1st Earl of Harborough
Alice initially selected as suitor to Margaret, Bennet Sherard, 1st Earl of Harborough (1677 -1732) a distant Sherrard relative. In 1696 he had married Mary Calverley, but she died in the spring of 1702 shortly after giving birth to their son, who also died some months later, in August.
Alice knew this Stapleford branch before any talk of marriage arose. Based on a samples from the accounts, 18 interactions such as letters and travel to and from Stapleford were taking place between 1700 and 1703, many before Mary's death. Noteworthy is that Lord Sherard dined at Belton in November 1702, with partridges, plover and fish on the menu. This, just a few months after his tragedy. Was Alice wooing yet a third widower for the hand of a daughter?
A visitor to Stapleford observed,
the entertainment we met with here was singularly good, for the family pique themselves upon eating and drinking well . . . the old Lord Sherard has been dead about a year, and left a son [Bennet] who is very much a gentleman
Lady Wentworth thought differently, in a July 1709 letter,
the third [Margaret] is going, but not yet marryed but al things conclewded one with Lord Sherwood ... they say the Earl of Exetor luvs drincking and so dus this Lord Sherwood, and that he [Exeter] has made the match up.
He nor Lord Gilford [Alicia's husband] are what I lyke. Lord Gilford loocks not at all lyke quallety but a little ugly man. I thinck Lord Sherwood is proper and tall , but loocks heavy and dull.
Apocryphally, Margaret stated she would rather die than marry Bennet (Cust 1909).
By December 1709, Lady Wentworth records it is now Lord Willoughby who is to be married to that which Lord Sherwood should have had [Margaret].
In June 1710, Wentworth spots Eleanor and Margaret in the Chapel Royal, St James's Palace - the other [Margaret] is not soe handsome but she is very soon to be marryed to Lord Willoby. Thanks to Lady Wentworth, we know that Margaret was buying her wedding trousseau in London for a Belton wedding planned for July or August - terminated by Margaret succumbing to smallpox.
The heartrending memorial to Mary and Bennet, Stapleford Church. Mary is holding her son on her knee, while her husband reaches out to the dead pair in grief.
Could the inanity of The Honourable Order of Little Bedlam drinking club have put Margaret off Bennet? Or was it his lingering grief reflected in the memorial, left? Certainly, ties were broken with no Stapleford interactions in 15 months of accounts 1710 to 1711.
Bennet didn't need the Brownlow heiress money. That he had no burning desire to re-marry is evidenced by the fact that the Barony, 1714 and Earldom, 1719 were created with a special remainder, failing heirs male of his body. This allowed the titles to pass to other males in the family. On his death in 1732, the titles went to his cousin Philip Sherard, of Whissendine.
Jane Brownlow, Duchess of Ancaster and Kesteven . Born 9th November 1689, christened in St Martin in the Fields the 11th. Died 1736. A medallion from the memorial to her and her husband in St Michael & All Angels Church, Edenham.
Louis Francois Roubiliac Sculptor 1702-1762
Portrait Of Peregrine Bertie, (1686 to 1742) when Marquess Of Lindsey 1717, By Charles D'agar. MP for Lincoln 1708 to 1715.
Jane Brownlow
January 1710, Its said that Lord Willoby is to have the next sister to his Mrs. that's dead; the Lady Brownloe is very fond of him, they say.
Aged 24, Peregrine Bertie , Lord Willoughby became engaged to Jane in December 1710, 4 months after Margaret's death. They married 6 months later on Monday June 4th 1711 (Belton Parish records).
In 1704, Peregrine's elder brother had died, leaving him heir to the Earldom of Lindsey, the barony of Willoughby de Eresby and the hereditary office of Lord Great Chamberlain of England. Styled, Lord Willoughby de Eresby between 1704 and 1715, Marquess of Lindsey between 1715 and 1723 and then Duke of Ancaster and Kesteven.
Left, Jane Brownlow when Duchess of Ancaster (from 26 July 1723. Grimesthorpe Castle) in her peerage robes. for the coronation of George II in 1727.
Yellow cowslips with anemones.
to my Lady, the weding day of Madm Jane Brownlowe, to Ld. Willoughby June 14th - £1
Trigg records the payment of £1, or £203 today to Alice on the day of marriage in 1711, a Thursday, on page 151 of his accounts, for charitable distribution. Sums quoted below are adjusted to 2021.
One month earlier he took delivery of 27 pecks of cowslips (Primula veris), equivalent to 4,000 potted plants and costing £273. We conclude for decoration of church and Mansion. These apricot-smelling, spring flowers were traditionally scattered on the church path at weddings. Even today, cowslips are recommended for late spring weddings.
Three weeks earlier, Alice had journeyed to Grimsthorpe and tipped the butler £101. The cost for servants and horses there came to £139. It was the norm that the Brownlows would pay stabling costs, even though here the recipient was an imminent son-in-law.
Lord & Lady Exeter sent a venison haunch from Burghley. Hanging this fallow deer flesh for ~3 weeks until the wedding would produce a flavoursome meat.
Trigg bought 12 yards of flaxen cloth for 4 shirts for Mr Foster, a factotum who often appears on horse or foot going to and fro between Belton and other noble homes. He was togged out with 2 new cravats and Holland and Muslin for Ristbends to a total of £338. Foster's new wig cost £304 alone. In his rich new apparel, his role would be to welcome guests and/or participate in the wedding processions?
Trigg paid another £213 for 19 1/2 yards of flaxen cloth, probably for other servants or table covers. Repair of a broken sash window cost £324.
Left, the wedding announcement in the Dublin Intelligence, Tuesday 3rd July 1711.
Number of eggs & strikes of wheat usage
Wedding Feast
Jane's wedding was week 8 in the charts above. They show that eggs, butter, wheat and bullock weight consumption dramatically increased. After the wedding week, this continued with an increase in chicken meals. The typical weekly wheat usage of 9 strikes of wheat increased to 18 the wedding week and didn't return to 9 until 5 weeks later in July. This suggests that guests and their servants stayed on for weeks. Eighteen strikes would produce 243 quartern loaves. Eaten in the main by the servants, loaves baked that wedding week, gives an estimate of 100+ servants on site.
The wedding feast was prepared by an outside cook, Mr Switheringale, who was paid £435 to utilise the 146 lb of butter. 714 eggs and 12 lemons necessitated. Along with Soules & Shrimps, Britt, Crabs & Lobsters, Fish from Marnham [further north on the River Trent], 17 ducks and 78 chickens. For desert, he prepared Cherries & Strawberries.
Payment for wine wasn't made until November 2, J. Sharpe for wine as ff bill, a total of £729. That was the only Belton vintner bill in 1711.
Entertainment
Music and song came from the Grantham Waights & the Stamford Waights at a cost of £1,027. The term waights refers to Waits, troubadours as in the City Waites in this YouTube clip and below. Often the wedding procession was led by a fidler.
Additional cost was the Play at Grantham, £455. With the Stable Horses at Grantham Plays £15. A possible connection arises to Colley Cibber (1671-1757) an actor-manager, playwright, and Poet Laureate. He was the son of Caius Gabriel Cibber, sculptor of Belton's 'Moon Dial'. Colley went to Grantham Grammar School. He ran his own production company in Drury Lane near Brownlow family property. He acted as a signatory to a grant of annuity from William Brownlow, and so was known to the wider family (BNLW/4/6/12/1).
A large payment is made for the Coach & Stable horses at Post Witham as ff Bill £145. Post Witham is The Old Black Bull Inn, Lobthorpe Lane. In coaching days, no fewer than forty-four coaches - twenty-two up and the same number down - changed at the “Black Bull,” Witham Common on the Great North Road, every twenty-four hours. The current Black Bull Inn (c1730s) is still in business. Situated 8 miles from Grimsthorpe and 13 miles from Belton. We could infer that the Belton coach and stabling team were awaiting the groom to process him through Grantham to Belton for his wedding and the married couple back to Grimsthorpe. Or perhaps to act as a guard against highway robbers?
Wedding contract
The names on the settlement included Sir John Vanbrugh who may well have attended as a guest and to sign the document. Cousin, Tyrconnel to be, Sir John Brownlow was absent. He was in Rome on his Grand Tour.
Some of Jane's children (Grimsthorpe Castle)
Family Life
The couple went on to have eight children. Their first son was born at their London home, Lindsey House, Lincolns Inn May 1712, but died that year. The second born son of 1714 survived to inherit his father's titles. A daughter Jane was born in 1720 and her daughter married James , the brother of Jane Austen, (Chilvers 2010, page 168). A third son of 1729 was named Brownlow Bertie memorialising Jane's family name as a Christian name. The christening register for another daughter, Caroline Bertie of 1729,
Caroline Bertie daughter of his Grace Peregrine Duke of Ancaster Lord Great Chamberlain of England and Jane his Duchess ...
That entry symbolises the difficulty in finding out about the personality of the Brownlow sisters, subsumed by the 'importance' of the overweight titles of their spouses. We do know that Jane was a great letter writer covered in a later section and that she was involved with smallpox eradication. The famed antiquarian, Dr William Stukeley was chaplain to Jane Duchess of Ancaster. He designed a garden at Grimsthorpe called the Duchesses Garden, suggesting her interest in horticulture. As of 1713, there was still £12 million of the Brownlow estate to be paid out. Chilvers (2010, page 167) reports that Jane was unable to sign as she was disordered in body and mind.
Alice Brownlow's youngest brother, Sir Brownlow Sherard, 3rd Baronet of Lobthorpe, on his death on 13th September 1736 at Cork Street, St Jame's left property at Little Bytham, Careby, Castle Bytham and Creeton to Jane's son, Brownlow Bertie, later the 5th Duke of Ancaster (Chilvers 2010, page 225).
Dublin Intelligence - Tuesday 3 July 1711
How Alice chose suitors and the wedding of Eleanor, the youngest daughter to her cousin the later Viscount Tyrconnel follows.
Chilvers A (2010) The Berties of Grimsthorpe Castle