Posts tagged with “wills”

The Wills Group

The reading and transcription of 15th- and 16th-century wills can reflect a moment in history. A name becomes a person with family, possessions and often land. We might learn who someone was married to and/or whether they had children living. Siblings, godchildren and cousins might be named, although the latter was a broad term for a variety of kin. Connections with other local families can be made and the testator’s devotion to faith and the afterlife surmised through bequests to church and community. Very occasionally there are glimpses into more personal family issues, such as wayward or absent children, or lack of trust between offspring. Children often received legacies of different value, depending on age, entitlement or favour. The value of bequests in a will can be an indication of the testator’s financial situation. But what can we then conclude about his daily life, or hers, insofar as married women made wills? Does the will describe the home or the testator’s occupation? References to land rarely suggest how it was used.

In the case of one Thomas Fowle of Newenden, who died in 1584, virtually none of the above is disclosed in the will, which was described as ‘nuncupative’. This means that it was delivered orally before witnesses and only recorded later in the church court register provided the court officials were satisfied the declaration represented the deceased's last wishes. It suggests that Thomas was then on his death bed with witnesses gathered around him. He bequeathed his goods, house and land to his wife and five shillings to the parish poor for bread and drink at his burial. Beyond that, Thomas’s life would have been a closed book, were it not for another document – the inventory of all his ‘goodes and Cateles’.

His will is sparse, but his inventory covers several pages.

Let us look first of all at Thomas’s house. Several rooms are mentioned: ‘the parler’, ‘the halle’ and ‘the kechyn’ and each has a room above. From the furniture and items found there, the ‘halle’ seems to be the main living space, with fire implements, a table and seating for a number of people.

The ‘parler’ also has a table, seating, two cupboards and a number of pewter plates and dishes. Is this where the family received guests? It has two painted wall hangings, which suggests it was more on show. A sword and musket (‘calyver’) are also listed there. Perhaps this was Thomas’s particular room, off the 'high' end of the hall, at the opposite end of the hall to the ‘entrye'. Of the kitchen we know nothing, it is not separately described. Within the four upper rooms, (a fourth described as being ‘over the entrye’), are a total of eight bedsteads with mattresses, coverlets and bolsters. It seems likely that the bedroom over the ‘parler’ was used by Thomas and his wife, while the ‘chamber over the halle’ with four bedsteads may have been for children. The two other upper rooms had one bed each.

This then was a sizeable, although not large, house. Much of the furniture was ‘joyned’ and therefore well made. Painted hangings and plenty of bedding suggest a comfortable home.

Outside there was a ‘mylke hovse’ and a ‘shope’, both of which had rooms above. There was also a ‘buttrye’ in which there was a truckle bed and a number of storage vessels. In addition, this property had a stone courtyard with a ‘grete beame and skales to waye marchandyes’.

Further on, listed amongst the tools of husbandry, are some quantities of lead. Could Thomas have been in the business of buying and selling lead? This was commonly used for pipes, pewter and roofing so would have been in demand. Like many other households with land to farm, it’s evident that Thomas’s produced much of their food and other necessities. There are tools for processing linen and wool, woodworking tools, dairy implements and farming apparatus, along with oats, wheat, barley and malt. Oxen were used for ploughing; a small number of cattle and sheep were kept, plus chickens, geese and bees, which produced honey and wax for candles.

From Thomas Fowle’s will alone, he was little more than a name on a document. By linking him to an inventory, a window opened onto a busy, human landscape, broadening understanding of the man in his surroundings and inviting further questions and research.

Susan Callow

The Will of Thomas Winterbury

In another of our occasional pieces looking at the community around Lossenham through the evidence of wills, let me introduce you to Thomas Winterbury. Thomas ‘the elder’ was a grandfather and a widower, living in Sandhurst and it would seem that by 1501 his health was declining. On the 13th of August he decided it was time to make his will.

Thomas’s will gives us no indication of how he had made a living; he left no business utensils or other items suggesting a means of income. Instead it is clear that, understandably, his main concern was for the health of his soul - in other words, what would happen to him after his death. So how did he write this concern into his will?

In the first place, Thomas requested burial in the churchyard of St Nicholas in Sandhurst, giving ten shillings for his burial expenses and leaving twelve pence to the high altar of the church ‘for my tithes forgotten’. This is a standard bequest found in virtually every pre-Reformation will.

He then requested that ten shillings be spent at his month’s mind and ten shillings more was to be spent at his year’s mind for the benefit of his and his former wife, Johanne’s, souls. The month’s mind and year’s mind were both typical ‘anniversaries’ for a dead person, usually celebrated with prayers or masses sung by a priest or chaplain in the church. Such events had a profound importance, as it was universally believed that one’s soul would ultimately go either to heaven or to hell, after a period in purgatory. Purgatory (from the Latin purgare - to clean/purify) was where the soul went, hopefully to be cleansed of sin, before entering heaven - or not, in which case it went to hell. It was widely held that the more prayers were offered up for your soul whilst it was in purgatory, the more likely it was that you would be cleansed of sin and saved - hence the buying of masses and prayers in the years following death.

Thomas was a man with substantial economic resources, but he was also so concerned about his soul (did he have much sin to cleanse? Or was he just very devout?) that he chose to use these resources to ensure that his soul would be saved, rather than damned. His will therefore specified that

my messuage (property) with all the houses thereto belonging and pertaining with iii gardens and iii crofts of land lying in Sandhurst upon the dennes of Silverden and Osynden (Silverden can still be located to the north of Sandhurst Cross)


were to be leased out by his executors for six years. From the profits arising, ten shillings were to be distributed every year

in diriges and masses to be done in the church of Sandhurst for my soul, my wife’s soul and for all Christian souls. The residue of the said 10s if any be to be distributed in diriges and masses and poore people.


After those six years, Thomas’s son (Thomas the younger) was to inherit the properties. Even then, however, the will specified that if Thomas the younger were to die without heirs, the properties were to be sold to fund

an honest priest to sing in the church of Sandhurst or else where my executors will assign, to sing for my soul, my father and mother’s souls and all Christian souls for three years: ten marks a year to sing yearly as the money will be received.


Unusually, and touchingly, Thomas the elder was also so concerned for his son’s soul in the event of his death, that he specified that 3s 4d was to be spent at his son’s ‘outbering’ (burial), then at his month’s mind, and then at his year’s mind. He added

And so yearly I ordain in masses and diriges to be done in Sandhurst church for the soul of Thomas Winterbury, me, my wife and all Christian souls for six years after Thomas’s death every year 3s 4d.


Apart from modest sums left to a couple of other beneficiaries, including 3s 4d to the Prior of Lossenham and 13s 4d to his granddaughter Elise, it was clearly the health of his and his family’s souls which dominated Thomas the elder’s thoughts when he made his will. Let us hope that these final arrangements gave him some measure of confidence as he faced his last few weeks and whatever lay beyond. Probate was given on his will in October the same year.

Rebecca Warren