WORSLEY OF APPULDURCOMBE

Description: Though the Worsley deposit is not the largest in the County Record Office, Oglander, White-Popham and Ward exceed it in bulk, it is nevertheless the archive of the most extensive estate which existed on the Island in the early modern period. The Worsleys of Appuldurcombe are a classic example of a gentry family making their fortune out of monastic dissolution and royal favour. The core of the estate, the so-called manor of Appuldurcombe, in fact an amalgamation of at least four manors, was the property of the great Norman Abbey of Montebourg. Custody of this estate was periodically granted during the Hundred Years' War to the Nuns Minoresses without Aldgate who eventually received a permanent grant when all the alien houses were suppressed in 1414. Sir James Worsley, founder of the Appuldurcombe family, came down from Lancashire to the court of Henry VII. He subsequently held the office of Groom to the Wardrobe under Henry VIII. A marriage with Anne Leigh, heiress of the then farmer of Appuldurcombe, Sir John Leigh, was arranged for Sir James in 1511 and when the convent of the Minoresses was itself suppressed in 1538 he was perfectly positioned to ease himself into a permanent grant. His son, Richard, subsequently obtained a long lease on the suppressed Priory of Carisbrooke, though this was only to remain with the family till 1571. Other lands in the area around Appuldurcombe were purchased during the 16th century on the more open market. Richard Worsley, son of James, served the Tudor state as Captain of the Isle of Wight. Some idea of his wealth can be obtained from the inventory of Appuldurcombe House taken shortly after his death in 1565 (36/9). The document describes a house crammed with the most sumptuous furnishings. The Worsley archive is rich in 16th century title deeds, the period during which most of the estate, Appuldurcombe, Stenbury, Nettlecombe, Wathe, Bembridge and Chale, was obtained. All is neatly summerised in the Inquisition post mortem of John Worsley of 1582. (1/1) There is comparatively little to interest the medievalist. There are good series of court rolls for Appuldurcombe and Whitwell in the later 16th and early 17th centuries. Only a few rolls and rentals of 15th century or earlier date have survived. Separate rolls for each manor were kept into the second decade of the seventeenth century. A lone roll for all the courts exists for 1632 (32/77). Thereafter a more straight forward system of estate management was adopted and a series of annual stewards' accounts was begun in 1642. The counterpart leases are severely defective as a class and the full history of the management of the estate is best pieced together from these books. Members of the family continued to serve the Crown in local administration and sometimes rather further afield. Though Thomas Worsley was amongst the Island gentry protesting at the Governor Sir George Carey's treatment of Robert Dillington in 1588, he subsequently served as a deputy lieutenant under Carey's successor, the Earl of Southampton. Thomas's son and grandson, Sir Richard, the 1st baronet, and Sir Henry, the 2nd baronet, served their turns as Sheriffs of Hampshire though Sir Henry was also active in local administration during the Commonwealth. ("A Royalist's Notebook" p.110). Henry Worsley, brother of Sir Robert, the 4th baronet, was sent to Spain and Portugal on treaty negotiations (37/15 and later became Governor of Barbados. With the death of Sir Robert Worsley in 1747 the baronetcy passed to a branch of the family living at Pylewell, near Lymington, Hants. The estate, however, was conveyed to trustees for twenty-one years, after which it was to revert to Thomas Worsley, the son of Sir James Worsley of Pylewell (35/23). During the twenty-one years term the principle beneficiaries appear to have been James Worsley of Stenbury and Robert Worsley of Pidford. Thomas Worsley died in the same year that the term expired and it was left to his son, Sir Richard, to reunite the Appuldurcombe baronetcy with the estate. Sir James Worsley of Pylewell began a history of the Isle of Wight for which he collected a variety of papers. The project was continued by his son, Sir Thomas, and completed by his grandson, Sir Richard, who is conventionally cited as author of the "History of the Isle of Wight" eventually published in 1781. Sir Richard usefully endorsed all the documents he looked at for the History in his distinctive hand. Many of these are unconnected with the Worsleys and will be found in section 39. Though some of his forebears had contracted marriages with powerful aristocratic families (see Section 35) Sir Richard Worsley, the 7th baronet, was more tempted by the £60,000 on offer with one Seymour Fleming, younger daughter of Sir John Fleming, a successful London merchant. (Seymour's mother, Jane, however, was herself a grandaughter of the 8th Duke of Somerset and, after Sir John's early death had taken the Earl of Harewood as a second husband.) The marriage ended disasterously with the famous suit for criminal conversation in which Lady Seymour successfully undermined her husband's case by deliberately destroying her own character before the court. A legal separation and much lucrative work for the lawyers followed. A single odd letter (38/2) suggests that the full story was even murkier than the revelations in court indicate. Though forced to step down as Governor of the Isle of Wight, and resign his pretensions to complete political control of the place, Sir Richard continued to find favour at court, however, and was later sent to Venice as British Ambassador. His affairs were left in a state of great disorder on his death in 1805 and they were still being cleared up twenty years later. The largest single item in the deposit is a volume of transcripts of deeds relating to these matters. (35/23) Sixteenth and seventeenth century rentals and surveys tell us much about the layout of the estate. However, no really rational attempts at recording the place were made till 1773 when Sir Richard commissioned a complete survey with maps. (33/36 and 33/44-49). Used in conjunction with the earlier surveys these items will enable an almost complete picture of the estate to be drawn, tenement by tenement. The break-up of the estate came in two distinct phases. First a number of farms were put on the market in 1809, as soon as possible after the death of Sir Richard, no doubt to satisfy the claims of Lady Worsley (40/1). The main sale was not effected till the 1850's. Initial attempts then at selling it off as a going concern were not successful. A large number of draft conveyances survive (class 41) to record the purchasers and one of the sale catalogues was endorsed at the time with many of their names (40/3).

Date: 01/01/1250 - 31/12/1858

Last import: September 11, 2017