Alice Eyston

notes

From The Tablet, Page 7, 10th March 1928. "BLESSED GERMAN GARDINER SOME NEW BIOGRAPHICAL DETAILS." By W. H. GRATTAN FLOOD, K.S.G.

Blessed German Gardiner married Alice, the granddaughter of Blessed Thomas More, in proof of which I quote the following grant of a lease from the Calendar of Patent Rolls (Ireland), (p. 345) : "Lease for reversion to Thomas Eyston who married Alice, daughter of Elizabeth Dauntsey (Daunce), one of the daughters of • Sir Thomas More of the farms of Ratoath and Haggardstown (Co. Louth), for the term of forty years after the determination of the existing lease." Thus, Alice Gardiner, widow of German Gardiner, took for her second husband Thomas Eyston, who, on October 28, 1551, though a layman, was given the Rectory of Rosslare in the diocese of Ferns (Ireland) under Edward VI. The reversionary lease of lands in Co. Louth to Blessed German Gardiner's widow, was granted by Queen Mary, on October 12, 1554, ten years after the death of the martyr, and was apparently given by the Queen on account of the relationship of Mrs. Alice Eyston to two such champions of the Catholic faith as Blessed Thomas More and Blessed German Gardiner.

Sources

1. The Family and Descendants of Sir Thomas More by Martin Wood