Elizabeth Reppes (Grimstone)

Old visitations for the Repps family say that Henry Repps married Elizabeth Grimston, daughter of an Edward Grimstone of Rushangles in Suffolk, Esq. The problem is that there were a series of different Edwards. The relevant ones for this question died in 1478, 1494, and then approximately 1520.

The children of Elizabeth and Henry were adults who died for example in 1558 (Henry junior), 1566 (Francis), and before 1571 (Alice).[1] Alice was dead before her husband Augustin Styward, but at least some of her children mentioned in that will were still under 21 in 1570, meaning Alice was having children as late as about 1550. So realistically, considering the age at which women can children, she must have been born no earlier than about 1515, and no later than about 1530 (Styward was her second husband). By the same type of reasoning, Elizabeth, her mother, must have been of child bearing age before this period (1515-1530), so herself born approximately 1480-1515.

Fitting well with this, we know Elizabeth's husband Henry was born after 1485, because his mother had him in a second marriage, and in 1485 her first husband died.[2]

In contrast, the Irish genealogist John Lodge believed that Elizabeth was the daughter of Edward Grimston (d. 1478) and Mary Drury, which would make Elizabeth a sister to the Edward we show here as Elizabeth's father.[3]

Problems with the proposal of Lodge (which was copied by Collins):

(1) The Dashwood pedigree for Grimston, in the Norfolk Visitations edition, shows her marrying a Richard Candish, or as Walter Rye describes him, in his edition of the visitation, Sir Richard Candyshe of Trymley, Suffolk.[4] The Suffolk Visitation of 1561 has a Candyshe pedigree which confirms such a marriage, and they had children.[5] (Rye's edition of the Norfolk visitation just refers to the Essex visitations for this branch.[6])

(2) The Essex visitation shows this Elizabeth was born 1458, so she would be a bit older than her father, born 1461! [7]

(3) Lodge seems to say that Elizabeth who married Henry Repps had a daughter named Elizabeth who married a Thomas Holt of Swanstead. The children of Henry and Elizabeth are however quite well accounted for in wills etc, as shown by Dashwood, and do not seem to include any such person. This appears to be an error for Thomas Holland of Swinsted, whose own daughter (named Elizabeth) married the eldest son and heir of Henry Repps and Elizabeth Grimston, also named Henry Repps. In other words, the pedigree contains information which has somehow been misunderstood.

The second Edward lived from 1462 to 1494, so he died relatively young. He had a daughter named Elizabeth mentioned in his inquisition post mortem, who, given the age of Edward himself, must have still been young at that time. There is clearly enough time for her to have had children born around 1490-1530, who could be having children themselves in the mid 1500s, and passing away early in the second half of the 1500s.

However there was also a third Edward, who lived about 1482-1520, again dying relatively young, and his will mentions a daughter named Elizabeth also. If his children were born about 1500-1520, then there was not as much chance for them in turn to be having children who were all adults (and even elderly) themselves by 1550, but it seems possible. (It would mean for example that Elizabeth married a man of similar age to her father. Also all her children would have had to have had children young, despite in some cases having them to more than one spouse.)

The 1520 will of the 3rd Edward makes clear that at least some of his children were "young", and that Elizabeth (like all or most of the others) was not married yet in 1520.

If Henry Repps married the daughter of this 3rd Edward, then he was marrying his mother's first husband's, nephew's grand daughter. If he married the 2nd Edward's daughter (as wikitree is showing) then he was marrying his mother's first husband's nephew's daughter's sister-in-law.

Sources

↑ https://archive.org/stream/visitationnorfo00dashgoog#page/n208/mode... ↑ https://books.google.be/books?id=WVoMAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA336 ↑ The Peerage of Ireland, Volume 3 p.267 ↑ The 1563 Visitation of Norfolk was originally made by William Harvey, Clemenceux King of Arms. A printed edition in two volumes was published much later, with a lot of extra notes and material: Volume 1, published 1878, was edited by Rev. G. H. Dashwood and others. It is available online at familysearch and the internet archive. Walter Rye also published an edition in 1895, making use of the visitations of 1563, 1589, and 1613. It is available on the internet archive and UK genealogy archives. ↑ https://archive.org/stream/visitationsofsuf00harvuoft#page/12/mode/2up ↑ https://archive.org/stream/publicationsofha32harluoft#page/140/mode... ↑ https://archive.org/stream/visitationsofess13metc#page/206/mode/2up