Sir Richard Musgrave,of Edenhall, MP

MUSGRAVE, Richard (1524-55), of Hartley, Westmld. and Edenhall, Cumb.

• from http://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1604-1629/member/mu...

Family

b. Aug. 1524, o.s. of Sir William Musgrave of Hartley and Edenhall by 1st w. Elizabeth, da. of Sir Thomas Curwen of Workington, Cumb. m. by 1547, Agnes, da. of Thomas Wharton, 1st Baron Wharton, 1s. 1da. suc. fa. 18 Oct. 1544. Kntd. by Aug. 1552.1

Biography

Richard Musgrave’s wardship and marriage were granted to the 1st Baron Wharton on 12 June 1546, little more than a fortnight before he received livery of his lands, and at about the same time he married Wharton’s daughter. Musgrave’s mother was a Curwen so that he already belonged to the cousinage, headed by Wharton, which was contesting the traditional mastery in the north of the Cliffords, Dacres and Percys. Sir William Musgrave, Richard’s father, had challenged the Dacres, with the approval of the crown. When he failed to bring down the 3rd Lord Dacre, unsuccessful pressure was brought upon him by his father, Sir Edward Musgrave, and by the 3rd Duke of Norfolk to marry Richard to Lord Dacre’s daughter.3

In January 1549, during the second session of the Parliament of 1547, Musgrave gave a signal demonstration of his disaffection from the Cliffords when he brought in a bill to deprive the 2nd Earl of Cumberland of his hereditary shrievalty of Westmorland, an action which, as the earl’s servant Thomas Jolye reported to his master, ‘could not be otherwise than by the procurement of the Lord Wharton’.

Musgrave purchased from the crown the rectories of Kirkby Stephen and Warcop, both in Westmorland, in June 1549 for £1,441, but later sold that of Kirkby Stephen to Baron Wharton, reserving to himself certain tithes. He died on 10 or 11 Sept. 1555 at Edenhall when his son Thomas was aged eight years and more. His widow received a grant of Thomas’s wardship on 1 May 1556 but the boy died in 1565. Musgrave’s daughter Eleanor married Robert Bowes of Aske, Yorkshire.

Sources

1. "Baronetage of England" by Betham. "Musgrave of Eden Hall, Cumberland."
2. "History of Richmond" by Clarkson. "Wharton."
3. C.W.A.A.S., Tr. N.S., Vol. 2, 1902, "Wharton Hall, Westmorland", Part I by John E. Curwen.
4. "History of Yorkshire" by Plantagenet-Harrison. "Pedigree of the family of Wharton of Westmorland (Lords Wharton)."
5. "History of Yorkshire" by Plantagenet-Harrison. "Pedigree of the family of Musgrave."
6. C.W.A.A.S., Tr. N.S., Vol.11, 1911, 38-51 and pedigrees. "The Border Manors" by T.H.B. Graham. "The Family of Musgrave of Harcla, Westmorland."
7. C.W.A.A.S., Tr. O.S., Vol. 4, 1879, 178-249. "Appendix."
8. "The Extinct and Dormant Peerages of the Northern Counties of England" by J.W. Clay. "Wharton, Lords Wharton."

Links

• http://wc.rootsweb.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=GET&db=allerton%...