John Basset (1462–1528)

Arms of Denys of Orleigh: Azure, three Danish battle axes erect or.[15] As engraved on monumental brasses on Sir John Basset's tomb

Top slab of chest-tomb of Sir John Basset (1462–1529) of Umberleigh, inset with monumental brasses of himself, his two wives, and their children with heraldic escutcheons. Right: first wife Ann (or Elizabeth) Denys, above her 5 children, 1 boy and 4 girls; left: second wife Honor Grenville, above her 7 children, 3 boys and 4 girls. Atherington Church, Devon. These brasses were ordered by Honor Grenville herself, made in 1533, purchased by George Rolle of Stevenstone before July 1534[16] and set onto the tomb in 1534, as correspondence to Honor surviving in the Lisle Papers reveals.[17]

• Firstly before 1474[18] to Elizabeth[19] (or Ann[20]) Denys, daughter of John Denys of Orleigh, near Bideford, by his wife Eleanor Giffard (daughter and co-heiress of Stephen Giffard of Thuborough[21]) by whom he had the following progeny, one son, who died young,[22] and four daughters:
  • Unknown son Basset, died young
  • Anne Basset, who as a child had been sent by her father, together with her sister Thomasine, to live in the household of Giles Daubeney, 1st Baron Daubeney (1451–1508), under a special agreement entered into in 1504, referred to by the family as the "Great Indenture".[6] This specified that Daubeney would pay about £2,000 for the recoveries of Basset's Beaumont inheritance on condition that one of the Basset daughters and co-heiresses would marry Daubeney's son Henry Daubeney (1493–1548), on whom the lands were entailed. The marriage never took place and in 1511 she married James Courtenay (born 1459) of Upcott in the parish of Cheriton Fitzpaine,[23] Devon, a younger son of the first Sir William Courtenay (d.1485) of Powderham by his wife Margaret Bonville[24] a daughter of William Bonville, 1st Baron Bonville (d. 1461). James's eldest brother was Sir William Courtenay (1477–1535) "The Great",[25] who was responsible for giving the order for the pulling down of Umberleigh weir in November 1535, much to the opposition of Lady Lisle.[26]
  • Margery[27] or Mary[28] Basset who married William Marrys of Marrys in Cornwall (i.e. Marhayes Manor, Week St Mary, Cornwall).[28] The manor of Marrys was adjacent to the Basset manor of Femarshall, part of which Margery had as her dower.[29] William died leaving a young daughter Margaret Marrys (d.1621) as his sole heiress. Her wardship and marriage was purchased by the North Devon lawyer George Rolle (c.1486-1552) of Stevenstone, who later was an important adviser to John Basset's widow Honor Grenville, later Lady Lisle. In his will Rolle left Margaret's wardship to his son George Rolle (d.1573), who therefore chose to marry her himself.[30] George Rolle (d.1573) named one of his daughters Honor, apparently after Lady Lisle, as his elder brother John Rolle had done for one of his daughters also.[31]
  • Jane Basset.[32] Six of Jane's letters, written when aged in her 40s, to her step-mother Lady Lisle survive in the Lisle Papers.[33] Lady Lisle had legal possession for life of Umberleigh as her dower, but allowed Jane and her blood-sister Thomasine to live there. Jane was a talkative and assertive character.[34] Jane's presence at Umberleigh from 1533 was resented by Lady Lisle's servants there, whom Jane believed were not looking after the property adequately and were defrauding their mistress, for example by selling salmon and accounting for only part of the proceeds.[35] She wrote to Lady Lisle that while she was away at Calais (1533-1542) with Lord Lisle, that her servants, including Rev John Bonde her bedesman and Vicar of Yarnscombe, kept a prostitute in the house and maintained a "bawdy and unthrifty rule" at the manor. She clearly was fond of Umberleigh, and perhaps resentful of her young step-brother John Basset who would himself inherit it.[36] She occupied the "corner chamber" and the buttery[37] and was reported to have had a greyhound which slept on the bed most of the day. She was allowed by Lady Lisle pasture in the park for 2 cows, but defiantly pastured 3 cows and a horse, which was reported by Rev Bonde to Lady Lisle. She asked Lady Lisle to lease her the fishing rights on the River Taw to supplement her small income.
  • Thomasine Basset[38] (d.1536). As a child she had been sent by her father, together with her sister Anne, to live in the household of Giles Daubeney, 1st Baron Daubeney (1451–1508), under a special agreement entered into in 1504, referred to by the family as the "Great Indenture".[6] This specified that Daubeney would pay about £2,000 for the recoveries of Basset's Beaumont inheritance on condition that one of the Basset daughters and co-heiresses would marry Daubeney's son Henry Daubeney (1493–1548), on whom the lands were entailed. The marriage never took place. It is not known if she ever married. Aged in her 40s, she lived with her blood-sister Jane Basset at Umberleigh whilst Lady Lisle was away at Calais, but as was reported in one of Jane's letters, ran away early one morning to her sister Margaret's house at Marrys. Wood (1846) suggested an elopement had occurred, discounted by Byrne who suggested she was perhaps fleeing from her domineering sister Jane.[39] Jane saw it as a conspiracy by Thomasine and the servants to persuade her to leave too. Thomasine became ill at Marrys and was apparently on her way back to Umberleigh when she died 18 months later at Dowland on the Friday before Palm Sunday 1536.[34]

Arms of Grenville: Gules, three clarions or. These arms are engraved on monumental brasses on Sir John Basset's tomb but are reflected in a vertical axis

• Secondly when he was 53, in 1515,[40] to Honor Grenville (1493–1566), a daughter of Sir Thomas Grenville (died 1513), Sheriff of Cornwall in 1481 and in 1485/6,[41] (whose monument and effigy exists in Bideford Church) of Stowe in Kilkhampton, Cornwall and lord of the Manor of Bideford, Devon, by his wife Isabella Gilbert, by whom he had the following eight children (7 surviving):
  • John Basset (1518–1541), eldest son and heir, who married Frances Plantagenet, the daughter and co-heiress of his step-father Arthur Plantagenet, 1st Viscount Lisle, bastard son of King Edward IV (she married secondly Thomas Monke (died 1583), of Potheridge in Merton, Devon (as his first wife), with whom she had three sons and three daughters. By her eldest son she was great-grandmother of George Monck, 1st Duke of Albemarle (1608–1670), KG.[42] By Frances Plantagenet John Basset had a son and heir Sir Arthur Basset (1541–1586), MP, of Umberleigh and a daughter married to William Whiddon.[43] Due to his Plantagenet ancestry, Arthur's son Sir Robert Basset (1573–1641) made what turned out to be a foolish and costly decision to offer himself as one of the many claimants to the throne of England after the death of Queen Elizabeth, perhaps encouraged by his father-in-law Sir William Peryam, Lord Chief Baron of the Exchequer.[44] He suffered a heavy fine for his action which according to the biographer John Prince (died 1723), involved the sale of thirty of the family's manors.[45]
  • George Basset (c. 1524 – c. 1580), 2nd son, MP for Newport-juxta-Launceston in 1563 & 1572 and for Bossiney in 1571.[46]
  • James Basset (1526–1558), 3rd son and youngest child,[18] MP,[47] a courtier first to Stephen Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester and Lord Chancellor and later a courtier to Queen Mary I. He built up his own substantial estate in lands and was granted by Queen Mary the manor of Great Torrington.[48]
  • Honor Basset, christened in 1515,[49] assumed to have died young
  • Philippa Basset (d.1582), wife of James Pitts of Overcombe, possibly a son of Richard or William Pitts who appear on the lay subsidy roll of February 1526 for Atherington.[50]
  • Katharine Basset (b.circa 1522), (sometimes erroneously referred to as "Elizabeth") a servant to Queen Anne of Cleves, wife of Sir Henry Ashley (1519–1588), MP, of Hever in Kent, later of St Giles, Upper Wimborne in Dorset[51]
  • Anne Basset, maid of honour successively to Queens Jane Seymour, Anne of Cleves, Catherine Howard and Katharine Parr;[52] and said to have been a mistress of King Henry VIII.[53] As a child she went with her mother and step-father Lord Lisle to Calais, and in November 1533 entered the household of Thybault Rouaud, Sire de Riou (d.1556), at Pont de Remy near Abbeville.[54] He was a friend of Lord Lisle's and his sister Anne Rouaud was the wife of Nicholas de Montmorency, into whose household entered Anne's sister Mary Basset. She married Francis Hungerford[51]
  • Mary Basset[55] (d.1598), youngest daughter. She went with her mother and step-father Lord Lisle to Calais, and in August 1534, aged about 11 or 12, she entered the household at Abbeville of Nicholas de Montmorency, Sire de Bours (d.1537), a branch of the premier family of France the House of Montmorency.[56] She remained there for almost 4 years,[57] following which she returned to Calais. In Lent 1540 she was secretly engaged to her former guardian's son Gabriel de Montmorency, Seigneur de Bours, who had proposed marriage to her.[58] This closeness to a subject of the French king was incriminating evidence in Lord Lisle's arrest for treason, followed by the arrest of Mary herself, with her mother and sister Philippa Basset.[59] Following her release from house arrest at Calais in 1542 she became in 1557 the wife of John Wollacombe of Combe, Roborough, Devon.[60] She died and was buried on 21 May 1598 at Roborough, Devon, having produced several children.[61]

Sir John Basset left a will dated 6 November 1527, now lost but of which parts were transcribed by the 18th-century herald Anstis.[64] He listed his feoffees, amongst whom were Roger Graynfild (i.e. Grenville), who were directed to "keep every year a solemn dirige and the morrow upon three masses for the good estate of the said Sir John Basset and Honour his wife" and of various members of the Grenville family.[64] He left his wife Honor, until she remarried, all the rents and profits of his manors of Trevalga, Femarshall, Whitechapel, Holcombe, Upcott Snellard and Calston, from which she was to pay his debts and also provide dowries of 100 marks each on the marriages on each of his daughters Jane, Thomasine, Philippa, Katharine and Mary.[64] His marriage settlement of 1515 had already provided that Honor should have as her jointure the manor and advowson of Tehidy, the manor of Umberleigh, and lands in Bickington and Atherington.[65]

His chest tomb with monumental brasses on top, of himself between his two wives with his children below in two small groups exists in St Mary's Church, Atherington, to where it was moved in 1818 from Umberleigh Chapel.[66] The Lisle Letters record some details concerning the making of the tomb. His widow Lady Lisle ordered "images & scripture...for Mt Basset's tomb" before she departed for Calais[67] to join her new husband, and a letter from Richard Kyrton to Lady Lisle dated 21 November 1533 states: "And as for your plates for the tomb, they are sent home by the carrier, and for the gilding they must descry all the arms by the reason of colours. And they asketh £ v for the doing of it and for the making Master George Rolles hath laid out xxxiii s iiii d unto Candlemas, the which Burye then must pay him".[68] In a letter dated April 1534[69] Sir John Bonde wrote to Lady Lisle "the pictures of Mr Basset's tomb" have been "laid on by the hands of Oliver Tomlyng". Thus the brasses were made in 1533 and set onto the tomb in 1534.[70] A letter to Lady Lisle from George Rolle[71] referred to an inscription on the tomb, which is now missing.