Person:Robert Cary (3)

Biography

In the ‘Devon Carys’, Volume I,^[1] its author, Fairfax Harrison (1869-1938) devotes its Chapter VIII (pp.144-162) to the life of Robert Cary (1457-1540), of Clovelly in Devon. And in the next Chapter IX (163-172), he describes how Robert Cary divided his estate amongst all of his sons.

Following are some excerpts from both of these chapters, without the footnotes. I have added a couple of notes in italics.

« There is a strong contrast to the turbulent, unsatisfied life of Sir William Cary of Cockington, of the tenth generation, in that of his eldest son Robert Cary of Clovelly (1457-1540).

...

Robert Cary was born, as he says in his will, at Hinton St. George, the seat of his maternal grandfather, Sir William Paulet, in Somerset. As his father was already married to his second wife in 1458, we may fix the date as not later than 1457. By reason of his father's absence after the first few years of his infancy, he grew up among his mother's people, a fact which is indicated by the several evidences of his strong affection for the Paulets. It was a family like the Carys themselves, seated in the west of England soon after the Conquest, taking their name from that of their first manor, producing knights and squires for many generations, and finally flowering into the peerage.

Though of Lancastrian sympathies, it does not appear that the Paulets took an active part on either side; and as no chapter of the contest was fought out in Devonshire, a boy like Robert Cary could live and grow up in these times with more knowledge of rumors of war than of war itself. He would have no personal memories of his absent father. Robert Cary was apparently of a cold and stolid disposition; perhaps his father's experience atrophied in him any natural impulse to ambition or desire to take part in the large world of affairs. At all events, for all that he was born in unsettled times, the boy's experience during his youth need not have been abnormal; his subsequent career is warrant that his education was peaceful. It was one of the phenomena of the Wars of the Roses that while they raged the regular life of the nation was not arrested.

Robert Cary made his chief residence during a long life at Clovelly, and there erected a monument to his father, although for several generations Cockington had been the chief seat of his ancestors. Perhaps the explanation of this is that his grandmother, the widow of Philip Cary, was still in possession of Cockington in right of her dower when Robert Cary recovered his father's estates and so that charming seat did not come into his possession until his affection had already been fastened upon Clovelly. At all events, Robert Cary salved his conscience for his desertion of Cockington by building the church there in 1490 after he got possession. The font of this chapel of ease still bears an inscription of his dedication.

At the time of his father's death Robert Cary would be fourteen years of age. During the fourteen years to come of the reigns of Edward IV and Richard III he could hardly expect any grace of restitution from those princes of the House of York, but when in 1485 the wheel of fortune turned and the Earl of Richmond conquered the crown of England on Bosworth field and became Henry VII, every Lancastrian in England felt that he had come into his own again; for while Henry VII founded a new dynasty under his paternal name of Tudor, his maternal blood, which alone gave him the status of royalty in England, was that of Lancaster (what was more important to Robert Cary, his mother was a Beaufort), and he was nephew to the last unhappy king of that house, in whose behalf Henry VII's own grandfather had given his life. The support on which he built his conquest was all Lancastrian. It was reasonable, then, for Robert Cary to expect at the hands of Henry VII a restitution of the forfeited ancestral Cary estates. A petition to this end was accordingly made during the first year of Henry VII's reign. We find this petition endorsed with certain conditions in favor of those who held the property under grant from Edward IV, and, subject to such conditions, with the comforting cedula, Soit fait comme il est desire From his deed of settlement of 1535 we learn that this was done, for the enumeration of Robert Cary's manors includes, with others, the old names we have so often met in the history of Cary of Devon.

After some litigation with his father's widow, Alice Fulford, now the wife of John Anthony, and with his half-brother, Thomas Cary, her son, Robert Cary, now restored in estate, proceeded to live the quiet life of a prosperous country squire. He became, says Pole, "a grave lerned man in the lawes and Justice of Peace in Devon." Twice he was on the sheriff roll, in 1510 and 151 1, when each time the king picked another, but in the latter year, like the Chief Baron, he served in a Commission of Array.'

During a long life he married three times: first, Jane, daughter of Sir Nicholas Carew; second, Agnes, daughter of erson:William Hody (1)|Sir William Hody]], who was chief baron of the exchequer from 1486 to 1516;- and third, about 1512, Margaret, widowed daughter of William Fulkeram (or Fulkroy) of Dartmouth. We get no further glimpse of Robert Cary until April 11, 1518, when at the age of sixty-one he made a will declaring therein that his action was preparatory to a pilgrimage to Compostela during the ensuing summer. We may fix the date as being two years before Henry VIII's Field of the Cloth of Gold, at which Robert Cary's nephew William was to win a jousting reputation.

––[ Here on this and the following pages Fairfax Harrison writes about the practice of pilgrimages, leading us to that undertaken by Robert Cary (pp.152-154). ]

... The chief foreign resort of Englishmen was, however, to Santiago de Compostela: no one knows how many went, but they swelled the throng which made of the road to St. James, el camino de Santiago, the proverbial name which Spaniards have for the Milky Way. So much was Compostela the habit of the well-to-do in England that one who examines medieval English tombs is almost persuaded that the cockle-shell was a badge of all pilgrims: as a matter of fact it was the sign of pilgrimage to Compostela alone.

So while Robert Cary was somewhat late in time as well as in life when he undertook his pilgrimage, for he went in the very teeth of the Reformation, he was still in the English fashion in choosing the object of his devotions. ...

––[ Here on this and the following pages Fairfax Harrison writes about Robert Cary's pilgrimage to Compostela (pp.154-160). ]

On his return from Compostela, Robert Cary protracted a long and uneventful life at home. Perhaps his faith won for him, from that experience, the miracle of persistent good health. On April 12, 1535, he executed a long deed of settlement of his estate(fn) and five years later he died. He was buried in Clovelly Church, where in the chancel a sepulchral brass perpetuates his name. This noble monument, marking the end of an era, has been well described as follows:

"The figure is arrayed in very rich armour : the breast-plate is fluted: from the waist are suspended two narrow taces, to which are appended two ornamental tuilles reaching to the bend of the thigh, a tunic of mail hangs below the elbow and the knee plates are very rich. The legs are enclosed in plate and large rowelled spurs are fastened on the heels with long straps. The offensive arms are a sword and dagger suspended from a curiously arranged belt. The head is without covering, and the hands are bare and joined, as if in devotion, on the breast."

The inscription on the tomb is:

"Praye for the soule of Master Robert Cary, Esquire, Sonne and heyre of Sir William Cary, Knight, which Robert decessyd the XVth day of June in the yere of our Lord God MVXL, on whose soule Jesus have mercy."

Robert Cary lived beyond the age to which he belonged and into the modern world. "The spacious times of great Elizabeth" were near. Doubtless he had relations with his prosperous young kinsman the Bristol merchant, who was soon to be a mayor, and felt an uneasy stir moving his pulses as he heard from him the new ideas engendered by participation in a roaring foreign trade. He heard of the discovery of America and of the golden conquests of Cortez and Pizarro in Mexico and Peru, of Luther and the Reformation, of the Renaissance of art and. letters. He saw printing come into general use and doubtless heard the Scriptures read from a printed English Bible, though he might not approve that practice. He saw Henry VIII, like Henry V, established in the power won by his father, turn to foreign politics to consolidate the opinions of a people distracted by civil strife, and he lived to see and lament the consequent breach with Rome, the establishment of a national Church and the dissolution of the monasteries. But he died a staunch Roman Catholic and a survivor of the middle ages. »

« ... Robert Cary of Clovelly had five sons by his three wives. They were John and Thomas, sons of Jane Carew; William, son of Agnes Hody; and Robert and Gregory, sons of Margaret Fulkroy. Thanks to the prudent marriages of his forebears and his own careful management during a long life through the years when England was prospering in the domestic peace which the Tudors established, Robert Cary was not only a rich man, but in the very nature of the method of their accumulation the broad acres of his inheritance lay in separate groups scattered across Devon from Bideford Bay to the English Channel. It was not necessarily an impartible military tenement, such as the law had cherished. His manors were administered largely by stewards without constant personal supervision except in the vicinity of the seat of the lord's habitual residence. This consideration may have suggested to Robert Cary the step, as unusual in England to-day as it was in the sixteenth century, of dividing his property among all his sons, contrary to the rule of primogeniture. By so doing he might, as indeed he did, sacrifice the opportunity of political influence which in England has seemed to increase in geometrical ratio with the ownership of land; but on the other hand he could found several new families and so establish his name in his native land beyond the peradventure of the vicissitudes of a single inheritance. Robert Cary remembered how his family's lamp was twice preserved from extinction by the fact that Clovelly had been held as a separate estate. He may also have been influenced to his decision by the more immediate consideration of the character of his eldest son, whose offspring in the event proved themselves incapable of long maintaining the status of the family.

But whatever were his motives, in his seventy-seventh year Robert Cary took a step which lost to the family almost immediately some of its ancient manors, but to that step we may nevertheless fairly attribute the fact that Cary has been a name of dignity in Devon for as many centuries since Robert Cary as before him. This is true although his descendants do not now own a single acre of the manors he so settled upon them.

The deed of settlement of April 12, 1535, provided for the distribution of Robert Cary's property among his sons but subject to an elaborate system of cross-entails intended to preserve the family whatever might come. The aged squire recited that already to his great costs and charges he had married John Cary, his eldest son and heir apparent, to the daughter and heir of Edmund Deviock of Okehampton, but had not advanced any of his younger sons in any marriage, and forasmuch as they had all been loving, kind, aiding, and helping to their father he would now provide for them. So he divided his estate per stirpes.

To the oldest son, who had already acquired the Deviock manor of Kegbear in right of his wife, which might serve as an inheritance for the oldest grandson, he now assigned the ancestral manor of Cary as a portion for the two younger grandsons of the eldest line. To his second son, Thomas Cary, he assigned the properties on the southern coast, Cockington and Chilston. To the third son, William, he assigned Ladford and other properties in the Shebbear neighborhood. To the two younger sons, the children of his surviving wife, he assigned Clovelly with Halwill and Highauton and other property at Wyll, Sheepwash, and Monkokehampton, in the Clovelly neighborhood.

He thus budded four new branches of the family tree.

Two of them, the Kegbear and the Ladford branches, soon withered and died.

Unfortunately for an ancient tradition, the ancestral manor of Cary became part of the patrimony of one of the sons whose line failed. The descendants of John Cary of Kegbear did not have the vigor to hold their inheritance, and so it came to pass that the old hive was abandoned after thirteen generations had called it home during four hundred years. Since 1583 there has been no Cary of Cary.

.... »

1. ↑ ^{1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 1.11 1.12 1.13} Harrison, Fairfax. Devon Carys, Vol. 1, (New York: De Vinne Press, 1920) Chapter VIII, pp. 144-162 & Chapter IX, pp. 163-172.

   Chapter Eight: 'THE COMPOSTELA PILGRIM'
   This chapter may be accessed directly at: archive.org
   Chapter Nine: 'THE SWARMING OF THE HIVE'
   This chapter may be accessed directly at: archive.org
   Source:Harrison, Fairfax. Devon Carys

2. ↑ Westcote, Thomas: A View of Devonshire in MDCXXX: With a Pedigree of Most of Its Gentry - edited by The Rev. George Oliver D.D. & Pitman Jones Esq. Exeter, 1845. pp. 507-508.

   « CARY, of Castle-Cary in Somerset, Hook in Dorset, and Cary and Kegbear in Okehampton.—ARMS.—Gules a chevron between three swans, arg. CREST.—On a wreath a swan proper.
   ...
   Robert Cary, esq., married, first Jane, daughter to Nicholas Carew, knight, Baron of Carew-Castle in Pembrokeshire, and had issue John, and Thomas of Cockington, Devon; secondly Agnes, daughter to Sir William Hody, of Pillesden, Dorset, lord chief baron of the Exchequer, and had issue William; thirdly Margaret, daughter and heir to William Fulkeram, (alias Fulkeroy,) of Devon, esq., the widow of John Herle, esq., and had issue Robert of Clovelly, and Gregory. .... »
   Accessed on 15/07/2019 at books.google.ca

3. ↑ ^{3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5} 'Cary Family of Devon' - incl. the Will of Robert Cary, of Cockington, esq., in The Herald and Genealogist, edited by John Gough Nichols F.S.A., Vol VI, London, 1871. pp.6-10.

   « ... Sir William Cary was succeeded by Robert, the only son of his first wife. Born, as his will shews,[sic] at Hinton St. George, he "was a grave learned man in the laws," (1) a justice of the peace, and, living to an advanced age, he left a numerous family by three wives. The date of his birth has not been ascertained, but he was probably of age in 1485, as, in that year, the first of Henry the Seventh, we find his petition to the King answered by the restitution of the estates which had been forfeited by his father's attainder 14 years before. The present church of Cockington was probably erected under his auspices about 1490, and the font, still used there, was his gift, as appears by the inscription in brass round its edge. His will, dated 1518, and made preparatory to a pilgrimage to Compostella, affords further evidence of his pious disposition and zeal for the Church. One of the finest of the sepulchral brasses of Devonshire lies over his grave in the chancel of Clovelly. (2)
   This Robert Cary of Cockington and Clovelly was the common ancestor of all the branches of this Cary race of whom it is my purpose to treat. In 1535, five years before his death, this aged squire executed an elaborate deed of settlement, by which his several manors and lands were distributed amongst the male heirs born of his three wives. This deed is given in the Appendix, and will be found singularly rich in genealogical evidence, and perfectly consistent with the proofs yielded by other documents.
   It has come to pass that not a single acre of the extensive possessions owned by Robert Cary is now held by his posterity. By his first wife Jane, a daughter of the ancient house of Carew, he left an eldest son John, who had acquired by marriage an estate called Cadickbere or Kegbear, in the parish of Okehampton. This he in turn transmitted to his eldest son, Robert, who was succeeded by his only son Launcelot, the last heir male of this branch. Thomas, the second son of John Cary, inherited the manor of Cary, in the parish of St. Giles-in-the-Heath. Like his great-grandfather, he linked the family by marriage with the ancient house of Fulford, but the scanty particulars furnished by the Heralds' Visitation supply all that is known of his numerous posterity. The number of its male members seems to render improbable the statement of Lysons that this branch became extinct after a few generations, and future inquiries may possibly discover their traces. The quaint little church of St. Giles yields no evidence save that of the single flat tombstone referred to in the Appendix. In the course of some recent restorations this stone has been removed from its former position in the chancel to the floor of the aisle, where its inscription is exposed to the wear of passing feet. A local tradition asserts that the east end of the south aisle was originally a chapel of the Cary family, and the timbers of the waggon-shaped roof are here more elaborately carved than in other parts of the aisle.
   The parish register commences in 1653, but contains no entry of the name ; and it may be assumed that the connection between the family and manor of Cary ended with the death of Thomas Cary in 1583, or in the succeeding generation.
   Thomas, the second son of Robert and Jane (Carew) Cary, inherited Cockington, which passed from the family in the Civil Wars, and from him descended a race which afterwards migrated to Oxfordshire, and that line of the Carys whose present representative now possesses with the mansion of Torre Abbey a large portion of the site of the beautiful town of Torquay. The generations of this prolific branch will form the subject of a future paper.
   By his second wife, Agnes, the daughter of Chief Baron Sir William Hody, Robert Cary left a son William, who inherited Ladford, in the parish of Shebbear, with the estates of West Wanford and Hayne, in North Devon. We soon lose sight of William's descendants, and no evidence has yet transpired to invalidate Prince's statement, that they were extinct in his time.
   On Robert, the elder of two sons of Robert Cary by his third wife, Margaret (Fulkroy), was bestowed the Clovelly property, and there, as we shall relate in a future number, his descendants flourished in wealth and dignity until the male line failed in the early part of the eighteenth century. This branch also took Highampton, Halwill, and other estates lying at no great distance from the mansion of Clovelly.
   Exeter. Robert Dymond.
   (1} Pole's Collections, p. 89.
   {2} The figure is arrayed in very rich armour ; the breast-plate is fluted ; from the waist are suspended two narrow taces, to which are appended two ornamented tuilles reaching to the bend of the thigh ; a tunic of mail hangs below the elbow and the knee plates are very rich. The legs are encased in plate, and large rowelled spurs are fastened on the heels with long straps. The offensive arms are a sword and dagger, suspended from a curiously-arranged belt. The head is without covering, and the hands are bare and joined, as if in devotion, on the breast. To this description Mr. W. R. Crabbe, F.S.A., adds a lithograph of the stone and brass in his "Account of the Monumental Brasses of Devon," printed in vol. v. of the Transactions of the Exeter Diocesan Architectural Society.
   APPENDIX.
   Monumental Inscriptions.
   In the chancel of the church at Clovelly, Devon :
   Praye for the sowle of Master Robert Cary esquier, sonne and heyer of Sur Will'm Cary knyght, whiche Robert decessyd the xv^th day of June ī the yere of o^r lord god mvcxl. ö who^s sowle ih'u have m'cy.
   ...
   WILLS.
   From family documents at Torre Alley.
   « —ROBERT CARY, of Cockington, esq. son and heir of Sir William Cary, knt. preparatory to a pilgrimage to Compostella made and sealed his will 11th April, 1518. He gives to the Abbot of Tor 40s. To the convent there 20s. for prayers. To the church of Hinton St. George where he was born xs. To his wife Margery all the goods she had at the time of her marriage to him, "and I wylle that she may have of my goodes according to my promise, the which I endowed her with at the church dore." She was to be allowed to reside during her widowhood in his chief mansion or place of Clovelly. He mentions his sons, John, Robert, and Gregory, and his daughter Jane. To the chapel of Cockington he gives 40s. and mentions its stone of St. Katharine. He desires Godmaston Place, which he had purchased, to be sold for payment of his debts. Appoints as executors Sir Amys Paulet, knt. and John Bow, serjeant-at-law, to whom he gives 40s. each, with Robert Ashford, John Nosworthy, and John Cleve, to each of whom he gives 20s. "Jesu keep you and me. Amen."  »
   ....
   Cover page accessed at: archive.org ; page 6 at: archive.org

4. ↑ ^{4.0 4.1 4.2} WikiTree webpage for 'Robert Cary (abt. 1457 - 1540)'.

   This webpage contains a biography of "Robert Cary (abt. 1457 - 1540)" as well as an image of the sepulchral brass atop the tomb of Robert Cary, Esquire, who must be the subject of the figure in armour therein depicted. [See the previous reference, where it is beautifully described.]
   And this webpage conveniently translates the inscription on the brass into modern English:
   « He died on 15 June 1540 and was buried at Clovelly in Devon where a memorial brass commemorates him with a knightly image and the verse Pray for the soul of Master Robert Cary, Esq, son and heir of Sir William Cary, knight, which Robert deceased the 15 June in the year of our lord god 1540, on his soul, Jesus have mercy. (Spelling has been modernised for ease of reading.) »
   Accessed 07 August 2021 at: wikitree.com/photo/

5. ↑ Note: There are some who have indicated that this Robert Cary, of Clovelly in Devon, where he was buried; and who died on 15 June, 1540,^S1 was also born at Clovelly in 1460. These are mostly family trees on sites like myheritage.com and genealogieonline.nl. But I have found none of these that give any primary or even satisfactory secondary sources for this contention. Therefore I think we may rely more on the opinion of Fairfax Harrison, who suggests the more likely year of his birth as being 1457 or a bit earlier. As he writes in Volume One of his Devon Carys: "... As his father was already married to his second wife in 1458, we may fix the date as not later than 1457...." ^S1 —R.C.A. (Robinca)