Smyth Family

CALENDAR OFlHE CORRESPONDENCE OF THE SMYTH FAMILY OF ASHTON COURT 1548-1642 EDITED BY J. H. BETIEY Printed for the BRISTOL RECORD SOCIETY 1982 ISSN 0305-8730 ISBN 0 901538 04 3 © Joseph Bettey Produced for the Society by Alan Sutton Publishing Limited, Gloucester Printed in Great Britain CONTENTS Page Acknowledgments vii Introduction (a) The Smyth Family 1545-1642 ix (b) The Sources xxii Note on transcription xxv List of abbreviations xxvi Calendar of Letters 1548-1642 3 Appendix 1 Undated Letters to Thomas Smyth 179 Appendix 11 Calendar of Miscellaneous Documents relating to Thomas Smyth 190 Index 204 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to thank all those who have helped in the production of this volume, particularly Miss Mary Williams, Bristol City Archivist, who read and commented upon the whole manuscript, Miss Judith Close and other members of the staff of the Bristol Record Office, Mr Geoffrey Langley and the staff of the Bristol Reference Library, and Mr Oerek Shorrocks and the staff of the Somerset Record Office. I am also indebted to Mr Anton Bantock, to Miss Penelope Byrde of the Museum of Costume at Bath who identified various articles of clothing mentioned in the letters, to Or Peter Edwards, and Professor Oavid Underdown of Brown University for his help and suggestions about the political affairs in which Thomas Smyth was involved during the period 1640-42, and Or Jean Vanes whose work on the early history of the Smyth family has been a constant help. I acknowledge with thanks the kindness of Mr O.B. Hardison, Jr., the Director of the Folger Shakespeare Library, Washington, D. C., in allowing me to use the letters of the Smyth family which are owned by the Library. Professor Patrick McGrath, the General Editor of the Bristol Record Society has been a constant source of encouragement and guidance. I am grateful to Mrs Joy Flower and Mrs Rosemary Johnston for their secretarial assistance. Bristol Record Society is indebted to the Bristol Archives Office and in particula:- to Miss Mary Williams the City Archivist for permission to edit these manuscripts. vii INTRODUCTION (a) The Smyth Family 1545-1642 The Smyth family lived at Ashton Court in the parish of Long Ashton, just over the Somerset border from Bristol, from 1545 when the house and estate were purchased by John Smyth until just after the Second World War. The last male head of the family to live at Ashton Court was Sir Greville Smyth who died in 1901; his wife, Dame Emily Smyth, died in 1914. Dame Emily's daughter by a former marriage took the name Smyth, and was known as the Hon. Esme Smyth; she lived at Ashton Court until her death in 1946. The contents of the house were sold in 1947, and in 1959 the house and grounds were acquired by Bristol Corporation. The early history of the family provides a remarkable example of rapid rise from obscure beginnings as farmers and craftsmen in the fifteenth century, through trade and commerce in Bristol to a position of great wealth and to the status of landowning gentry by the later sixteenth century. The story of this rise, and of the family's origins at Aylburton, near Lydney in the Forest of Dean, during the fifteenth century, their move to Bristol and their success as trades men and merchants has already been told by Dr Jean Vanes in a previous volume in this series and need not be repeated here.' In her edition of the Ledger of John Smythe, covering the years 1538 to 1550, Dr Vanes has also shown the way in which John Smythe, 2 who was the real founder of the family's fortunes, acquired his immense wealth through trade, built up a thriving business as a merchant in the port of Bristol, and was able to purchase the house and estate at Ashton Court from Sir Thomas Arundell in 1545, and also invested extensively in lands in south Gloucestershire and north Somerset. 3 His acquisitions included the manors of Stanshawes and Sturdon 1 Jean Vanes (ed.), The Ledger of John Smythe, 1538-1550, Bristol Record Society, 1975, pp. 1-29. See also J.H. Bettey, The Rise of a Gentry Family, The Smyths of Ashton Court c1500-1642, Bristol Branch of the Historical Association, 1978. · 2 During the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries the family name was spelt in a variety of different ways; later members of the family tended to use 'Smyth' and for the sake of uniformity this form has been adopted throughout this volume. 3 Jean Vanes, op. cit. pp. 25-26. See also B.R.O. AC/01/143- !50; 36074/13, 14 a-b, 35, 36. P.R.O. E 318/1016, 1017. IX X Calendar of the Correspondence and other lands at Winterbourne and Newnham in south Gloucestershire, houses in Bristol including his own house in Small Street, and property in Somerset including lands at Huntspill, Ston Easton, Keynsham, Wookey, Durleigh, Bridgwater and Wells. The estate at Ashton Court consisted of the fifteenth-century manor house comprising a tower, great hall, gallery, parlour, chapel, kitchen, several chambers, stable buildings, barns, dairy, brew-house and lodgings for estate workmen; it also included most of the surrounding land. 3 Only a few of the letters of John Smyth (or Smythe) survive, and most of this volume is therefore concerned with the correspondence of his two sons, Hugh and Matthew, of his grandson Hugh (later Sir Hugh), and of his great grandson Thomas Smyth who died in 1642. The early letters illustrate very well the contrast between the cautious, hard-headed business-man, John Smyth, and the rebellious nature of his sons, especially the violent disposition of his eldest son, Hugh. Notwithstanding the large fortune which he had acquired and the lands which he had been able to purchase, John Smyth did not seek to become a country gentleman himself. He continued until his death in 1555 to live in his merchant's house in Bristol, and did not move permanently into the manor house at Ashton Court. His few surviving letters as well as his informative Ledger Book reveal him as a shrewd, careful man, anxious to avoid difficulties and legal costs wherever possible. They show the care he took over the details of his trading ventures and over the investment of his profits in land. They also show that he was quick to take advantage of the oppor tunities presented by the confiscations of ecclesiastical property and the sale of former Church lands by the Crown. In 1546 for example, he bought from the King the manor of Ashton Meriets, adjoining his estate at Long Ashton, and the advowson of the parish church, all of which had previously belonged to the Priory of St Peter in Bath. In the following year he bought the lands and buildings of the former Choke chantry in Long Ashton. John Smyth was also concerned with the purchase by the Corporation of Bristol of various lands and properties in and around Bristol. In 1544, for example he lent £20 to the city 'in lone for to hellp pay to the Kyng for the landes that the Lord Lisle had in Bristowe and Thereabowt'. During the next few years he was also active in helping to arrange for the purchase of former monastic lands by the city. In 1547 when the chantries were dissolved, John Smyth became mayor of Bristol and was involved in the purchase of former chantry lands and property by the Corporation, including the Chapel of the Assumption on Bristol bridge. The picture which emerges of John Smyth from his ledger and his of the Smyth Family of Ashton Court xi letters is of an able, hard-working and public-spirited man. His business as a merchant grew rapidly and was extremely profitable. He traded in woollen cloth which he obtained from clothiers in Somerset and Wiltshire and sent to France and Spain; he also exported leather which came from the Forest of Dean and from Wales, lead from the Mendips, and wheat. His imports included large quantities of wine from Bordeaux, iron from northern Spain, and woad and other dyestuffs from Toulouse, the Azores and Genoa. In addition he imported oil for use by cloth-workers and soap-boilers, and small quantities of fish and salt. These goods were conveyed in various ships, including his own ship the Trinity which in 1539 was reckoned to be worth £250. The Trinity was regularly used for trade with Spain and Bordeaux, and her cargoes included the goods of many Bristol merchants, for John Smyth and other Bristol merchants adopted the sensible policy of consigning their goods to several ships in order to lessen the total loss which might follow the wreck of one ship. It is a tribute to John Smyth's energy and business enterprise that as well as managing a large and lucrative trading business and establishing his family as major land owners, he was also able to devote so much time to public affairs. He had a few staunch friends, including several Bristol merchants, among them some who had been his own apprentices, and most notably the Bristolian, Dr George Owen, who was Henry VIII's physician and an influential figure at Court. It would be wrong to over-stress the picture of a sober merchant, however, for there was another side to John Smyth's character. He obviously dressed well, and the inventory of his goods made after his death shows his clothing as worth the large sum of £42, and includes several fine gowns and cloaks.

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