USA > Virginia > Some prominent Virginia families, Volume II > Part 5
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In anno 1582 (25th of Elizabeth's reign), upon the return of the Duke of Anjou, who had stayed here three months, as a suitor to Queen Elizabeth (with some other of the nobility), he attended him to Antwerp by Her Majesty's command, and in 29 of the reign of Elizabeth he was made General Warden of the Marches toward Scotland, as [also about that time] Lord Chamberlain of the Queen's household. In 30. of Elizabeth's reign, upon putting the Queen of Scots* to death in England (con- tinuing at Barwick), he was employed unto King James, her son, to pacify him therein and in anno 1592 (35 Elizabeth), upon the charge laid to Sir Thomas Perrot, Deputy of Ireland, was one of the commissioners assigned to consider thereof. He was also Captain of the Pensioners and Knight of the most noble order of the Garter, and having married Anne, daughter of Sir Thomas Morgan, Knight, by her had issue, four sons and three daughters :
I. George Cary.
II. John Cary
III. Sir Edward Cary, Knight.
IV. Robert Cary, afterwards Earl of Monmouth.
V. Catherine Cary. Married Charles, Earl of Nottingham.
VI. Philadelphia Cary. Married Thomas, Lord Scropc.
VII. Margaret Cary. Married Sir Edward Hoby, Knight.
Henry Cary, Lord Hunsdon, departed this life upon the 23rd of July, anno 1596 (38 of Elizabeth), being then seventy-one years old. He was buried in the Chapel of St. John Baptist, within the Collegiate Church of St. Peter at Westminster, where there is a noble monument erected to his memory.
To wliom succeeded George Cary, his eldest son, who being also Knight of the most noble order of the Garter, Governor of the Isle of Wight, Lord Chamberlain of the Queen's Household and one of her privy council, departed this life, September 9, 1603 (1 James),
"NOTE .- There is a ring in the possession of John Ambler Brooke, said to have been sent or taken by a Cary to announce to the Regent Murray of Seotland, as a token announcing that Mary, Queen of Scotland's, death warrant had been signed by Elizabeth. [This ring was made into a mourning ring for John Ambler, first.]
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leaving issue by Elizabeth, his wife, daughter of Sir John Spencer, of Althorpe in eom. North, Knight, one sole daughter and heir :
I. Elizabeth. Married Sir Thomas Berkley.
Whereupon John Cary, his next brother and heir, male, suc- ceeded him in the honor. Whiel John, during his brother's life, seil. in 43 Elizabeth was constituted Warden of the East Marches towards Seotland, being then a Knight, and departed this life April -, 1617 (15 James), left issue by Mary, his wife, daughter of Leonard Hyde of Shrogkin in eom., Hert., Esquire, two sons and two daughters :
I. Henry Cary.
II. Charles Cary.
III. Anne Cary. Married Sir Francis Lovell, of East Har- lyng, in County Norf., Knight.
IV. Blanche Cary. Married Sir Thomas Woodhouse, of Kimberley, in the same County, Knight.
Whiel Henry Cary, succeeded as Lord Hunsdon, was advaneed to the dignity of Viscount Roekford 6th July (9 James). Like- wise to the title of the Earl of Dover, and having married Judith, the daughter of Sir Thomas Pelliam, of Lofton, in County Suffolk, Baronet, by whom he had three sons and three daughters :
I. John Cary, made Knight of the Bath, at the Corona- tion of Charles I.
II. Pelham Cary, who died without issue.
III. George Cary.
IV. Mary Cary. Married Sir Thomas Wharton, Knight of the Bath, brother of Lord Wharton.
V. Judith Cary, died unmarried.
VI. Philadelphia, departed this life, anno 1668.
John Cary sueeeeded to his father, Henry Cary, and was his heir. He married, first, Dorothy, daughter to Oliver, Earl of Bolingbroke, and by her had no issue; second, Abigail, daughter of Sir William Cokain, Knight, Alderman of the City of London, by whom he had issue, only one daughter :
I. Mary Cary. Married William Heveringham of County - -, Esq. in
Having finished with the elder braneh, I lastly come to Robert, third son of the first Henry, Lord Hunsdon, in 40 of Elizabethi.
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This Robert, being then a knight, was made Warden of the Marches towards Scotland and in (19 of James) 6th February, was created Lord Cary of Lexington, in County Ebor, also Earl of Monmouth, and departing this life at Moor Park in Hertfordshire 12th April anno 1639, left issue by Elizabeth, his wife, daughter of Sir Hugh Trevanian, of Cæsriheigh in County -, Knight. Issue :
I. Henry Cary, made Knight of the Bath in 1616, at the creation of Charles, Prince of Wales.
II. Thomas Cary.
The only daughter and heir of Thomas Cary married John Mordaunt, Earl of Peterborough and their eldest son, Charles the third Earl, was created Earl of Monmouth and afterwards Earl of Denbigh.
Robert Cary had one daughter, Philadelphia, married to Sir Thomas Wharton, Knight, son and heir to Lord Wharton. Which Sir Henry succeeded him in his honors. Married Martha, eldest daughter of Leonel, Earl of Middlesex, by whom he had issue, two sons and eight daughters:
I. Leonel Cary.
II. Henry Cary. Both died in their father's lifetime with- out issue.
III. Anne Cary. Married James Hamilton, Viscount Clave- by and Earl of
IV. Philadelphia Cary, died single.
V. Elizabeth Cary.
VI. Mary Cary, wedded to William, Earl of Desmond.
VII. Trevaniana Cary, died unmarried.
VIII. Martha Cary. Married John, Earl of Middleton, in Scotland.
IX. Theophila Cary, died single.
X. Magdalena Cary, died single.
Sir Henry Cary died June 13, anno 1661, and was buried at Rickmansworth in Hertfordshire.
["Historical Description of Westminster Abbey," published 1824. Appendix, p. 20 of MS.]
In the chapel of St. Edmunds there is a monument: "To the Right Honourable , the Lady Katherine Knollys, chief lady of the bed chamber of Queen Elizabeth and wife of Sir Francis
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Knollys, Knight, treasurer of the household. She died January 15th, 1568." This Lady Knollys and Lord Hunsdon, her brother, were the only children of William Cary, Esq., by Lady Mary, his wife, one of the daughters and heirs of Thomas Bulleyn, Earl of Wiltshire and Ormond, the sister to Anne Bulleyn, Queen of England, wife to Henry VIII, father and mother to Queen Eliza- beth. What is remarkable, Lady Knollys' only daughter was mother to the favorite Earl of Essex.
The following is taken from "Extinet Peerage of England," etc., by the late Solomon Bolton, ete. :
HUNSDON.
The ancestors of this family took their name from Castle Carey, in Sommersetshire, aneiently written Karey, a Lordship in their possession.
[Nottingham, p. 325, Volume I.]
Charles, second Lord Effingham, was constituted by Queen Elizabeth, April 24, 1574, Lord Chamberlain of Her Majesty's household, and in 1585 Lord High Admiral, of England, Irc- land and Aquitaine. He was commander-in-chief of the fleet by which the Spanish Armada was defeated, in the year 1588, and of another squadron which sailed against Cadiz, in the year 1595, having on board a number of land forces under the command of Robert Deveran, Earl of Essex. He was created on the 22nd of October in that year Earl of the County of Nottingham, and was a principal leader of the party that effected the ruin of the gallant Earl of Essex.
It was his eountess, Catherine, daughter of Henry Cary, Lord Hunsdon, to whom that unsuspecting nobleman is said to have delivered the ring that had been given him by Queen Elizabeth, as a pledge of her perpetual favor.
This ring was intended, by the Earl, then under sentenee of death, to be carried to the Queen, accompanied by a request of Her Majesty's pardon, but was conecaled from political motives by thic Countess of Nottingham, at the instigation of her husband. She is said to have confessed the suppression, with great penitence, upon her death bed, to Queen Elizabeth, who furiously shook the dying countess, exelaiming :
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"God may forgive you but I never can;" and who from that time was seized with a melancholy and despair that put an end to her life.
Lord Nottingham's issue by this marriage was :
I. Charles, second Earl of Nottingham.
By a second wife he had issue :
II. Charles, third Earl of Nottingham, upon whose death the 26th of April, 1681, the title became extinct.
John Jaquelin Ambler has several more extracts from other books and authors, but they were mere repetitions of the above with slight variation in the wives' names and in spelling them, when they are the same, so I did not copy them.
ARMORIAL BEARINGS.
In the armorial drawings have been found the armorial bearings of England and France, from whom are descended those branches of the Cary and Jaquelin families who have intermarried with the present Ambler family of Virginia and whose arms Col. John Ambler and his descendants are entitled to bear, quartered with the Ambler arms, by the laws of heraldry.
The whole has been carefully and accurately marshaled and blazoned by a person intimately acquainted with the science of heraldry.
No. I. THE ARMS OF THE AMBLER FAMILY IN ENGLAND.
Blazoned according to the terms used in heraldry.
Sable on a fess or between three pheons' heads argent, a lion passant regardant gules.
(Sa, on a fess between three pheons as a lion passant regardant gu.) Translated thus :
A black shield with a stripe of a golden color across the centre, exactly on one third of the shield in width, containing a red lion, passive, and look- ing at something, with three silver arrow heads of equal size, two being placed above the golden stripe and one below it.
No. II. THE ARMS OF THE JAQUELIN FAMILY IN FRANCE.
Sa. three horses' heads conped ar.
Crest .- Horse's head couped argent.
Black shield with three silver horses' heads cut evenly off, being exactly the same size and two placed side by side in top part of the shield and
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looking the same way. The third is placed in the centre of the lower part of the shield, and looks in the same direction in which the other two are looking.
Crest-A silver horse's head, cut evenly off and looking to the left, with his mane flowing, his nostrils expanded, his mouth sufficiently open to show his tongue and teeth.
No. III. CARY FAMILY IN ENGLAND.
Argent on a bend sable, three roses of the field (or silver). Translated :
A white or silver shield with a black belt drawn from the top left-hand corner to the bottom of the right-hand corner of the width of one-third of the base of the shield. The belt contains, at equal distances, three full-blown roses, white or silver.
No. IV. AMBLER FAMILY IN VIRGINIA.
Quarterly first and fourth. Sable on a fess ar, between thrce pheons argent, a lion passant regardant gules for Ambler.
Second quarterly : Sable three horses' heads couped argent for Jaquelin. Second: Argent on a bend sable three roses silver.
Third: Argent on a bend three roses silver.
Fourth : Sable three horses' heads couped argent.
Third Quarterly :
First : Sable three horses' heads couped argent.
Seeond: Argent on a bend sable, three roses silver.
Third: Argent on a bend sable three roses silver.
Fourth: Sable three horses' heads eouped argent.
Crest -. Upon a wreath horses' heads couped argent.
Motto-"Audaces fortuna jurat timidos que repellit." Borne under and around the shield.
Motto-"Comme je trouve." Borne upon a small seroll placed over erest.
No. V.
WILLIAM FERDINAND CARY, LAST LORD HUNSDON, DIED IN 1768.
No. 1. Argent on a bend sable three roses of field or silver for Cary.
No. 2. Sa two bars inb. by ermine, for Speneer.
No. 3. France and England quarterly, a bordure goborie arg. and azure for Beaufort.
No. 4. Gules a fess between six eross crosslets or. for Beauchamp.
No. 5. Cheeky or and azure, a chevron ermine, for Warwiek.
No. 6. Gules a chevron between ten crosses patter argent, for Berkelcy.
No. 7. Gules a lion passant guardant erowned for Gurard.
No. 8. Argent, a chevron gules between three bulls' heads couped sable, Bullen or Boleyn.
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VIRGINIA FAMILIES
No. 9. Quarterly sable and argent for Hov.
No. 10. Or a chief indented Azure, for Butler.
No. 11. Argent a lion rampant sable crowned gules.
No. 12. A fess between six cross crosslets.
No. 13. Azure three sinister hands couped argent, for Malmains.
No. 14. Ermine on a chief sable three crosses patter argent, for Wick- ingham.
No. 15. Azure on a fess argent a chief crosses, for Hankford.
No. 16. Argent two hands wavy sable.
Over all in an escutcheon of pretence or a bend azure between three leopards' faces gules-being the arms of his Lady, daughter and heir of Sir Edward Wadloe, of London, Knight, and relict of Sir Nicholas Wol- stoneholme, of Forty Hill, in the parish of Erefield, in Middlesex, Baronet.
Crest-Upon a wreath, a swan rising, a argent beaked, and membered sable.
Supporters-On the right a ram argent, spotted gules and azure, armed ducally gorged with chain d'or. On the left a male griffon argent collared, chained.
Motto-Comme Je Trouve.
WILSON CARY OF "CEELYS" AND HIS FAMILY
[Compiled by Wilson Miles Cary, of Baltimore, Md., with extracts from Virginia Historical Magazine, Vol. IX, No. 1, July, 1901, and a few notes from Goode's "Virginia Cousins."]
In 1868, I (Wilson Miles Cary) made a horseback trip to the Peninsula of Virginia and travelled over all that seetion of country, with the purpose, if possible, of reconstructing the genealogy of my family, whieh, as embodied in a fine old vellum reeord, had been destroyed, together with the family Bible, etc., ete., at the burning of our Fluvanna residence, Carysbrooke, November 26, 1826. In the clerk's office at Hampton, I found not only the original will of Col. Wilson Cary, of which I already had obtained a copy in 1866, but that of his brother Miles Cary, of "Ceelys," as he styles himself, and which I then transcribed ..
The then elerk of the court offered to permit me to appropriate both of these wills, but I considered such a pillaging of the publie arehives as indefensible in me (though a direet descendant of the testator) as it was in the Yankees, whom we have so deservedly castigated ever since the war of their wholesale pilfering.
I rode to "Ceelys," on the banks of the James, three or four miles from Hampton, to visit the mansion so long the residence of my aneestors. The whole estate, containing some two thousand
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acres in Colonel Cary's time, lay along the river and adjoined the present Newport News. It was then oceupied by a settlement of negro squatters, a seetion of "Butler's Contrabands." There was searee a vestige of the old mansion remaining-the very founda- tions were obliterated-not a tree left standing, and the garden, which onee ran in terraees to the river's edge, now a wilderness of weeds. I found the dispossessed proprietor, a young Mr. Smith, quartered in a most primitive shanty, on the edge of the estate, almost despairing of ever enforcing his rights and cjecting the darkies, but still awaiting with what patienee he might the out- rageous dilatory proceedings of the reconstruction period. Mr. Smith informed me that the negroes, after burning the fine old brick mansion to the ground, had entirely dismantled its walls, using them for the chimneys of their hovels. The original build- ing was of large dimensions, two stories, with wings. Its age had been discovered by his father, who, on removing the portico to make some repairs, had found the figures 1706 on the lintel. The records of Elizabeth City inform us that the nucleus of the estate called "Ceelys" consisted of two traets of two hundred and fifty acres each, at the mouth of Saltford Creek, on the banks of James River, which were aequired by Colonel William Wilson in 1691 and 1695 from one Thomas Cecly-who represented Warwick County in the House of Burgesses, from 1629 to 1639. Colonel Wilson was for many years the presiding justice and most promi- nent personage of Elizabeth City County, being long the Royal Naval Officer of the Lower James, and a very wealthy planter. He it was who built "Ceclys" in 1706. He died in 1713, but his will was doubtless recorded in the General Court, whose archives were destroyed in the eonflagration of 1865, so that a detailed disposition of his large estate ean not now be had. His only son, Captain Willis, had died without issue in 1701. His daughter Mary (1675-1741) had first married William Roscon, with whom she lies buried under a handsome monument at Blunt Point, in Warwiek. After his death, which occurred November 27, 1700, she did not long remain in weeds, but in April, 1702, eommiserating the equally sad lot of a near neighbor, she bestowed her hand upon Colonel Miles Cary, of "Riehneck," who had been bereaved at the same time, his wife, Mary Milner, having left him, "issue- less," as her tombstone states, October 27, 1700. And just here,
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there is a romantic episode, which I intend writing up, growing out of the frantic proceedings of one Captain James Moody, of Her Majesty's man-of-war, Southampton, who madly, though a married man, contested the hand of the fair widow, with Colonel Cary. The latter, having the inside track, treated the would-be bigamist with contempt, and so overwhelmed him with ridicule, that in a bloody rage lie sailed around to Yorktown, where the Governor and Court were in session, and despite the Governor's threat of irons, undertook to post Colonel Cary. The Governor and Council took down the proceedings and promptly complained of his outrageous conduct to the home government, and the reck- less villain was forthwith removed to appease the indignation of the entire colony.
Col. Miles Cary died intestate, but from his tomb we learn the names of his children.
To the younger of his two sons, Miles, his grandfather Wilson's estate of "Ceelys" descended, while lie, dying a bachelor in 1756, willed it to his only brother Colonel Wilson Cary, of "Richneck." The latter, however, must have inherited lands in Elizabeth City, from his grandfather, as in 1751 (see Palmer's State Papers, I, 247) he was lieutenant of the county. He undoubtedly became a resident of the county from the date of his appointment in 1726, to the lucrative post of Naval Officer of the Lower James, which he held for thirty-five years or more. His patrimonial estate of "Richneck," over four thousand acres, lay in the County of Warwick, some twenty miles from Hampton and about three from the Court House.
When I visited it in 1868 the mansion was a pile of ruins, though from the remains of the walls still standing I could estimate its former extent. It was a long-fronted, two-storied brick building, with the usual adjacent outhouses, and must have been very commodious. The tradition that I gathered from some of the oldest inhabitants at the Court House was that the House of Burgesses had sat there several times (sessions), after the burning of the State edifices at Jamestown, and before the com- pletion of the capitol at Williamsburg. These gentlemen informed me that the mansion had been wantonly destroyed after the cessa- tion of hostilities in 1865 by the troops of General French on returning from that section of Virginia.
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Col. Wilson Cary was born about 1703 ; the exact date eannot now be ascertained, owing to the destruction of the family archives at Carysbrooke. This is shown by an autograph inseription to that effect on the title pages of a number of the books of his once extensive library, about two hundred and fifty volumes of which. I still possess. I was in England in 1867, and on one occa- sion had the pleasure of dining in Trinity Hall with the dons, and the librarian, Mr. W. Aldis Wright, kindly made me the following extract from the College admission books, viz. :
June 30, 1721, Admissus Wilson Cary; peus, an. nat. 18, filius de Miles Cary, de Virginia in India Occidentale, e Collegio Gulielme et mariae in eadem terra. His marriage occurred before January 20, 1728-9, as is shown by a York County deed made at that date between "Wilson Cary, of the County of Elizabeth City, Gent., and William Nelson, of York County, Merchant," Cary conveying lots twelve and eighteen in the town of York, "formerly sold and conveyed by the trustees of the town land unto Miles Cary, of the County of Warwick, Gent., father of the said Wilson Cary, etc., etc., .
. . and free from all right of dower of Mary, late relict of the aforesaid Miles Cary, Gent., deceased, and of Sarah, now the wife of the said Wilson Cary, if she should happen to survive."
Now this lady did happen to survive until 1783, when she died between the first and sixth day of September, as I learn from a letter of Edmund Randolph (who married her granddaughter) to Bryan Fairfax (her son-in-law). But her maiden name has eluded all my efforts to ascertain it. I am, however, very strong- ly inclined to the conclusion that she was a scion of the long extinct family of Pate, of Gloucester. Richard Pate had patented as early as 1650 one thousand one hundred and forty aeres on Poropotank Creek, and was Burgess of Gloucester in 1653. Ad- ministration on his estate was granted to his nephew, John Pate, in 1657. This John Pate, Hening records as added to the com- mission of Gloucester, in 1660 (II, 15), and the only extant volume of the General Court proceedings shows that he was "ad- mitted and sworne one of ye Counsell of State of this Colony, November 20, 1671." In this volume it is further stated that at a court held November 8, 1672, "Col. U. John Pate, Esquire, dyeing possest of a considerable estate in this country left a widow out of this country, and Mr. Thomas Pate, brother's son to the said Pate, deceased, appears and petitions for administration on his said Unkle's estate, which is accordingly granted him," where-
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upon the said Pate furnished as his securities Major Richard Lee and Captain John Armistead. This was the Major Thomas Pate, of Petsworth Parish, Gloucester, at whose house Nathaniel Bacon, the rebel, died in October 1676, being buried in the bed of Poropo- tank to prevent Berkeley from hanging his corpse on the gibbet. The records of Gloucester having been destroyed in 1820, it is difficult to trace the descendants of this family, but Major Thomas Pate seems to have left at least two sons, John and Matthew. In 1715, one John Wills patents one hundred and thirty acres in Gloucester, bounded by the main creek of Poropotank, adjoining a tract devised to said Wills by "Mr. John Pate," in his last will.
This John Pate is possibly the father of Mrs. Wilson Cary. I have in my library several volumes bearing the autograph "John Pate, 1706," on the title page above that of Colonel Wilson Cary (possibly his son-in-law), and to increase the probabilities, I would add, that I have also a volume showing in like manner the signature of Colonel Thomas Milner, and beneath it that of his son-in-law, Colonel Miles Cary. Now Colonel Wilson Cary in his will devises to his son lands lying on both sides of Poropotank, in the counties of Gloucester and King and Queen. These Glou- cester lands, it is true, may have been subsequent purchases, and thus my theory that Colonel Cary acquired them through marriage might be untenable, still there is nothing to show that Miles Cary may not have been induced to invest in these very lands by the fact of his elder brother already having acquired property in Gloucester by marriage. However this may be, there certainly had been intermarriages between the Cary, Pate and Wills families.
Mr. Miles Cary Wills was the general manager of the Carys- brook estate.
Col. Wilson Cary had issue by this unknown wife, Sarah, four daughters and one son. These will be given later.
Colonel Cary names as one of his executors my kinsman, Richard Cary, of Warwick, afterwards Judge of Admiralty, and of the General Court, who was born about 1730 and died November 13, 1789, and more than once had represented Warwick in the House of Burgesses. He had been bred to his profession in the school of the County Clerk's office, he himself, his father and his grand- father before him having succeeded one another almost as heredi-
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tary clerks of Warwick ever since the latter end of the seven- teenth century. He was a cousin of the testator, but many degrees removed, being the second son of Major Miles Cary, of "Peartree Hall," by Hannah Armistcad, and the grandson of "Mr. Miles Cary, Jr.," as he is styled in the records, by Elizabeth, daughter of Richard Cocke. This latter Miles is mentioned by the Quaker Story, who visited Warwick in 1699 and 1706, as Sceretary of the county, who, with his brother, Thomas, had become converts. They were undoubtedly the sons of Major Thomas Cary (1647-80), uncle of Colonel Wilson Cary, of "Ceelys."
Wilson Miles Cary, of Baltimore, sent these items, taken from his Cary Genealogy, to Mr. Stanard, thinking possibly that he might wish to make some comments upon the various parties mentioned in the will. His Cary material is very voluminous. He could give Mr. Stanard, if he desired it, some articles on the Virginia Fairfax family. I suppose-in fact, I know-there is no one so accurately posted on its genealogy as Mr. Cary.
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