Connecting the Hollyman Lineages, Part 3

 by Glenn N. Holliman

Professional genealogist Anne Holmes of Buckinghamshire, a recognized authority in America on the Hollymans and Lees of England, continues her research on the Hollymans of London and their relationships with the Buckingham and Bedfordshire Hollimans.  In this blog, the 3rd in this series she begins to explore the possibilities of kinship ties with branches in Worcestershire and Somerset. The Richard Hollyman examined in this article was wealthy and moved in high social circles. - GNH

Part 3 by Anne Holmes

Going back in time to the Elizabethan era there was another Richard HOLLYMAN present in London in the Tudor period, namely a Richard HOLLYMAN Citizen and Mercer of London. Richard died in 1572 and was buried in the parish churchyard of St. Michael Bassishaw, London.

A mercer dealt with fine fabrics such as silk and velvet. To the left, Queen Elizabeth I, England's greatest queen.

 It is not certain where Richard was born but as the research unfolded, and more information was discovered about him, it began to seem more and more likely he came from the Worcestershire branch of HOLLYMANS. This is interesting as there is a suggestion, in the Hollyman Dictionary that the earliest HOLLYMAN noted in North Somerset may have been born in Belbroughton, Worcestershire in 1661.

St. Michael Bassishaw was dedicated to the Archangel Michael and named after the Basing family during medieval London. Haw means yard.  There were several rebuildings of the parish due to fires.  In 1900 the church was demolished on land now occupied by the Barbican Centre complex.

Richard HOLLYMAN Mercer first appears in the records (those that could be found online) in 1557 and 1558, in the London Livery Company Records. He is noted as a Mercer and a New Freeman of the City of London. His Master was a Humfrey BASKERFIELD or BASKERVILLE. To reach the status of New Freeman, Richard would have completed a seven-year apprenticeship. 

The minimum age to start a Mercer’s apprenticeship in London was sixteen years old so Richard would have been at least twenty-three years old in 1557. Eleven or so years later in 1569, Richard HOLLYMAN is noted as a Master of the Mercer’s Company himself. His apprentice Thomas HODSON now becoming a New Freeman of the City of London.

In 1560, Richard HOLLYMAN had married Martha PAKINGTON of the gentry family the PAKINGTONS of Worcestershire: the PAKINGTONS also had connections to Aylesbury in Buckinghamshire.  Note, Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire is just a few miles from Cuddington and Dinton, ancestral homes of most Hollimans (various spellings in the USA).

Martha’s uncle Robert PAKINGTON was the first PAKINGTON of Aylesbury. Robert married an heiress of Sir John BALDWIN of Aylesbury, and thus inherited some of BALDWIN’s Buckinghamshire lands and property. 

Murder by 16th Century Technology!

Robert PAKINGTON is an interesting character. He was murdered in Cheapside, London in 1536, shot with a handgun, one of the first of this type of crime in the country. 

Below, handguns of the 1500s.

His brother Augustine PAKINGTON had predeceased him by 1536 but Augustine was known to have smuggled English Bibles into the London Ports from places like Antwerp in Belgium. It is thought Robert PAKINGTON was involved in something similar. Some of the PAKINGTON family though remained staunch Catholics throughout the Reformation, note here the later recusant PAKINGTONS of Harvington Hall, Worcester.

Richard HOLLYMAN’s marriage into the PAKINGTON family opened up a whole new level of society for him. His associates (mostly relatives by his marriage to Martha) were heads of Companies such as the Mercers and Grocers of the City of London, and some were Aldermen like his old Master Humfrey BASKERVILLE (Humfrey died 1564).

Richard and Martha HOLLYMAN had, it seems, ten children from their twelve-year marriage. The children were: Humfrey, Richard, Elizabeth, Lionel, Henry, Anne, Margery, Edward, Robert and Sarah. Richard had a prosperous career as a Mercer importing exotic goods into London, such as nutmeg as well as the materials for his Mercers business.

Richard appears in the London Port Books of 1567/8 importing the following goods from Antwerp:

1567 November: 35 lb of nutmeg cost £5 16s 8d ,

1568 January: 11 cwt of madder cost £7 6s 8d

1568 January: 2 cwt of estrige wool and 16 cwt of madder cost £20 13s 4d

1568 September: 90 half pieces of fustian cost £30

Fustian was a cloth made of cotton and flax, manufactured mainly in Italy and southern Germany.

Madder was a vegetable root that was used as a source of dye.

Estrige wool was imported from Central Europe.

Richard HOLLYMAN died suddenly in 1572. He did not leave a Will, but administration of Richard’s estate was applied for by Martha’s Brother, William PAKINGTON. By 1572 it seems two of the children of Richard and Elizabeth had died, sadly their namesakes Richard and Elizabeth. 

This information came from the nineteenth century Percival Boyd’s Citizens of London. Boyd did get one piece of information wrong though. Martha as a widow did not marry Robert BURBAGE of the famous BURBAGE family, as the 1569 Visitation of Worcestershire also states. I managed to locate the Will of Robert BURBAGE dated 1575. In his Will Robert BURBAGE refers to his wife Margery. Indeed, other sources do indicate Robert BURBAGE married Martha’s sister Margery PAKINGTON. - Anne Holmes