PURCHASED BY WILLIAM LEVESON GOWER ESQ.
24TH JULY 1832. AT THE SALE OF THE EFFECTS OF
GEORGE WATSON TAYLOR ESQ M.P. OF ERLESTOKE PARK, WILTS.
AND NOW IN POSSESSION OF THE FAMILY AT TITSEY PLACE.

PREFACE.

THIS Work has occupied twelve years, and is at last completed. It is the history of a family which, like many others, takes its name from the place of its origin, rises into importance with the progress of mercantile adventure in Henry VIII.'s reign, fills important civic offices, takes rank among the principal gentry of the county as Sheriff or in Parliament, suffers heavily in the Civil Wars, is rewarded with a Baronetcy at the Restoration, becomes in due time extinct [as I believe the Gresham Family to be absolutely in the male line], and transmits its line and property through females. It was difficult to identify the persons intended in the Introduction to the Pedigree printed in Ward's 'Lives of the Gresham Professors,' although I have succeeded to a great extent; and there are a few blanks in the one compiled by me which I had hoped to fill up, but which, notwithstanding the most thorough investigation on my part, and the kind assistance of others, I have not succeeded in doing; some of these will, doubtless, be made good as time goes on. I have had the advantage of a very large collection of deeds in my possession to refer to, from which most of the autographs and seals are taken; but, on the other hand, of monuments, family pictures, or correspondence, there are next to none. It is a remarkable fact that whereas in the Registers of Limpsfield [where for one hundred and fifty years the Greshams were the principal local residents] there are about forty burial entries, and in the Registers of Titsey twenty-three; there is in the former church only one monument-that to Martha, the wife of Sir Edward Gresham, Bart., 1712-and in the latter only two. None, I believe, have been destroyed, as the County Historians, from Aubrey downwards, only mention the above. In an interleaved copy of Ward's Lives of the Gresham Professors,' in the British Museum, that writer says that in the old church at Titsey there were, besides the two monuments, two hatchments-one for Sir Marmaduke Gresham, Bart., with the arms of Gresham impaling Corbet; the other for his son Sir Edward, with his arms impaling Maynard. There are, as far as I know, only eight monuments now existing in England to members of the family bearing the name: viz., two at Titsey, one at Limpsfield, one at Haslemere, one at Thorpe Market, one at Walsingham, one at Fulham, and one in St. Helen's, Bishopsgate Street. The family portraits at Titsey doubtless disappeared when the house was pulled down, cir. 1770; of the Titsey line there remains but one, that of William Gresham, painted by Cornelius Ketel in the year of his death. It is a half-length on panel, representing a man standing, looking to the left, in a black silk dress with ruff, and velvet cap, the sleeves slashed with velvet and tufted, the hands folded in front. It has the painter's anagram, C. K. F. (Cornelius Ketel fecit), Etatis suæ 58, A° DNI. 1579, and a motto, "Mon Espoir en Dieu," possibly the religious utterance of one who felt the hand of

death upon him. That there were pictures at Titsey is clear from the bequest in Dame Elizabeth Gresham's will, 1660, "I give unto Sir Marmaduck Gresham all the pictures in the galerey, not otherways desposed of," and by her devising to Mr. Richard Couper of Tempell "his own picture in the gallerey," and to Mrs. Ann Anderson "her [i.e. the testatrix's] pektur drane in black in the galerey.'

Of the portraits of Sir Thomas Gresham, the founder of the Royal Exchange, I have given three representations to illustrate this work. The first is from a portrait by Sir Antonio More in my possession, which has been engraved by Thew, date 1792, and was at that time the property of Lady Northampton, from whom it descended to Mr. Watson Taylor, and was sold among the contents of Erlestoke Park in 1832.* The second is from an engraving by Delaram, taken from the larger portrait belonging to the Mercers' Company, which is also engraved in Lodge's Portraits.' The third is from an engraving by Michel, published 1779, of a picture formerly in the Houghton Gallery. It is a half-length by Sir Antonio More, with the date 1550, representing him nearly full-face, with both his hands resting on a table or counter.† Other known portraits of Sir Thomas Gresham are the following:-A portrait by Sir Antonio More, seated, and in many respects identical with that belonging to me, now in the Hermitage Gallery at St. Petersburg. Another in the National Portrait Gallery, purchased at a sale at Christie's in June 1872, was formerly in the collection of Sir Henry Bedingfield of Oxburgh, co. Norfolk, Bart., and is mentioned in the 'Beauties of England and Wales,' Norfolk, p. 278. It is a half-length standing figure, wearing a black dress and a flat cap studded with small round buttons; the beard is a rich brown and forked; through a slash down the side of his dress part of a large golden chain can be seen. Another is in the possession of Sir John Neeld of Grittleton Park, Wilts, Bart., and was exhibited at Burlington House not long ago. It forms the frontispiece to Burgon's 'Life of Gresham.' It was purchased in Sept. 1830 by Joseph Neeld, Esq., from Dr. Dibdin, and was formerly in the collection of a Scotch nobleman; an enamel has been made of it by Bone. It measures 48 inches by 281, has the dagger and the pouch which appear in the portrait belonging to the Mercers' Company and in that at the National Portrait Gallery, and in the left hand is a pomander. Another belongs to Mr. Gresham, the High Bailiff of Southwark, and hangs in his house at Croydon. It is a small-sized half-length portrait, with richly embroidered figured dress, with pouch and belt, and the cap is studded with numerous jewels.

There hangs on the staircase at Audley End, the seat of Lord Braybrook, a small cabinet portrait, No. 33 in the catalogue. It is a half-length of a young man with his right hand on a pouch, and his left on the hilt of a dagger; it is called Sir John Gresham,

* The chair in which he is seated is evidently the painter's chair; it is identical with that in the portrait by Sir Antonio More in the Hermitage Gallery, and also with one by the same master exhibited in the Loan Exhibition at South Kensington in 1866. There is a strip of red leather at the back, a fringe with buttons on the seat, and a quatrefoil ornament on the arm.

+ The Autotype Company have lately been publishing photographs of all the pictures in the Hermitage Gallery; this is not among them, although the sitting portrait before referred to is, and this latter is probably the one which Horace Walpole calls a very good portrait. [See Burgon, 'Life of Gresham,' vol. i., p. 205.] A portrait of Ann, wife of Sir Thomas Gresham, by Sir Antonio More, is in the same gallery.