Thomas Holbrooke

Yeoman of Norton Malreward. Married first an unknown wife, perhaps a daughter of Nicholas and Alice Derell of Marksbury, and second, by about 1550, Edith, widow of ___ Sanders. "Thomas Holbroke of Norton Malerward" held £10 and a yearling for Nicholas Derell of Marksbury and was overseer of his will (1546), and is "my sonne in lawe" in the will of Alice Derell (1551/2), which left cows to his children John and Johan. Charged with a bow and a sheaf of arrows in the Norton Malreward tithing at the 1569 musters ("a bow and a sheaf of arrows," Certificate of Musters, Somerset Record Society 20).

At Compton Dando he gave a bond for £20 to John Hungerford on 7 Sep 1562, and on 30 Apr 1565 Hungerford leased property there for lives to "Edyth Holbrooke, and Robert and John her sons" (Bristol Archives, Smyth of Ashton Court papers, AC/D/26/5 and 26/8; catalogue descriptions).

His will (11 Jan 1571/2, proved at Wells) is lost, but an abstract survives. It names sons John the elder (eldest), Thomas, William, John the younger and Robert, daughter Margery, wife Edith (executrix) and "his wife's son" Richard Sanders, and leaves leases at Compton Dando, including "the park" to William. As Davis summarises it: £5 and a colt to his son Thomas; £5 each to his sons William and John the younger; £10 to his daughter Margery; £5 to "his wife's son" Richard Sanders. Of his three leaseholds at Compton Dando, a fee farm went to Thomas, a farm with a tenement called Cases and a cottage called Busshes to Robert, and "the park" to William, where no trees were to be felled or sold. His wife Edith, executrix, was to have the farm and the park for her widowhood, paying each son 12s. a year. The gear for his oxen went to his eldest son John.

Davis (1945) lists his children as John the elder, Thomas and Margery, and, "by wife Edith," John the younger, William and Robert.

Open questions

• Was he a son or a grandson of Roger Holbroke of Chew (will 1503, record), whose son Thomas was his executor? Roger was already an adult in 1463, so he is more likely the grandfather than the father (inferred).
• A lead for his parents: a Chancery suit of 1533-1538 was brought against "Elizabeth Holbroke alias Hedge and Thomas, her son" over pasture in Chew Stoke (TNA C 1/833/14, catalogue). The bill may name Elizabeth's husband.