Top(11) The Hoghton uncles
A.S.'s mother Margaret Hoghton(1) was one of six illegitimate, but fully recognised and acknowledged daughters of Sir Richard (de) Hoghton (1498-1559). Two of these turned out to be crucial in bringing the Standishes to centre stage in the Hoghton and 'Shakespeare in Lancashire ' stories: one was Margaret(1), A.S.'s mother, and another was one of the Elizabeths , who had married another Standish of Duxbury. This marriage was to Lawrence , the uncle of A.S.'s stepfather Thomas(2), to confuse all these relationships even more. This, indeed, was one of the confusions that led to 19th century muddles, as it was not recognised that this was a marriage contracted when Lawrence and Elizabeth were very young. They did consummate the marriage, but the male line died out when their only surviving son Lawrence left no children. (Records in Chorley Parish Registers.)
Sir Richard had four wives: by his first wife Alice, daughter of Sir Thomas Assheton of Ashton there were two surviving sons, Thomas 'The Exile' and Alexander 'of the 1581 will'. By his second wife Alice Morley there were also at least two sons: Thomas (T.H., potential host of Shakespeare and later killed at the 'affray at Lea') and Rowland (who played no further part in the story). It seems there were no surviving sons by his third wife Elizabeth Gregson of Balderstone and that most of the illegitimate children were by his mistress Anne, daughter of Roger Browne (place of origin unknown but presumably local), who became his fourth wife when the third one died. At this point the illegitimate children were legitimised retrospectively.
The husbands of five illegitimate daughters of Sir Richard Hoghton are given as "Cuthbert Clifton of Lytham, Nicholas Skillicorne of Preese, Standish of Duxbury, William Haydock of Cottam and Robert Talbot, natural son of John Talbot of Salesbury", in J. H. Lumby, A Calendar of the Deeds and Papers in the possession of Sir James de Hoghton, Bart. of Hoghton Tower , Lancashire (LCRS, 1926, vol. 88), Deed no. 45, note at the bottom of the page. Honigmann (1985, p. 146) gives "at least two" illegitimate daughters: Elizabeth, wife of Robert Talbot, a trustee of the fund in Alexander Hoghton's will of 1581 that was to provide annuities to William Shakeshafte, etc., and another Elizabeth. This second Elizabeth also married a Standish of Duxbury - marriage settlement Lawrence Standish and Elizabeth Hoghton 20 November 1531, Lumby, no. 1391 (also abstracted by Farrer under his account of the Standishes of Duxbury, VCH vol. 6).
The same document also gives details of six illegitimate sons of Sir Richard:
Richard Hoghton the elder, commonly called of the Cawsey; Leonard Hoghton of Grimsargh whose daughter Bridget married Stanley of the Moor Hall [Lumby adds: ? in Woodplumpton, but it was definitely Moor Hall in Aughton, according to Ormskirk Parish Registers, which gives baptisms of Edward Stanley's children], who had Peter and Thomas; Richard Hoghton the younger who had issue William who had issue John now of the Parkhall; Arthur Hoghton of Grimsargh who hath issue male; Gilbert Hoghton of Stanworth who had issue Richard of the Red Lee (in Tockholes); and Edward of Smithybottom (in Ribchester) of both of whom there is issue remaining.
This information was given "in a volume of pedigrees now in the British Museum (BM Addl. MSS 32114, ff o 85d & 86), by Towneley on information supplied to him by William Hoghton of Grimsargh" (perhaps one of the "issue male" of Arthur of Grimsargh?).
One vital point is that this information was given by a close member of the Hoghton family of the next generation, who actually knew these families, and was almost certainly recorded by Christopher Towneley, whose reputation as a meticulous recorder was impeccable at the time and has been fairly impeccable ever since. His informant William Hoghton of Grimsargh seems to have had one slip of memory in his accounting for all of Sir Richard Hoghton's illegitimate children. He gave only one daughter as marrying a Standish of Duxbury, when extant documents prove that two of them married into this family. A slight slip, and totally forgivable, as Lawrence and Elizabeth's family in Duxbury had died out by the end of the 16th century. Meanwhile, we can only be grateful for William Hoghton's otherwise presumably sound personal knowledge, and Towneley's recording of this.
Another vital point was that this provided a list of A.S.'s uncles and aunts from his mother's side and among them were three extremely interesting names: Clifton , Talbot and Haydock. The Cliftons were the largest land-owning family in the Fylde and the Talbots of the Ribble Valley were the family that produced the Earls of Shrewsbury. The first one and his son had prominent roles in Henry VI Part 1 , and the current one, married to Bess of Hardwick, was the guardian of Mary Queen of Scots at Chatsworth.
The Haydocks were interesting for several reasons: (1) they were Catholic, (2) they provided a Catholic priest, George, who became a martyr, (3) he provided another piece of folklore when his father Evan had a vision of his head floating in front of him at the moment of his death, (4) it was a Haydock (the same Evan?) that Thomas Hoghton 'The Exile' consulted before taking his decision to flee, (5) A.S.'s grandfather James had married a daughter of Evan Haydock (the same or his father?) as his first wife, (6) a Haydock appears in Captain Ralph Standish of Duxbury's will in 1637, and (7) they were the owners of Cottam Hall near Preston, a name already in the 'Shakespeare in Lancashire' story because of John Cottam, schoolmaster at Stratford Grammar School. Did these somehow connect A.S. to 'Catholic Shakespeare in Lancashire ' yet again? In any case, the Haydocks became another 'signpost'. Their story was largely told by Joseph Gillow, The Haydock Papers: a glimpse into English Catholic life (1888). They deserve more research.