Gilbert Heathcote I was the second son of George Heathcote I [c.1550-1601] of Loades in the parish of Brampton. His elder brother, George Heathcote II [1569-1626] lived at Cutthorpe Hall. He had two sisters, Dorothy and Catherine, who were named executors of his mother Agnes/Anne’s will in 16091The will of ‘Agnes Heathcot of Lodes in Brampton, widow’ dated 9 September 1609 was proved 4 May 1610. Her son, George Heathcote II was appointed supervisor of the will..
He married Elizabeth Owtrem [1585-1653]2Elizabeth Owtrem, daughter of William Owtrem, was baptized at Barlow on 21 September 1585. ‘Francis Owtrem & Robert Owtrem my wyves brethren’ were appointed overseers of the will of Gilbert Heathcote I, dated 20 October 1634. Francis Owtrem [bap.30 Sept 1579, Barlow & Dronfield registers] and Robert Owtrem [bap 15 Dec 1582, Dronfield register] are both recorded as sons of William Owtrem., daughter of William Owtrem of Barlow c. 1610. Their marriage is not recorded, nor are the baptisms of their daughters, Elizabeth, Alice and Dorothy. However, the baptisms of their other 4 daughters, Frances [bap.3 Dec 1615], Ann [bap. 8 Nov 1617], Helen [bap. 22 July 1619, bur. 28 May 1625], and Rosamond [bap.5 Dec 1620], are all recorded in the parish register at Chesterfield. The baptism of their only son, Gilbert Heathcote II, is recorded there on 24 August 1625.
The date of Gilbert Heathcote I’s burial is not known but the will of ‘Gilbert Heathcott, yeoman of Chesterfield’, dated 20 October 1634, was proved on 10 January 1634/35 in the probate court of Canterbury3PROB 11/167/26.. He left his ‘dwelling house’ with its ‘Barne & Crofte or Garden thereunto belonging’ to his wife, Elizabeth, and then to his son, Gilbert Heathcote II ‘To enioy the sayd house and premises when he shall attayne to the age of xxi yeeres’. As Gilbert Heathcote II was only 9 years old, he would not inherit until the year 1646, at the time of the Civil War. If either party were to die, then the property was to be sold and the money raised to be divided amongst his six daughters: Dorothy, Frances, Anne & Rosamond Heathcote, Alice Harding, and Elizabeth the wife of Mr Peter Watkinson.
Elizabeth Heathcote married Peter Watkinson in 16344Evelyn D Heathcote, An account of some of the families bearing the name of Heathcote, 1899, 65, says they were married at Chesterfield on 30 December 1630. However, there is no record of this in the Chesterfield parish register., and a marriage settlement5Lincolnshire Archives, 1 ANC2/A/10/3, Counterpart indenture of marriage settlement, 21 April 1634. was drawn up on 21 April 1634 between Gilbert Heathcote I, yeoman of Chesterfield, and Peter Watkinson, clerk of the same. The Watkinsons were a long-established gentry family from Loades in Brampton where the Heathcotes lived. Peter Watkinson6A Cambridge Alumni Database: Peter Watkinson. had attended Trinity College, Cambridge, before being appointed master at Chesterfield school in 1627. He later served as rector of Kirk Ireton, where he was noted in 1647, and as vicar of Wirksworth from 1658, where he was a leading member of the Presbyterians7Evelyn D Heathcote, op cit, 65., before his death in 1689. In his will of 11 November 1686, proved at Chesterfield on 30 April 1689, he is described as clerk of Castle Hayes, Staffordshire. His wife, Elizabeth, was appointed executrix and sole beneficiary. In turn, her will of 17 May 1689 describes her as Elizabeth Watkinson of Chesterfield, widow, and she appointed her ‘loving brother Mr Gilbert Heathcote [II]’ as sole executor.
Gilbert Heathcote I held several civic positions within the township of Chesterfield over the years. He was Constable in 1616, Common Councilman in 1619, Capital burgess in 1620 & 1621, and Chamberlain in 1623 & 16248George Hall, The History of Chesterfield, 1839, 271, footnote.. Like his uncle Ralph Heathcote and cousin Godfrey Heathcote, the bell-founders and braziers, he also held the office of Mayor on at least one occasion. In 1618, he was described as the ‘former mayor of Chesterfield’ in a case which he brought before the ecclesiastical court, accusing the vicar of Chesterfield of impropriety.9Staffordshire Record Office, B/C/5/1618/2.
His wealth came from the lead industry,10Evelyn D Heathcote, op cit, 64, quoting Sir William Heathcote, Bart, of Hursley: “Gilbert Heathcote had large concerns in the lead mines, by that and in other things he had £5000 per annum clear, but venturing into projects did lose considerably, and therefore was forced to sell great part of his estate.” especially in mining and smelting with his brother George Heathcote II on their lands at Loades in Brampton. His will gives considerable details of the lead mines he held there. To his wife, Elizabeth, he left ‘my parte of the deep Grove and Lamas Grove upon the long rake’, and the ‘remainder of all my other Groves’ he bequeathed to his daughters. He shared the mill at Loades in Brampton, which manufactured red lead, with his nephew George Heathcote III, and this, too, he bequeathed to Elizabeth his wife: ‘all my part of the red Leade Milne at Lodes in Brampton and of the leade there, and of the tooles thereunto belonging’. Elizabeth was to dispose of these assets ‘amongst my children at her discretion.’
Heathcote House, Nos 2-4 St Mary’s Gate, Chesterfield
The house in which Gilbert Heathcote I lived, in St Mary’s Gate, Chesterfield, was built on the site of a house formerly occupied by the Dean of Lincoln’s bailiff. In 1496 it was sold to a family of butcher-graziers called Lache who, between the years 1597-160111Lincolnshire Archives, 1ANC2/B/18/1, Bundle of title deeds to lands in Chesterfield & Dronfield, 1598-1684., conveyed the property to Robert Curtis of Summerley [in Unstone], yeoman. He died in 161112Will of Robert Curtis, dated 31 January 1610/11 [copy in Lincoln Archives 1ANC2/B/18/1] proved 28 March 1612 [ledger entry only Lichfield probate records]. but his younger son, another Robert Curtis, sold it to Gilbert Heathcote I in 161413Philip Riden et al, Chesterfield Streets & Houses, 2019, 25. Gilbert Heathcote brought an action against Francis Curtis, eldest son of Robert Curtis, in 1617, concerning property in Chesterfield [National Archives, C3/313/21].. Before this date Gilbert Heathcote I had lived at Loades in Brampton, and his marriage to Elizabeth Owtrem as well as the baptisms of his daughters, Elizabeth, Alice and Dorothy, would have been recorded in the parish registers at Brampton which do not survive before 165814As Gilbert Heathcote’s burial in 1634 is not recorded at Chesterfield, it may be that he was buried at Brampton near his ancestors.. The baptisms of all his other children are registered in Chesterfield starting in 1615, confirming that he was resident there by that year. His appointment as Constable in 1616 is further proof. In 1615 his brother George Heathcote II acquired Cutthorpe Hall, which suggests that both were doing well in the lead industry at that time, and were able to use the profits to purchase new properties.
The will of George Heathcote II, dated 20 April 1625, simply refers to Gilbert Heathcote I as ‘my well beloved brother Gilbert of Chesterfield’, but gives no indication of exactly where in Chesterfield he lived. However, the marriage settlement indenture drafted on 21 April 1634, between Gilbert Heathcote I and Peter Watkinson, specifies the property as the “Messuage in St Mary’s Gate, Chesterfield”.
The house fronting St Mary’s Gate which Gilbert Heathcote I purchased was a late-15th or early-16th century timber-framed structure of 3 bays, with jettying at first-floor level. The canted easterly cross wing, which follows the line of Station Back Lane [formerly Bishops Mill Lane], was also timber-framed15Derbyshire County Council, Listed Building record MDR 5364 – No.2 St Mary’s Gate, Chesterfield, 30 July 2021.. It is not known precisely when Gilbert Heathcote I made alterations to the property, but these included encasing the timber-framed house in stone: the rear elevation still retains an early 17th century mullion and transom window on the ground floor. Alongside this window is a wide segmental arch with pilasters, marking the carriageway which originally ran through the building from its entrance on St Mary’s Gate, into the yard behind. The St Mary’s Gate entrance to this carriageway is now disguised by the elaborate arched doorway which fronts the street. It was a substantial town-house and in the 1670 Hearth Tax return for Chesterfield ‘Mr Gilbert Heathcote’ was assessed on 6 hearths16David G Edwards [ed], Derbyshire Hearth Tax Assessments 1662-1670, Derbyshire Record Society, VII, 1982, 137, ‘Scarsdale Hundred, Chesterfield’..
A drawing made in 184917Evelyn D Heathcote, op cit, 63. Illustration ‘From a Pencil Sketch by Selina, Lady Heathcote – 1849’. shows this stone-built house fronting St Mary’s Gate, concealed behind a coat of roughcast render, and with its own gate in the railings of the graveyard surrounding the parish church, giving easy access for church attendance. A map of Chesterfield in 1849 clearly shows the churchyard paths. The side elevation indicates the extent of the cross wing with its 3 mullioned windows at first floor and 4 windows in the lean-to. The front elevation appears to show mullion and transom windows at both ground-floor and first-floor level, although those in the ground-floor are larger than those above. The front door is recessed within the former carriageway arch and has a small diamond-leaded window positioned directly above the door. Further alterations in the late 19th century included the enlargement of the windows in the elevation fronting St Mary’s Gate, and an elaborate surround enclosing a date plaque of 1898 above the main doorway.
Inside, the house has two oak panelled rooms on the ground floor: one early 17th century and the other late 17th century. The staircase also appears to be late 17th century with turned balusters, the alternate ones of barley-twist. The main room upstairs, which may have been called the great chamber, fills the centre of the house, and originally extended over the carriageway beneath. This portion of the room, above the former carriageway, is now divided from the remainder by a wall with a fireplace flue: the chimney-stack is clearly shown off-centre in the roof ridge of the 1849 drawing. The original fireplace to this room was in a chimney built into the frontage facing the churchyard, as indicated by the cornice mouldings which survive at that point in the plasterwork ceiling of the room. When this chimney stack was removed it was replaced by the only window now lighting the room, the one shown near the centre in the 1849 drawing and photographs. Seemingly, the position of the original fenestration to this room and, perhaps, elsewhere in this frontage, is concealed behind the roughcast render.
The decorative plasterwork ceiling
The plasterwork ceiling to the great chamber is divided by 3 transverse beams intersected at their central points by longitudinal beams, thus creating a ceiling divided into 8 compartments. Two of these compartments now form the ceiling of a small room behind the wall which divides the original chamber. It is quite apparent that the transverse beams are original to the timber-framed house which Gilbert Heathcote I acquired. As they are positioned at slightly different heights from each other the plasterwork ceiling has a gentle undulation, but this structural irregularity is largely disguised behind a brave display of decorative detail. Each of the 8 compartments is surrounded by elaborate cornice mouldings. The compartment in front of the window is shorter in depth than all the others, with the cornice moulding forward into the room, indicating that this is where the original chimney had been positioned, as explained above.
Each compartment contains either a diamond or an oval reserve, set alternately, and formed with a raised rib, enclosing a cruciform ornament of decorative plasterwork. The individual enrichments making up the cruciform ornaments are all cast from moulds, as are the enrichments placed on the soffit at the crossings of the beams. The only hand-modelled work is the concave square around the rose at one of these crossings.
The diamond-shaped panels are each filled with the same design of a central grape-cluster boss with 4 leaves and 4 elaborate fleur-de-lis. Exactly this arrangement of motifs, cast from the same moulds, can be found at the centre of a ceiling panel at Holmesfield Hall. All these enrichments are seen extensively in the region at properties dating from the early 17th century, such as Brampton Hall and Greenhill Hall. The oval-shaped panels are similarly filled by enrichments seen elsewhere. The pyramidal boss on its strapwork pattress can be seen at Holmesfield Hall, and the elements which make up the triangular ‘arabesque’, at Brampton Hall and formerly at Norton House.
At the beam crossings, the familiar fleur-de-lis makes another appearance in an arrangement centred on a boss with cones which can also be seen at Hathersage Hall.
The second crossing of the beams is ornamented with 4 stylized leaves that are also seen at Holmesfield Hall. However, the main enrichment is a 14-petal double rose, within a concave square. The concave square was a favoured element in ribwork ceilings of the early years of the 17th century, as at Greenhill Hall. Here, at Heathcote House, it is simply hand-modelled, as it is at Hathersage Hall in the ceiling compartments there. The 14-petal double rose also features at Hathersage Hall and at Bishops’ House, Norton Lees – and nowhere else. Its appearance at these 2 properties helps to date the ceiling at Heathcote House, since the mould seems to have been newly carved for these commissions.
In sharing compartmented ceilings, and a restricted but recurrent choice of plasterwork motifs, Holmesfield Hall, Hathersage Hall, Bishops’ House and Heathcote House are all clearly connected. The parlour ceiling at Bishops’ House was installed 1632-34, and that at Hathersage Hall c.1635. Gilbert Heathcote died in October 1634, and his heir did not come of age until 1646, so it seems fair to propose a date of c.1630-34 for the ceiling at Heathcote House. The old timber-framed property had evidently been given a face-lift by the time that the marriage settlement of April 1634 was drawn up, which specifically mentions the ‘messuage in St Mary’s Gate’.
David Bostwick
27 October 2024