PETRE

This collection contains documents relating to the Western estates of the Petre family of Ingatestone Hall, Essex, and covers Devon, Dorset and Somerset.

<p>See also the collections 123M, DD6800-7938 and CR 716-881, all held at Devon Record Office. The latter two collections were purchased from the executors of Richard Savage Esq., and also seem to largely concern the Petre estates.</p>

Presented by W. Sanders, Esq.,

Via The British Records Association (B.R.A. 767)

The founder of the estate was Sir William Petre, c.1505-1572, who was born at Torbryan in South Devon. He became tutor to the brother of Anne Boleyn, later entered the service of Henry VIII, acted as a commissioner for the dissolution of the monasteries and was a principal secretary of state to Henry, Edward VI, Mary and Elizabeth. He began to purchase properties in Devon in the 1540s and by his death the substantial part of the Western estate had been established and was to remain, with the important additions of Axminster (including the site of Newenham Abbey) and part of Colyton by his son Sir John (created Baron Petre of Writtle in 1603), intact without any important additions until its dispersal out of the family starting in the 1780s and completed in 1826. The family seat was and still is at Ingatestone and the head of the family never lived in the West.

The South Devon properties included land in Blackawton, the former Buckfast Abbey manors of South Brent, Churchstow, and Kingsbridge (also the borough), the manor of Harberton and land in East Allington and Torbryan. The properties in East Devon had nearly all belonged to the Bonville family, descended to Henry Grey, Duke of Suffolk, and on his attainder escheated to the crown. They included the manor and hundred of Axminster as well as other Axminster manors and properties, manors in or of Awliscombe, Axmouth, Combpyne, Kilmington, Membury, Northleigh, Shute, Sidbury and Southleigh, and half the hundred and manor of Colyton with the manor of Whitford and borough of Colyford. Nearly all the Petre properties in Devon were former lands of dissolved monastic houses or were lands which had escheated to the crown and many of the conveyances relating to their disposal and ultimate acquisition by the Petres can be found in this collection.

The 123M deposit (Petre) also contains documents relating to the Western estates of the Petre family and covers Devon, Dorset, Somerset and Gloucestershire. Deposit 49/26 is complementary to some of the material in deposit 123M in that it includes some early deeds of Bonville property in Axminster, an early 17th century copy of the cartulary of Newenham Abbey, collections of copy pre-1600 charters, deeds etc., relating to Axminster, Newenham, South Brent, Churchstow and properties in East Devon, Dorset and Somerset, and rentals and surveys of the manor of Axminster and other properties, including Newenham, 1561-1608, 1704 and 1777-1824. The collection contains a plan of Newenham drawn in 1616. Other items relating to the Petre Western estate, its disposal and the subsequent ownership of the various properties can also be found in this collection.