SHAKESPEARE'S FAMILY
William Shakespeare from the Drocshout painting now inthe Shakespeare Memorial Gallery at Stratford-on-Avon.SHAKESPEARE'S FAMILY
BEING
A Record of the Ancestors and Descendants of William Shakespeare
WITH
SOME ACCOUNT OF THE ARDENS
BY
MRS. C. C. STOPES
Author of
"The Bacon-Shakespeare Question Answered," "Shakespeare's Warwickshire Contemporaries," "British Freewomen," Etc.
LONDON
ELLIOT STOCK, 62, PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C.
NEW YORK
JAMES POTT & COMPANY
1901
PREFACE
When I was invited to reprint in book-form the articles which hadappeared in the Genealogical Magazine under the titles of"Shakespeare's Family" and the "Warwickshire Ardens," I carefullycorrected them, and expanded them where expansion could be madeinteresting. Thus to the bald entries of Shakespeare's birth and burialI added a short life. Perhaps never before has anyone attempted to writea life of the poet with so little allusion to his plays and poems. Myreason is clear; it is only the genealogical details of certainWarwickshire families of which I now treat, and it is only as aninteresting Warwickshire gentleman that the poet is here included.
Much of the chaotic nonsense that has of late years been written todisparage his character and contest his claims to our reverence andrespect are based on the assumption that he was a man of low origin andof mean occupation. I deny any relevance to arguments based on such anassumption, for genius is restricted to no class, and we have a Burns aswell as a Chaucer, a Keats as well as a Gower, yet I am glad that theresult of my studies tends to prove that it is but an unfounded[Pg vi]assumption. By the Spear-side his family was at least respectable, andby the Spindle-side his pedigree can be traced straight back to Guy ofWarwick and the good King Alfred. There is something in fallen fortunethat lends a subtler romance to the consciousness of a noble ancestry,and we may be sure this played no small part in the making of the poet.
All that bear his name gain a certain interest through him, andtherefore I have collected every notice I can find of the Shakespeares,though we are all aware none can be his descendants, and that the familyof his sister can alone now enter into the poet's pedigree with anydegree of certainty.
The time for romancing has gone by, and nothing more can be doneconcerning the poet's life except through careful study and throughpatient research. All students must regret that their labours have suchcomparatively meagre results. Though sharing in this regret, I have beenable, besides adding minor details, to find at last a definite link ofassociation between the Park Hall and the Wilmcote Ardens; and I havelocated a John Shakespeare in St. Clement's Danes, Strand, London, whois probably the poet's cousin. I have also somewhat cleared the groundby checking errors, such as those made by