Hillgartner Family History: Lawrence

(var. Laurents, Laurence, Lorenz, Lorents)

The Lawrences of Ashton Hall are descended from a Robert Lawrence born about 1150-60 A.D., in the vicinity of Lancaster, England. One source indicates that his father also was named Robert and worked as a silversmith for the Lord of Lancaster Castle.

Lancaster Castle was established about 1100 A.D. on the remains of three Roman forts and today is a prison. Within the halls of Ashton Manor is a silver cup adorned with the motif of Roman armies and the Roman General, Julius Agricola who was born in the year 40 A.D. Legend indicates that General Agricola arrived in Lancaster in the year 89 A.D. where he and his armies built the first wooden fort upon a hill where Lancaster Castle stands.

During his stay, he met and fell in love with a young British girl by whom he had a son. He was unable to take the girl and child with him when he returned to Italy where he had a large estate, wife, and children. He gave the cup to the girl as a legacy. The son supposedly became the first silversmith in a long line of silversmiths and, according to legend, was the direct ancestor of Robert Lawrence.

Robert, the first Lawrence

Robert Lawrence joined the Third Crusades in 1187 A.D. He traveled by ship to Cyprus with Richard the Lion-Hearted, and then to what is now Palestine. There he took part in the bloody siege of Acre. One source indicates that he was the first to raise the Christian flag on a hill outside the city. Another version indicates that he scaled the walls of Acre with four other men and opened the gates to the armies of the Crusades. If he did, he was no doubt also involved in the wholesale massacre of every male inhabitant which followed.

At any rate, Robert was knighted on the battlefield for his deeds by King Richard in 1191 A.D., and given Ashton Hall.

He was created a Knight-Banneret (a military Knighthood and the highest grade in the Middle Ages) and was allow to bear for Arms, "Agent, a cross ragulée gules," a red cross of trunks of trees having pieces like couped boughs projecting from the side in a slanting direction, on a silver shield. This Arms is registered with the College of Arms in London, England.

Sir Robert Lawrence is also referred to as Robert de Lancaster in some texts. This probably is more accurate, as surnames did not come into common use until the late 1200s. The first to actually use the Lawrence surname was John, the first Squire of Ashton Hall, deriving it from the given name of his father Lawrence de Lancaster.

Edmund Lawrence

Edmund Lawrence, the second Squire of Ashton, was born around 1315. In 1338 he held, with his parents, the Stapleton part of the manor of Ashton for life. But he wanted much more, and devoted his life to acquiring it.

He married twice for money. First he married Alice de Cuerdale, the daughter of John de Cuerdale and Dionisia. But he terminated the marriage without issue, and poor Alice died by 1353. His second wife, Agnes, daughter and heiress of Robert de Washington, Lord of the manor of Scotforth, brought him other lands and also, notably, the income of the manors of Carnforth and Carleton.

In 1345, Edmund was appointed commissioner with his uncle William "to investigate wastes" in the manor of Wyresdale. In 1348, John Franceys dismissed a considerable part of these lands to Edmund for life, at the rent of a rose for six years and 100 shillings thereafter. By 1357 he had a feoffment of lands in Lancaster, Skerton, Ellel, Ashton, and Preeshall. Then, in 1358, he ran afoul of the law for acquiring a life interest in the Irish Manors of Baliogary, Lough and Casterling without obtaining a license from the crown. He was pardoned after paying out 100 shillings in fines.

Soon therafter, Edmund was in trouble again. He was charged with making off with 200 pounds in silver from John Darcy's house in Preeshall. But he was pardoned again, this time for his military service in France. He was Knight of the Shire in 1362 when he and Matthew de Rixton, being deputies of the sheriff, concealed the election writ and returned themselves as knights of the shire again. This return was later quashed, but not before he became receiver of Queen Philippa's tax monies in Ireland in 1363.

Somehow, Edmund continued to acquire positions of trust. In 1367 he was attorney in England for the Prior of St. Mary's, Lancaster. And in 1368 he was made commissioner of Array to choose 100 archers in Lancashire.

In 1373 he held for life three plough-lands of Thomas de Stapleton by a rent of 20 marks. He did release his life interest in the Irish Manors and in that of Dunmow in 1375. But shortly before his death, John de Oxcliffe granted him yet another estate in Overton. Edmund died a wealthy man in 1381 at 66 years of age. In addition to the rest, Edmund held lands in Skerton and Heysham. ten burgages, two messuages, and 30 acres of land "by a rent of 6s. 8d. of the duke in free burgage" at the time of his death.

Sir Robert Lawrence 3^rd

Sir Robert Lawrence was born in England in 1371. He was the third Squire of Ashton and married Margaret Holden. He not only inherited his father's lands and manors, but added to those estates in Ireland and the manors of Southworth and Dillicar in County Westmoreland.

In 1402 he was appointed a commissioner to arrest "sedition mongers". In 1403 he assembled knights and yeomen in Lancashire and brought them to the king to fight against the Earl of Northumbland in Scotland. He was appointed Knight of the Shire in 1403, 1406, and 1414.

A considerable contingent from Lancaster accompanied Henry V to France in 1415. John Lord Harcourt, bannert, took two knights, twenty-seven men-at-arms, and ninety archers; seven knights and two esquires, John Stanley and "Robert Laurence" each served with fifty archers. The campaign ended with the famous victory at Agincourt, and Robert was knighted in 1417 for his service.

In 1419 he was encharged to raise a loan for the King and in 1421 commissioned to bring 400 more archers to France as the Hundred Years' War ground on. Robert died 8 September 1439 in England, at 68 years of age.

The Last Lawrence Squire of Ashton

[Sir] Thomas Lawrence was born between 1461 and 1470. The Victoria History of the county of Lancaster indicates that he was 24 in 1490 (b. 1464) at the death of his father, Sir James. Thomas died about 1504, and his estates were transferred to his brother John. Apparently, Sir Thomas' eldest son John had been outlawed to France for killing an Usher of Henry VII, and his second son Thomas wished to remain a Monk.

But brother John died before he could assume control of the estate. The direct line of Ashton Lawrences came to an end and the estates passed to his aunts.

First American Lawrence

Robert Lawrence was born in England about 1617, the son of Sir John Lawrence, a puritan Baronet of London, and Grissell Gibbons. Robert entered Oxford University on November 4, 1631, and possibly studied law at the Inner Temple in the following year. Upon becoming of legal age and receiving his inheritance, he married his wife Elizabeth and departed for the Virginia Colony about 1638. He received two patents on 300 acres of land August 25, 1642, in Isle of Wight Co. for importation of himself, Eliza his wife, and four servants.

Robert joined other Puritans migrating to Nansemond Co., Virginia, and served as justice of the County in 1659-1660. But on March 14, 1659/60, he petitioned the Virginia House of Burgesses to have a "writ of ease granted him from his future officiating as a Commissioner in the County of Nanzemund." He probably became a Quaker about this time and could no longer abide the policies and actions of the Church of England and the Government.

The early Quakers were not the sedate, peace loving and well ordered Society of Friends we know in America today. In fact, they were rather unruly.. They denied all respect to magistrates and were prone to bursting into churches to disrupt the services and exhort ministers and congregations to change their ways. Caring nothing for earthly vanities, they sought no offices, flattered no one in power, denounced all forms of war and refused to take part in the national defense.

Consequently, it is no surprise that Robert and others were taken from a meeting at his house the 1st month, 1661, and "bound over to the court of Nansemond" for refusing to take certain oaths prohibited by their faith.

Robert died after 19 October 1682 in Virginia.

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