G12 Grandparents

Joyce Rugeley must have been born about 1480 and was descended from the Rugeley family of Dunton in Warwickshire. The Rugeley ancestry is somewhat erratically recorded in the contemporary Heraldic Visitations of Warwickshire of 1619 and it is not altogether clear exactly where she fits in. She died and left a will in 1553.  Importantly she married twice and was widowed twice. Her two husbands were wealthy and extremely well connected. This kind of widowhood was in reality the only way a woman in Tudor times could gain important independent social status. Continue reading →

Cecily Grey (c1497-1554) was the fourth daughter of Thomas Grey, First Marquess of Dorset and his wife Cecily Bonville, 7th Baroness Harington. She married John Sutton 3rd Baron Dudley in about 1520. She was therefore the grandmother of Anne Sutton and the great grandmother of Thomas Wilmer (1594-1680). This is therefore the direct and legitimate ancestral line of the Jellians, Shaw and Shaw-Hellier families discussed on this web site. Continue reading →

The Shaw family of Dudley has many strands but they seem to all lead back to Thomas Shawe who flourished 1510-1530. He died in about 1544 and was probably born about 1490. The evidence revolves around a Thomas Shawe of Dudley who does a number of land transactions, which lead to disputes after his death – although they may not necessarily all be the same person. Continue reading →