heraldryofyorkmi01custuoft

WALLER. 201
arms are Shirley, because, in his account of the " Funeral Monuments" of
the Minster, Torre says that there was a stone " in the middle choir" to
Marmaduke Constable of Wassand, husband of Elizabeth Shirley, who died
1607. So that the Shirleys were evidently connected with York. The
previous shield, charged with the arms of Waller impaling Maude, may
be the arms of his sister, who had married a Waller. And possibly
Mrs. Waller and Mrs. Maude may have worked the cushion together or
perhaps the former only, as the achievements of the Waller family are
most noted. At any rate there is no doubt about the first shield, it
contains the arms of Fane impaling Waller. And we find that George
Fane, Esq., of Badsell, in the county of Kent, who served the office of
sheriff of that county in the 4th and 5th of Philip and Mary, married
Joan, daughter of William Waller, of Groombridge.
And though
it is not easy to understand how the cushion with these
arms became connected with York Minster, it is very easy to understand
how George Fane and Joan Waller became connected with each other, for
Badsell was a fine old mansion in Tudeley parish, now in ruins, but on the
entrance-gate there is still the crest of the Fanes, with the date 1581 ;
and
Groombridge, the residence of the Wallers, is close by. So it was natural
there should be an alliance between the two families.
I do not know how far George Fane was in favour of Queen Mary.
At any rate, by his holding the office of sheriff, he dissembled his dislike,
even if it were not an evidence of his loyalty. His son Thomas, however,
boldly expressed his dissatisfaction, and was involved in the rebellion of
Sir Thomas Wyatt against her, committed to the Tower, attainted of high
treason, and only pardoned and set at liberty after he had been ordered
for execution. I have seen it somewhere stated that he was so young and
good-looking that her Majesty was persuaded not to cut off such a handsome
head. Queen Elizabeth knighted him ;
and he married Mary Nevill,
daughter and heiress of Lord Abergavenny, who on her father's death
claimed the barony of Abergavenny, which was disallowed by the House
of Lords, who, however, restored to her, by letters patent, the barony of
Le Despencer, which her father had also held, and she retained the ancient
castle of Mereworth, close by. Thither Thomas Fane went to live, and the
old house at Badsell naturally fell into decay and there his descendants
;
remained (his son having been created Earl of Westmoreland) until 1762,
when John, the sixth earl, who had served under Maryborough, died childless,
and the title of Le Despencer and the castle of Mereworth went to
his nephew, Sir Francis Dashwood, of West Wycombe, the son of his
sister, Lady Mary; and the family of Fane retained, with the title of
Westmoreland, only Apethorpe in Northampton, which was brought by
Mary, daughter and heiress of Sir Anthony Mildmay, when she married
the first Earl of Westmoreland.