Herrick Manuscripts

IDENTITY STATEMENT AREA

Reference code(s): DG9

Title: Herrick Manuscripts

Date(s): 1277 - 1930

Level of description: Fonds

Extent and medium of the unit of description: 2990 documents

CONTEXT AREA

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Administrative/Biographical history: The Herrick family's connections with Leicester date back to the early part of the 16th century, when the sons of Thomas Eyrick of Houghton on the Hill, Nicholas and John, moved to Leicester. Successive generations of Eyricks were ironmongers in the town and John's tenth child, also called John, served as mayor of Leicester. His fifth child, Nicholas, was sent to London as an apprentice to a goldsmith and his younger brother William also followed suit. In 1595 William Heyricke began looking for an estate in the country and, on the advice of his brothers in Leicester bought the manor of Beaumanor. He became a goldsmith of much standing as was appointed as royal jeweller to James I in 1603, knighted in 1605 and made a Teller of the Exchequer in 1616.

The Herrick family remained at Beaumanour throughout the 17th and 18th centuries and branches of the family, namely the Braynes and Gages, also purchased estates in Jamaica. Leicestershire records documenting the family's links with the Caribbean cease in the 1740s. By the 19th century the marriage of Thomas Bainbridge Herrick to the daughter and heiress of James Perry of Wolverhampton, allowed the Herricks to acquire estates in Staffordshire, Herefordshire and Wales that are passed to their son William Perry Herrick (d.1876).

Archival history: Deposited on permanent loan by the late Lieutenant Colonel Assheton Penn Curzon-Howe-Herrick, Clifton Castle, Ripon Yorkshire. A second subsidiary deposit of Herrick papers was made in the Record Office in 1980 (Ref: DE2155) containing information about Bardon Park Estate, acquired by William Perry Herrick in 1864.

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CONTENT AND STRUCTURE AREA

Scope and content: The Herrick Manuscripts collection comprises: (a) estate records for Leicestershire (the Beaumanor estate) and properties in Staffordshire, Herefordshire, Monmouthshire and elsewhere owned by the Herrick family, (b) official papers, such as exchequer records, and (c) personal papers, including Herrick, Perry and Gage family wills and items of family correspondence.
The bulk of the family's correspondence, which begins in the 16th century, was purchased by the Bodleian Library (Oxford University) in 1968 but over 130 items, dating from 1694-1874, are housed at the Leicestershire Record Office and provide information about the family's estates in Jamaica. Selected examples are listed below:

• DG9/ 2443 - dated 6th June 1705 - Letter from Mary Brayne, Jamaica, to Mrs Lucy Gage, her daughter in Leicestershire concerning the recent arrival of her brother, Richard Brayne, in Jamaica. The letter also includes details about estates owned by Mrs Brayne that had been damaged by fire and valued at £10 000 on her husband's death.
• DG9/ 2444 - Letter from Richard Brayne, Le Gonea, Jamaica, to his sister, Lucy Gage, Nottingham. Richard Brayne writes that he is short of money and cannot sell his property in Jamaica. He later states that he would return to England if anyone would give him a farm of £70 - £80 per annum and his mother asks him to enquire about her father's estate in England supposedly left to her sons.
• DG9/ 2449 - dated 16th March 1716 - Letter from Henry Sherbrooke, London, to Mrs Lucy Gage, his cousin concerning the recovery of debts owed by her brother in Jamaica.
• DG9/ 2600 - dated 1st June 1864 - James Thompson, Chronicle Office, Leicester, to W. Perry Herrick enclosing an extract from Leicester Hall Books recording a letter of attorney from John Gage, William and Lucy Herrick to Rose Fuller & Richard Beckford to act as their attorneys in Jamaican estates 1741.

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CONDITIONS OF ACCESS AND USE AREA

Conditions governing access: Open access

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Language/scripts of material: English

Physical characteristics:

Finding aids: Printed catalogues

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DESCRIPTION CONTROL AREA

Recorder's note:

Rules or conventions: Compiled in compliance with General International Standard Archival Description, ISAD(G), second edition, 2000; National Council on Archives Rules for the Construction of Personal, Place and Corporate Names, 1997.

Date(s) of descriptions:

Interest: Caribbean

Specific group:

Subjects

Sugar plantations

Land tenure

Personal/Corporate names

Places

Jamaica