Powys-Lybbe Forbears - Person Sheet
Powys-Lybbe Forbears - Person Sheet
Notes for Richard 'The Slave' Lybbe
Martin P-L writes:
Richard the Slave
!n 1685 Richard Libb brought a suit in the Court of Exchequer against Mason and others. He claimed to be Richard Libb of Sullum, only son and heir of another Richard Libb of Sullum, gent., dec'd, who was only son and heir of John Libb of Sullum, the eldest son and heir of Richard Libb of Hardwick.
When I first came across it, this, the start of his pleading, immediately quickened my interest, since I already knew that John had been the eldest son of Richard the Sewar, and I wondered why he had not inherited Hardwick. I suspected scullduggery.
According to the plaintiff, his father had been a royalist in the Civil War, in consequence of which his estates had been so plundered and destroyed that he was brought to necessity and distress. Apart from the manor of Sullum, he owned houses in Reading and elsewhere in Berkshire. He raised a mortgage from one Robert Mason, a merchant of Southampton. Mason wanted to gain full possession of the estates but knew that they had been entailed: after the owner's decease, they would pass in the first instance to his widow and then to his son, the plaintiff. He therefore threatened to foreclose on the mortgage unless the plaintiff, then aged ten, was sent to parts beyond the seas. He was accordingly sent to Barbados, where he was forced to serve a kinsman of Mason's, one Sion Hill. After a time, this Hill sold him as a slave to Jamaica, where he was held for seven years. There, in 1682, he learnt for the first time of his family's affairs and of his father's death twelve years before.
Returning (one wonders how) to England, he found that Robert Mason was dead, but that his son and grandson were in possession of Sullum manor, and other people in possession of the houses in Reading. He begged the court to require these men to show their title to the estates, and failing that to restore them to their rightful owner, himself.
[I first came on a reference to this suit in the Genealogical Library. It took me a long time to track it down in the PRO in Chancery Lane, and all I found was the plea, not the answer to it, let alone the judgement. It was many months before I tracked down the answer, in a remote colony of the PRO at Hayes, Middx. The judgement I never found, but I guess the suit was abandoned.]
The defendants began their answer politely. They accepted that the plaintiff was the man he claimed to be, that the family estates were as described and his descent as stated - though they begged to point out that, according to their understanding, John Libb was the natural son of Richard the Sewar and therefore not his heir (as was then the law).
They further expressed considerable doubt that the plaintiff's grandfather would have thought to entail his estates in the manner claimed, inasmuch as his daughter in law had been one of the housemaids and the marriage had only come about because of her pregnancy, a woman who could bring no fortune and was of so ill behaviour.
In any event they possessed valid deeds of sale, signed by Antony Libb of Hardwick as well as by the plaintiff's father and by the mortgagees - who were not Robert Mason but two Londoners, an Apothecary and a Vintner. The defendants took ill the plaintiff's remarks about Robert Mason. They wished to point out that he, too, had been a royalist, and had been imprisoned many years for this; and that he had arranged the plaintiff's deportation at the request of his father, who could not afford to support his extravagant son and feared that he would come to a bad end, having already broke into a house and stole.
The defendants humbly suggested that the plaintiff was on the make, and expressed reluctance to give him the estates he asked for or to pay him any compensation; Robert Mason had paid his father £2,500 for Sullum, which they thought sufficient.
[Apparently, there is no evidence for white slavery in Jamaica, but so many were sent out to Barbados (by Judge Jeffries and by Cromwell, among others) that the verb "to Barbadoes" was coined. They worked as slaves to the sugar planters.]
If anyone wishes to pursue this case further, the PRO ref. is E112/570.
Richard the Slave
!n 1685 Richard Libb brought a suit in the Court of Exchequer against Mason and others. He claimed to be Richard Libb of Sullum, only son and heir of another Richard Libb of Sullum, gent., dec'd, who was only son and heir of John Libb of Sullum, the eldest son and heir of Richard Libb of Hardwick.
When I first came across it, this, the start of his pleading, immediately quickened my interest, since I already knew that John had been the eldest son of Richard the Sewar, and I wondered why he had not inherited Hardwick. I suspected scullduggery.
According to the plaintiff, his father had been a royalist in the Civil War, in consequence of which his estates had been so plundered and destroyed that he was brought to necessity and distress. Apart from the manor of Sullum, he owned houses in Reading and elsewhere in Berkshire. He raised a mortgage from one Robert Mason, a merchant of Southampton. Mason wanted to gain full possession of the estates but knew that they had been entailed: after the owner's decease, they would pass in the first instance to his widow and then to his son, the plaintiff. He therefore threatened to foreclose on the mortgage unless the plaintiff, then aged ten, was sent to parts beyond the seas. He was accordingly sent to Barbados, where he was forced to serve a kinsman of Mason's, one Sion Hill. After a time, this Hill sold him as a slave to Jamaica, where he was held for seven years. There, in 1682, he learnt for the first time of his family's affairs and of his father's death twelve years before.
Returning (one wonders how) to England, he found that Robert Mason was dead, but that his son and grandson were in possession of Sullum manor, and other people in possession of the houses in Reading. He begged the court to require these men to show their title to the estates, and failing that to restore them to their rightful owner, himself.
[I first came on a reference to this suit in the Genealogical Library. It took me a long time to track it down in the PRO in Chancery Lane, and all I found was the plea, not the answer to it, let alone the judgement. It was many months before I tracked down the answer, in a remote colony of the PRO at Hayes, Middx. The judgement I never found, but I guess the suit was abandoned.]
The defendants began their answer politely. They accepted that the plaintiff was the man he claimed to be, that the family estates were as described and his descent as stated - though they begged to point out that, according to their understanding, John Libb was the natural son of Richard the Sewar and therefore not his heir (as was then the law).
They further expressed considerable doubt that the plaintiff's grandfather would have thought to entail his estates in the manner claimed, inasmuch as his daughter in law had been one of the housemaids and the marriage had only come about because of her pregnancy, a woman who could bring no fortune and was of so ill behaviour.
In any event they possessed valid deeds of sale, signed by Antony Libb of Hardwick as well as by the plaintiff's father and by the mortgagees - who were not Robert Mason but two Londoners, an Apothecary and a Vintner. The defendants took ill the plaintiff's remarks about Robert Mason. They wished to point out that he, too, had been a royalist, and had been imprisoned many years for this; and that he had arranged the plaintiff's deportation at the request of his father, who could not afford to support his extravagant son and feared that he would come to a bad end, having already broke into a house and stole.
The defendants humbly suggested that the plaintiff was on the make, and expressed reluctance to give him the estates he asked for or to pay him any compensation; Robert Mason had paid his father £2,500 for Sullum, which they thought sufficient.
[Apparently, there is no evidence for white slavery in Jamaica, but so many were sent out to Barbados (by Judge Jeffries and by Cromwell, among others) that the verb "to Barbadoes" was coined. They worked as slaves to the sugar planters.]
If anyone wishes to pursue this case further, the PRO ref. is E112/570.