History > Parishioners  

Notable Parishioners
(updated 14/6/2009)

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Entries on this page are arranged in alphabetic order of surname, rather than by dates.

Visit the Links page for links to:
  • the Royal Berkshire History website - for the Tilehurst Church page
  • the Berkshire Family History Society website - for details of Berkshire Parish Registers and indexes of Berkshire marriages and burials
  • the Berkshire Record Office website - for lists of St Michael's Church records and Calcot Parish records.



The Blagrave family

The Blagrave family held a great deal of land, property and influence in Tilehurst and Reading.  They had lived in the area from the 13th century.  They were a large and distinguished family, but research is made more difficult by the repeated use of the same Christian names.

Anthony Blagrave bought and rebuilt Southcote House in the late 16th century.  His brother, John Blagrave, was a famous mathematician and his nephew, Daniel Blagrave, was MP for Reading and signed the Death Warrant for Charles I.

Another John Blagrave (born 1713?) bought the Manor of Tilehurst, Calcot House, from Benjamin Child around 1755 but had to rebuild it (allegedly after having to remove the roof to persuade the disconsolate widower to leave).

Yet another John Blagrave (born 1751) married a distant cousin, Frances Blagrave and had 16 children.  In 1820 their 10th child, Eliza Agnes (aged 30), married Dr Martin Routh, then Rector of Tilehurst (aged 65).

The family has made many charitable donations in support of the community including land and money for a hospital, a school, a woodland park and a recreation ground.




Sir Francis Englefield (1522-1605)

Sir Francis Englefield was High Sheriff of Berkshire and Oxfordshire.  The Manor of Tilehurst came into his possession in 1545 after the death of Henry VIII.  As a Roman Catholic, he disobeyed an order not to say Mass in the house of Princess Mary where he was a chief officer.  He was imprisoned in the Tower of London until Mary came to the throne in 1553.  He was a member of a commission to investigate witchcraft in 1555, and later he took part in an enquiry into a conspiracy against the Queen.  In 1558 when Elizabeth I came to the throne, he left for Spain.  He was finally convicted of high treason and his lands were forfeit in 1585, when Tilehurst Manor passed back to the Crown.  He spent his final years blind and was buried in Valladolid around 1605.



Albert Illsley BEM

[Biographical details to be researched.]



Gauwin More (????-1469)

Gauwin More was one of the marshals of the court of King Henry VIII.  He died on 28 September 1469; his death - and that of his short-lived widow, Isabella - is commemorated in the brass plaque situated in the Lady Chapel.



E.W.P. (Pat) Moriarty OBE (1900-1993)

Edward William Patrick Moriarty O.B.E. [Biographical details to be researched.]



Sir Peter Vanlore (c.1547-1627)

The large and elaborate tomb in the Lady Chapel is that of Sir Peter Vanlore and his wife Jacoba Thibault.  He was a Dutch merchant and banker, born in Utrecht in the Netherlands in 1547 and naturalised in 1607.  He bought the manor of Tilehurst from Thomas Crompton in 1604 and also owned Wallingford Castle.  He lived in a mansion which he built in Calcot, probably on the site of Calcot House in the present golf course.  He had nine children, some of whom died in infancy.  Only two of the children were alive at the time of his death.  Their daughter, Jacoba, and her husband, Henry Zinzan, were also buried at St Michael's Church in 1677 and 1676 respectively.

Further biographical details are available in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, from which the following information is taken.

His name was originally Pieter van Loor, the third son of Maurice van Loor and his wife Stephania.  He was a merchant and a moneylender.  He is thought to have moved to England around 1568.  He lived at some time in the parish of St Benet Sherehog and by mid 1585 had married Jacoba (or Jacomina), the daughter of Henry Thibault (or Teighbott).  Although he stayed and flourished in England, developing close friends among the establishment, he still retained ties with his native land, as reflected in his will of 1627.  One overseer of his will was Sir Paul Bayning; the Lord Keeper Sir Thomas Coventry was mentioned, and legacies included the Dutch church and Christ's Hospital as well as St Michael's.  His children's marriages were similarly split between England and the Netherlands:

  • His son Peter (baptised in 1586) married Susanna Becke of Antwerp
  • Elizabeth married Hans van den Bernden
  • Jacquemine (baptised 1587, died 1606) married Johannes De Laet, a recent immigrant to England
  • Anne married Sir Charles Caesar, a third generation immigrant who was master of chancery
  • Mary married Sir Edward Powell who became master of requests
  • Catherine married Sir Thomas Glemham.
Although Vanlore left £1,000 to each of his grandchildren, his estate had many loans outstanding - almost a year later his widow and her son-in-law Powell were still trying to recover £13,000 lent to the crown.  The son Peter received a baronetcy on the first anniversary of his father's death, but the accumulated family estates were dissipated after his death, being divided between his three daughters in 1645.



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