Catalogue description Colchester-Wemyss family

Deeds, estate and family papers of the Colchester-Wemyss family of Westbury-on-Severn and Mitcheldean

The papers, and some of the deeds were fully calendared and indexed in the Records Office soon after deposit. This Summary Catalogue of the complete collection (1962) has been compiled to make the collection more easily accessible and to conform with other G. R. O. catalogues, but students should consult the Calendar for more details. The earlier arrangement of the records has been disturbed as little as possible in order to preserve the value of the Calendar. Some illogicalities of arrangement have, therefore, been retained but attention has been drawn to these in the Summary Catalogue.

Colchester-Wemyss family of Westbury Court, Gloucestershire

Wemyss, Colchester-, family of Westbury Court, Gloucestershire

The archives

Almost all the collection here catalogued was deposited by Sir Francis Colchester-Wemyss, in June 1937. A few documents of outstanding interest retained by the owner were later deposited. An important survey, with maps, of 1785 unaccountably strayed from the archives, and was deposited about 1950 in the Gloucester City Library (shelf mark W 66). Transferred to Gloucestershire Record Office, February 1965. D2123 Interesting building accounts of Westbury Court, 1743-1744, were in the possession of Sir Francis Colchester-Wemyss and may still be with the family.

Pedigrees of the Roberts, Colchester and Colchester-Wemyss families are given in great detail by Sir John Maclean, "The history of the manors of Dean Magna and Abenhall and their lords", Transactions of the Bristol & Glos. Archaeological Society, VI, (1881-2), 123-209. Since the Westbury-on-Severn, Mitcheldean and Abinghall estates all had a similar descent this article is also valuable for tracing their ownership.

Nicholas Roberts of Stanton Harcourt, Oxon. (1572-1637) bought the debt-ridden estates of the Baynham family at Westbury and Mitcheldean in 1619, and the annuity from Apley Grange, Lincs. from Sir Philip Ferritt, bt., the next year. His three children all died unmarried within a short time of his own death in 1637, and the estates went to his younger brother Giles Roberts of Little Washbourne. The latter sold them to his nephew Richard Colchester (1600-43), one of the Six Clerks in Chancery, in 1641, and his descendants held the estates until recently.

The principal seat of the family was Westbury Court, built about 1600, and rebuilt in 1743-44 by Maynard Colchester (see Rudder); this house was later demolished by Elizabeth Colchester in 1805 (D36/E72) and the more modern Court was demolished in 1962. It was flanked by formal Dutch water gardens, illustrated by Kip, c. 1712, and occurring in the accounts as canals from 1705 1697 (A4) these survive in a neglected state (1962). A second country seat, throughout the 19th century the chief family residence, was at the Wilderness on the boundary between Abinghall and Mitcheldean. This is said by Maclean to have been built first by Maynard Colchester in 1710, but a capital messuage on the site of 15 closes called the Wilderness is mentioned in deeds 20 years earlier (D36/T55). This house was rebuilt by Elizabeth Colchester when she demolished Westbury Court.

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