Family and Education

b. by 1492, 2nd s. of Sir Edward Darrell of Littlecote, Wilts. by 1st w. Jane, da. of Sir Richard Croft of Croft Castle, Herefs. m. Margaret.1

Offices Held

Bailiff of lordship and keeper of park of Chilton Foliat, Wilts. by 1534-?d.2

Biography

Very little has come to light about Edmund Darrell. Under his father’s will of 25 July 1528 he was to receive 20 marks a year, and the reversion of all the bequests made to his nephew in the event of the boy’s death. His father, who died a few months after his own election as a knight of the shire in 1529, was doubtless responsible for Darrell’s return to the same Parliament for Marlborough: properties in that borough were among those chargeable for Darrell’s annuity, and the 16 feoffees who were entrusted with its payment included his fellow-Member Henry Bagot. Nothing is known of his part in the proceedings of the Commons and it is no more than a probability that he sat there again in June 1536, in accordance with the King’s request for the re-election of the previous Members.3

The only clear reference found to Edmund Darrell outside the House is as bailiff and keeper of Chilton Foliat, a royal park adjacent to Littlecote; he held these two offices in 1533-4 under Anne Boleyn and again under Jane Seymour, receiving annual wages of £1 as bailiff and £3 0s.10d. as keeper. He was presumably dead by 13 Nov. 1539, when these offices were granted to Sir Anthony Hungerford, and certainly so by the following July, for it was to Cromwell that Margaret Darrell addressed an undated letter petitioning for the farm of Lord’s Mead in Chilton Foliat, and for the conies within the lordship, as they had been enjoyed by her late husband. Neither will nor inquisition survives to throw light on Darrell’s progeny or property. His widow married Sir Thomas Lisle.4

Ref Volumes: 1509-1558

Author: T. F.T. Baker

Notes

• 1. Date of birth estimated from date of fa.’s 2nd marriage, Wilts. Arch. Mag. iv. 226, 228. LP Hen. VIII, xiv.
• 2. LP Hen. VIII, vi, xiv.
• 3. Wilts. Arch. Mag. iv. 226; PCC 30 Jankyn.
• 4. LP Hen. VIII, vi, vii, xiv.