Family and Education

b. 1530, s. of Nicholas Dering^† of Stanstead, Suss. and Liss by his 1st w. Elizabeth, da. and coh. of Sir Henry Owen by his and w. Dorothy, sis. and coh. of Thomas West, 9th Lord La Warre. m. by Nov. 1552, Winifred, da. of Sir George Cotton of Combermere, Cheshire, sis. of Mary, Countess of Derby, afterwards of Kent, 2s. 4da. suc. fa. 1557.1

Offices Held

J.p. Hants from 1562.

Biography

Dering’s grandfather, younger son of an old gentry family of Pluckley, Kent, settled in Sussex. In 1546 Dering’s father bought the manor of Liss Harley in Hampshire, which Dering inherited and which enabled him to secure a seat for Petersfield in the 1563 Parliament. The rest of his father’s lands in Hampshire and Sussex were left to Dering’s stepmother for life to support her and her numerous children. Through his mother, Dering inherited a share of the estates of the 9th Lord La Warre. Dering and his aunts Mary Warnet and Ann Gage received half the manors of Stratford Toney, Wiltshire; Oakhanger, Hampshire, and Blatchington, Sussex; the other half went to the descendants of La Warre’s niece Jane, Duchess of Northumberland. They sold Oakhanger in 1558. Other lands may also have come to Dering through his mother, from the Owen side of the family. On 3 Feb. 1563 Dering was given ten days leave of absence from Parliament because of the death of his uncle. He was classified as a favourer of the established religion in 1564. His name is on the list of j.p.s dated 1583-6, but not on that for 1584-7, so a death date of about 1583 may be assumed. His son Henry lived at Liss until he sold the manor to a nephew, Thomas Cole, in 1612.2

Ref Volumes: 1558-1603

Author: Patricia Hyde

Notes

• 1. C142/104/75, 108/101; Vis. Hants (Harl. Soc. lxiv), 105; Vis. Suss. (Harl. Soc. liii), 38; C24, bdle. 153, ex inf. Mr. P. H. Blake; CP, vii. 172.
• 2. VCH Hants, iii. 11-12, 27, 85, 88; iv. 85; C142/108/101; PCC 5 Wrastley; CPR, 1555-7, p. 160; CP, iv. 156-8; CJ, i. 64; Cam. Misc. ix(3), p. 55.