Marrying Well

Walter [roughly 1140 to 1210] was a self made man. We can find no evidence that he inherited a substantial amount of land. But he was active in Yorkshire community life in ways that were associated with wealth. Apparently, he put together his own fortune, though it was almost certainly a modest fortune or we would find more information about it.

By the sixteenth century Walter's descendants had become one of the ten richest families in the East Riding of Yorkshire. And in the seventeenth century they were to become richer yet. [English, 1990]

What was the path from modest wealth to one of the richest families in the Riding?

Walter to William to Ingram and the Boynton Triangle

William was Walter's son and heir. He maintained the family fortune, but, as far as we can ascertain, did not increase it significantly.

Ingram was William's son and heir. He married Joan de Acklam, and when her father died in 1231 Joan was the sole heir to the family fortune. At that point the Boynton fortune approximately doubled -- with the merging of two family fortunes. Joan inherited manors at Acklam and Roxby. When combined with the Boynton holdings in Boynton you get the Boynton Triangle -- Acklam, Roxby, and Boynton -- which were to be the major Boynton holdings for another four centuries.

Henry de Boynton and Henry IV

Through the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries the Boynton-Triangle Boyntons remained prosperous and engaged. We know that Ingram was involved in the controversy that produced Magna Carta [A Boynton Story: Magna Carta -- Father and Sons]. His son and grandson were involved in judicial tasks. In the fourteenth centuries two Thomases, father and son, served the king and the palatinate of Durham.

In 1405 Henry de Boynton joined an insurrection against Henry IV. The insurrection was a failure. Henry de Boynton lost his head and the family land was attainted; Henry IV said I am going to take the land back.

The king was not prepared to leave Henry's family penniless, however. So he permitted Henry's mother and wife to retain the land at Roxby and Boynton until their deaths.

Twenty years and two kings later the land was returned to the Boynton family.

This is the best accounting we have of the Boynton holdings two hundred years later -- two hundred years after Ingram and Joan combined the Boynton and Acklam lands. There were always some other land holdings, but in 1425, as in 1231, the Boynton holdings were centered at Acklam, Roxby and Boynton.

Margaret del See and Henry de Boynton

This Henry was the great-grandson of the Henry who lost his head and attainted the family land. He married Margaret del See of Barmston.

Her family had accumulated quite a lot of land in and around Barmston. Barmston and Boynton are only a few miles apart making it an easy marriage to arrange.

Margaret's father died in 1494 leaving her as his heir, which joined the Boynton and del See holdings [Allison, p. 180]. However, Henry was already dead; he had died at a young age. His father did not die until 1523 and Margaret did not die until 1536. Notwithstanding Henry's early death, the Boynton family fortune doubled again by joining Boynton and del See land holdings.

The Dissolution

In 1530 the 10 largest land holders in the East Riding of Yorkshire were the Percys, the Cliffords and 8 religious institutions [English, p. 10]. Henry VIII could not fail to notice his own failing finances and the accumulated wealth of the church in Yorkshire and throughout England. And he made the church the solution to his financial problems. He took their land and sold it.

The major purchasers of this newly available land were local land holders -- the Boyntons, for example. The sales stretched over decades and involved circuitous routes, but it was local land holders who ended up with what had been church land [English, pp. 40-45].

In 1580 the Boynton family, now of Barmston, was one of the 10 largest land holders in the East Riding [English, p. 15]. The del See land at Barmston and acquisitions of formerly religious property catapulted them into major land holding status -- if anything that covers a century can be said to be catapulting.

Matthew Boynton and Frances Griffith into the Seventeenth Century

In 1580 the Boyntons and the Griffiths were both among the top ten families holding land in the East Riding. The Griffiths' land holdings were centered at Burton Agnes. Burton Agnes is between Barmston and Boynton -- putting the two families quite close to each other.

The fathers must have thought marriage of Matthew and Frances a match made in heaven. It was, of course, a match most likely arranged by the fathers. Frances and Matthew married, had fourteen children and she died at 36 -- surely from exhaustion. Matthew carved a memorial to their love that is still in the church at Roxby -- suggesting that fathers are not always wrong.

Frances' brother had inherited the Griffith family holdings, but he died in 1654 without heir. Frances was dead. Matthew was dead. So the land passed to Frances' son. And the Boynton holdings doubled once again.

Marrying Well

Wealth was land. Wealth was not money. When the wealthy made donations to the church, which they did frequently, it was donations of land. That is how 8 religious institutions could be among the 10 largest land holders in 1530; they were given the land. Land was held from the king or from a noble who held land from the king. The holding could be inherited, it could be traded, it could be leased, and it could be given as a gift when everyone involved concurred [A Boynton Story: Witnessing for God]. For most of the period, at least up to the sixteenth century, most land transactions did not involve buying and selling. And even Henry VIII, in the sixteenth century, gave land to his supporters for their service as well as selling the land he took from the church.

The real estate market was a pre-monetary market in a largely a pre-monetary society [A Boynton Story: Recalibrating Wealth].

The principal route for land was inheritance -- family. But inheritance was status quo movement of fortunes. Changing family fortunes often involved marriage alliances and the right of women to inherit the family fortune. Women could inherit land from their family -- though they had to get in line after the family males. But there were no family males when Joan inherited the Acklam land holdings and merged them with the Boynton land holdings. Margaret del See inherited from her father when he died without male heir. And Frances inherited after death -- the Griffith land going first to her brother, who died without heir, and then to her heirs.

The Boyntons prospered by marrying well.

....

Allison, K. J., ed. (1974) A History of the County of York East Riding, volume II, Oxford University Press.

English, Barbara (1990) The Great Landowners of East Yorkshire 1530-1910, Harvester Wheatsheaf, Herfordshire.