The Postcard
A postally unused postcard that was published by Chapman & Son of Dawlish. The image is a glossy real photograph.
Someone has used a pencil in order to write the following on the divided back of the card:
"Sir John Whiddon,
Judge of the King's
Bench,
ob. 27th. January
1575."
Sir John Whiddon
Sir John Whiddon of Whiddon in the parish of Chagford in Devon, was a Justice of the Queen's Bench from the 4th. October 1553 to his death on the 27th. January 1576 (not 1575).
-- Sir John Whiddon's Career
Whiddon entered the Inner Temple to study law and became Reader and later Double Reader and Treasurer of that Inn of Court. He was created a Serjeant-at-Law in 1547, and King's Serjeant in 1551. In 1553, Queen Mary I appointed him a Justice of the Queen's Bench.
He is said by Dugdale in his Origines Juridiciales (1666) to have been the first judge who rode to Westminster Hall on a horse or gelding, before which time the judges rode on mules.
The manner of judges riding to Westminster Hall is recorded in the case of his father's contemporary Thomas Wolsey (1473–1530) as:
"Trapped all in crimson velvet, with
a saddle of the same and gilt stirrups".
-- Sir John Whiddon's Personal Life
John was the son of John Whiddon of Chagford by his wife who was a member of the Rugg family of Chagford. His ancestors had already been resident in the parish of Chagford for at least six generations.
Whiddon married twice. His first wife was Ann Hollis, daughter of Sir William Hollis, by whom he had a daughter, Joane, who married John Ashley of London.
John's second marriage was to Elizabeth Shilston, a daughter and co-heiress of William Shilston.
Among their eleven children were William, his eldest son and heir apparent, who predeceased his father without children, having married Eleanor Basset, a daughter of John Basset (1518–1541), and Francis (died 1606), fourth son, whose granddaughter was the legendary Mary Whiddon.
In the church is a memorial to Mary Whiddon, who was shot dead by a jealous suitor as she left the church after getting married in 1641. A tradition has evolved whereby new brides lay flowers on Mary's grave.
Author RD Blackmore is thought to have used Whiddon's tragic tale as inspiration for his novel Lorna Doone. Mary Whiddon's ghost is said to linger in Whiddon Park Guest House, and by tradition, any bride getting married from the Three Crowns will encounter the ghost.
Sir John's other sons included Edward (1537–1598), second and eldest surviving son and heir, who was admitted to the Inner Temple in 1559; Oliver, third son, who became Archdeacon of Totnes; and Nicholas (died 1598), who became Rector of North Bovey.
Sir John Whiddon's monument survives in St. Michael the Archangel's Church, Chagford.
-- Sir John Whiddon's Land Holdings
During the reign of Queen Elizabeth I (1558–1603), he purchased the manor of Chagford in Devon. He built there on his ancestral estate within that manor a new mansion house at Whiddon, part of which survives today.
He enclosed a deer park with the surviving wall built of massive granite blocks at the entrance to the Teign Gorge.
Chagford
Chagford is a market town on the north-east edge of Dartmoor, in Devon, close to the River Teign.
The name is derived from chag, meaning gorse or broom, and the ford suffix indicates its importance as a crossing place. At the 2011 Census, Chagford had a population of 1,449.
Chagford grew due to the wool trade and from tin mining in the area. In 1305 it was made a chartered stannary town where tin was traded. Among the most prominent tin-mining families in the 16th. century were the Endecotts, Knapmans, Whiddons and Lethbridges.
A weekly market was held here from before 1220, and a monthly livestock market in the town survived until the 1980's.
In an English Civil War skirmish Sidney Godolphin, the poet and Royalist MP for Helston, was shot and killed in the porch of the Three Crowns.
In 1987, the New Scientist reported that Chagford contained "the most radioactive loo in the world", a reference to the high levels of Radon gas in this granite area.
