Disambiguation of Ralph Shirley

Question

The profile of Ralph Shirley-192 is currently conflated with Shirley-184, whom credible sources suggest to be his father, not a brother. I have removed his father's wife Waldeschef-2 as the spouse on Shirley-192's profile.

Stemmata Shirleiana https://archive.org/details/cu31924029787250/page/n45/mode/2up has a rather complete account of the two Ralphs, claiming that Shirley-192 was a son of Shirley-184 by a wife previous to Margaret Waldeschef, that he died without issue and thus the estate went to Thomas, son of S-184 and Margaret. Shirley cites Dugdale, whose Antiquities of Warwickshire https://archive.org/details/antiquitiesofwar00dugd/page/476/mode/2up/search/shirley claims Shirley-192 as the son and heir of Shirley 184, but also claims that Thomas Shirley was the son of S-192 not S-184.

If this Ralph Shirley served in the parliament of 14 E 3, as Dugdale claimed, this would be 14 years after the reported death of Shirley-184 in 1327. The given estimated birthdate of Shirley-192 is dubious.

Further research into this set of profiles could be profitable, and particularly learning what Richardson said in Magna Carta Ancestry as well as the source of the death of Shirley-184.

Comments

I added the Pre-1500 tag.  Thanks for posting, Lois.

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I plan to wait a bit for any responses here before making more unilateral changes to the Shirley line.

Answer 1

This was one of the easier Lewis entries, with just two entries from RA and/or MCA 2nd edition:

[S16] Douglas Richardson, Magna Carta Ancestry, 2nd Edition, Vol. IV, p. 24.

[S4] Douglas Richardson, Royal Ancestry, Vol. IV, p. 623-624.

Ref citations...

for MCA IV:24

• Douglas Richardson. Magna Carta Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families, 4 vols, ed. Kimball G. Everingham, 2nd edition (Salt Lake City: the author, 2011), volume IV, page 24 SHIRLEY 9.

Text in main entry relevant to Ralph: Isabel de Meynell, daughter of Alice de Audley and Hugh de Meynell, Knt., "married (1st) Thomas de Shirley, Knt., of Lower Ettington, Warwickshire, and Shirley and Hone, Derbyshire, son of Ralph Shirley, Knt., of Lower Ettington, Warwickshire, by Margaret, daughter and co-heiress of Walter de Waldershef." (Shirley Stemmata Shirleiana (1873:26-28, 31) is among the sources listed)

for RA IV:623-624... best guess is for Ralph Shirley who married Joan Bassett, but that's not the entry for them (and their line at the top of the SHEPPARD chapter did not include a reference to another chapter).

• Douglas Richardson. Royal Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families, 5 vols, ed. Kimball G. Everingham (Salt Lake City: the author, 2013), volume IV, pages 623-624 SHEPPARD. See also WikiTree's source page for Royal Ancestry.

not listed by Lewis:

• Douglas Richardson, Royal Ancestry, IV:626 SHIRLEY 12 (footnote 27 about Isabel de Meynell but discusses Shirelys - but apparently not this Ralph, at least not that I could identify).

Lewis says that Ralph Shirley, who died 1327, son of James Shirley and Agnes Walton, was "at of" Shirley, Derbyshire, England.... See the article by Michael Cayley about Lewis's use of "at of" in the September 2019 issue of the Magna Carta Project's newsletter: https://www.wikitree.com/g2g/899659/

Full citations:

• Richardson, Douglas. Magna Carta Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families, 4 vols, ed. Kimball G. Everingham. 2nd edition. Salt Lake City: the author, 2011. See also WikiTree's source page for Magna Carta Ancestry.
• Richardson, Douglas. Royal Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families, 5 vols, ed. Kimball G. Everingham. Salt Lake City: the author, 2013. See also WikiTree's source page for Royal Ancestry.
• Lewis, Marlyn. Entry for Sir Ralph Shirley, "Our Royal, Titled, Noble, and Commoner Ancestors" (free database online). Useful for leads; see cautions about use on the Magna Carta Project Reliable Sources page.

Comments

OK then.  In light of the non-mention of Ralph 192 in the other sources, I think I'm going to go with the Stemmata, which gives documentation of a Ralph Shirley on dates later than the well-attested death of Ralph Shirley-184 in 1327.

Many thanks to everyone who lent a hand.

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thanks for sorting them out!

Cheers, Liz

Answer 2

Thanks for posting to G2G Lois, and thanks Darlene for adding the pre-1500 tag! (I never thought to add "Richardson" as a followed tag for WikiTree-36!)

Anyway. The Richardson citations on the profile are second-hand, via Lewis's database. I'd be happy to do a source check for you to Richardson's Magna Carta Ancestry (2011) and Royal Ancestry (2013). Would you like me to post an answer here or post to the profile?

Comments

Here, I think, thank you.  Easier to ask followup questions here.

I'm not familiar with this Lewis database.  Do you have an opinion of the value of the Shirley genealogy Stemmata Shirleiana?  It claims to be based on the Great Shirley Pedigree

I appreciate your response!

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I remember working with the Stemmata Shirleiana, but I can't recall what my opinion of it was (I suffer from CRS syndrome LOL).

The Lewis database is sometimes called "ORTNACA":

• Lewis, Marlyn. "Our Royal, Titled, Noble, and Commoner Ancestors" (free database online). Useful for leads; see cautions about use on the Magna Carta Project Reliable Sources page.

It takes me a while to find the entries Lewis refers to, but I should be done within a couple of hours. In the meantime, I did find the Lewis entry for him:

https://our-royal-titled-noble-and-commoner-ancestors.com/p1032.htm#i30991

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Ah, THAT Lewis!  I can absolutely never remember that name.

Cokayne makes laudable remarks about the Shirley book, altho if Cokayne has a Shirley entry, I can't find it.  He seems to subsume Shirley under Ferrers.

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Found the Shirley I was working on where I encountered the Stemmata Shirleiana -

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Shirley-45

That profile might have some links to sources that could be useful to you.

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The Ettington entry is very useful.  I've seen that story before, but it's well-documented in the footnotes.