| AdminHistory | The Tomes family was settled in Long Marston from at least the 14th century, but only a small part of the collection relates immediately to the family or to Long Marston. Most of the items of known provenance concern neighbouring families connected by marriage with the Tomes. Thus the first wife of the John Tomes of Long Marston who died in 1601 was a Gonne of Saintbury (Glos.) (see 65-73); the John Tomes who was born in 1736 married a Bennett of Cleeve Prior (Worc.) (see 459-523). Their son, John, married Ann, the daughter of Robert Fisher of Kinwarton and the sister of Robert Fisher of Weston-on-Avon and later of Stratford on Avon, both of whose accounts and other financial papers are in the collection (680-2, 707-8, 717-23). Temperance, the sister of this last John, married Thomas Kemble Holland of Mickleton (Glos.) and no doubt brought his deeds into the family (94-116). The eldest son of John Tomes and Ann Fisher married a daughter of William Baylies of Welford, the source of some at least of the Welford deeds. Their second son, Thomas Bennett Tomes, married Mary Ann Round, a great grand-daughter of Francis Taylor of South Littleton (Worc.), from whom the family inherited some of the most interesting parts of the collection. These include Taylor's accounts (674-6), a few letters to him and his brother, Ralph, a non-juror, (686-95), and deeds which were evidently in his custody as steward to Lord Coventry, Baron Coventry of Aylesborough (524-39, 588-92). Taylor's wife, Elizabeth Rawlins of Salford Priors, was the niece of Thomas Rawlins, a Warwickshire J.P. who was steward of the manor of Stratford on Avon. 612, the latest known records of Stratford court leet (see V.C.H. Warwicks. III, 254-5), date from his period of office there, and 768 may well have belonged to him as a justice. The Bennetts mentioned above were related to the Charletts of Cleeve Prior (see 513). Arthur Charlett, the famous Master of University College, Oxford, is only represented by a copy of part of a letter addressed to him (690) and some counterparts of leases from the College during his period of office (297-300), but there are more papers concerning his grandfather, John Charlett, a Worcestershire clergyman (547, 570, 674, 775). Various other names occurring in deeds in the collection, such as Keck, Bushell and Tully, are also to be found in the 'Pedigree of the Tomes Family of Marston Sicca, co. Gloucester', published in Miscellanea Genealogica et Heraldica, October, 1879.
There remain however a considerable number of deeds and a few other items whose presence in the collection cannot be explained. No connection was noticed for instance, in the course of compiling this list, between the Tomes and the manor of Admington (8-45), nor do the Maunders and Dales of Ullenhall (371-85) appear to have been related to the family. Sir John Tomes of Caterham Valley, Surrey (born 1815), his brother Robert Fisher Tomes of Weston-on-Avon, and his son, Charles Sissmore Tomes, an eminent dentist, all had antiquarian interests, especially in genealogy, and they may well have collected as well as inherited and preserved papers of local interest. Sir John owned, and presumably compiled, the scrapbook of original papers and transcripts illustrating the history of his family (766). Robert Fisher Tomes and Charles Sissmore Tomes both published articles based largely on items in the collection (R.F.Tomes, 'Contributions towards a history of the parish of Cleeve Prior, Worcestershire', ? 1903; C.S.Tomes, 'Middle-class life 200 years ago in Nineteenth Century and After', September 1910, and 'Life in Worcestershire at the end of the 17th Century', 1911, originally contributed as articles to the Evesham Journal).
A few pedigrees compiled by Robert Fisher Tomes are included in 766 but more of his unpublished work is now separated from the collection. The Birmingham Reference Library purchased 5 volumes of pedigrees and 2 volumes of extracts from parish registers compiled by him from James Wilson, a Birmingham bookseller, in 1929 (B.R.L.362319, 362324). The Library also possesses a volume of original papers collected by Robert Fisher Tomes (362326). Other items are missing from the collection. The Taylor MSS. do not include two of those mentioned by C.S.Tomes in his article, 'Life in Worcestershire', namely a letter-book of Ralph Taylor and a history of Evesham Abbey in the hand of Francis Taylor. A court roll of Littleton of 1525-1539 which was in the possession of Fisher Tomes of Welford in 1845 (V.C.H. Worcs. II, 410) is not in either deposit (but appears now to be Worcestershire RO 705:962/BA 8965/3 (i) 1. Phillipps MS No. 26376). On the other hand, C.S.Tomes could not say when Ralph Taylor was ordained, but his deacon's orders are now in the collection (696). |