The Baughs of Ludlow and of Lincolns Inn

 Edward Baugh junior, son of Edward Baugh of Onibury, was only eight years old when the family moved to Clungunford and first his mother, then his youngest sister and brother, died within a few days of each other. He didn’t appear in the Clungunford parish registers at all, but he did appear in those of St Michael, Bristol, where he worked as a linen draper. He died on 15^th June 1675, six days before his 40^th birthday. George Morris in Shropshire Genealogy tells us that Edward Baugh, son of Edward and Bridgett Baugh, married the former Mary Stone, now widow of George Houghton  (died 1694), on August 29^th 1695. A document held in the Central Record Office at Shrewsbury, dated August 29^th 1695, states of Edward Baugh of Stoke St Milborough (where his cousin was Rector) that there is no lawful impediment to him marrying Mary Haughton of the Parish of St Mary, Shrewsbury, a widow. Though the Edward in question couldn’t have been the one Morris claimed for obvious reasons, he could have been his son, grandson of Edward and Bridgett Baugh. The wedding was Edward’s only entry in the St Mary, Shrewsbury, parish register.

As Edward Baugh Esq of Ludlow, another Edward, this one the son of Richard Baugh of Clungunford, married Elizabeth, daughter of Richard Knight of Wolverley. Co Worcester. A girl twenty five years his junior. They had eleven children, only five of whom survived through infancy and childhood. Richard, their first son died when he was only fourteen, Robert died when he was only one. Edward, Lancelott, Elizabeth and Mary each lived for only a few days. A plaque in the High Chancel of St Andrews, Ludlow says ‘Here lyeth the body of Edward Baugh gent. obit 26^th July 1742 aged 72. Also the body of Elizabeth Baugh, relict of Edward Baugh gent. Died 25^th June 1778, aged 84.’

Benjamin Baugh, eldest surviving son of Edward and Elizabeth, married Ann, daughter of Francis, the second son of Anthoney Biddulph of Ledbury on 11^th March 1749 in Ludlow. Their first child, a son, Benjamin, died in February 1751, when only eleven months old, their second child, Edward, was baptised on 7^th November 1751. As Edward Baugh of Ludlow, Esq., died 14^th May 1836, he was buried at St Andrews, Ludlow. Francis, born in 1754, and named for Ann’s father, was thirty one when he died in 1785. A second Benjamin was baptised on 25^th February 1756, and Richard on 4^th September 1762. Benjamin senior died on 13^th April 1765, aged 42. His widow, Ann, survived him by thirty six years, dying on 13^th September 1801, aged 75. Like Benjamin’s parents, they are commemorated in Ludlow Church.

The second of Edward and Elizabeth’s sons to survive into adulthood was Thomas, who had been baptised on 27^th March 1727. In general, the Baugh men seemed to choose either the church or the army when seeking a career, and Thomas chose the latter. He rose to the rank of Major in the 55^th Regiment of Foot and fought in the American War of Independence. In his later years he lived at Broad Street in Ludlow. He died on April 20^th 1793, aged 66. He, too, has a plaque to commemorate him in Ludlow Church and his death was reported in the Gentleman’s Magazine of April 1793.

Edward, the third son of Edward and Elizabeth, was their second attempt at a child of that name. He became Rector of Neen Sollars, Milson and Ribblesford in Worcestershire. He and his wife, Margaret, had two sons, both of whom entered the church. Richard was at Oxford, Edward followed in his father’s footsteps at Neen Sollars and Milson. He and his wife, Sarah, had two sons they named Richard and Edward, both of whom became church ministers.

Richard, the fourth son of Edward and Elizabeth, was born the year after their first son of that name died. Like his brother, Thomas, he chose the army as a career, was a Captain in the 39^th Regiment in 1765, and a Major when he died on 2^nd October 1787, aged 54. His possessions passed to his nephew Edward (son of Benjamin presumably), the Reverend Edward, Thomas Esq. and Elizabeth, spinster, the natural and lawful brothers and sister, and only next of kin of the deceased, having renounced their rights.

Elizabeth, the second of that name, and the only one of Edward and Elizabeth’s daughters to survive into adulthood, died on 30^th November 1799, aged 75 years.

Elizabeth’s uncle, Lancelot, the first of that name in the Baugh family, seems to have been the only one of the family to choose law as a career. He moved to Lincolns Inn, where he married Ann Buggin, with whom he had four sons. Richard, Lancelot, Edward and Benjamin.

    Lancelot Baugh, son of Lancelot Baugh of Lincolns Inn, Middlesex, was apprenticed to Thomas Cox on the 4^th September 1716, according to the Bindings Books of the Merchant Taylor’s Company. One of the second Lancelot’s sons, yet another Lancelot, born 7^th May 1728, appears on the register of Merchant Taylor’s School 1738 – 1740-1. Merchant Taylor’s School, founded by the Merchant Taylor’s Company of London, an incorporated group of craftsmen tailors, was the most famous of all the guild schools. It was in Suffolk Street and was a day school.

Lancelot the second, and his wife Alice, had two other sons. Richard was baptised at St Andrews, Holborn on 29^th December 1730, John was mentioned in Lancelot senior’s will so must have been born before 1731. He was dead before 24^th October

1771, when his widow, Merien (Boddington), of St James, Westminster, left a £20 annuity and a diamond ring to her son, John Boddington Baugh, and a £20 annuity and other rings to her daughter, Ann. Colonel Lancelot Baugh Esq. of St Marylebone and John Boddington Esq. were her executors.

      Theodosia Baugh, spinster, of Hertford Street, Marylebone, who died on 30^th May 1774, left £300 to her sister, Ann Howarth, and £300 to her sister, Mary Maddison. The residue of her estate went to her brother, Colonel Lancelot Baugh, her executor.

      Mary Baugh had moved to Portsmouth, where she married George Maddison on 11^th October 1757. It was one of their descendants, Reverend A R Maddison, who contributed the Baugh Notes to the 1896-7 edition of Miscellanea Genealogica et Heraldica from which much of this information has been gleaned.

      Lancelot Baugh junior was a Lieutenant in the 1^st Regiment of Foot Guards by 26^th August 1747, Captain and Lieutenant Colonel by 1^st May 1758 and Colonel in 1771. He was a Major General in 1777 and Lieutenant General in 1779. He was Colonel of the 6^th Foot (1^st Warwickshire Regiment) from 1787 until April 1792 when he died and was buried in the new ground at St James, Westminster. His will mentions a number of Maddison nephews and nieces, his nephew John Baugh, and his niece Ann Motz (ne Baugh) wife of a French army officer. John was a Lieutenant in the 58^th Regiment of Foot in 1778 and a Captain at the time of Lancelot’s will.

Lancelot of Lincolns Inn’s third son, Edward, was always a little apart from the others. He and his wife, Blanche, had their first three children christened at St Martins, Ludgate, rather than in Holborn. Lancelot was christened on 15^th May1729, Ann on 16^th July 1730, and another Ann on 13^th November 1734. After that the family moved back to their South Shropshire roots and their next child, Benjamin, was christened at Stanton Lacey on 30^th November 1737. Another son, Richard, followed on 4^th June 1738 and William on 10^th July 1740. William only survived for eight days, but another William was christened on 10th June 1743. Edward Baugh was church warden at Stanton Lacey in 1740 and 1741. Son Richard became Rector of Ludlow and died on 20^th May 1837. Benjamin became Town Clerk of Ludlow, married Elizabeth, heiress of William Holland Esq. of Burwarton, and had a daughter, Harriet, who married Gustavus VI, Viscount Boyne. All are commemorated on plaques in Ludlow Church, along with Edward Holland, Harriet and Gustavus’ second son.

    Benjamin, Lancelot of Lincolns Inn’s youngest son, married Mary, with whom he had Benjamin junior in 1734, Mary junior in 1736 and Lancelot in 1737. After that things seemed to go a little awry. In an attempt to carry on family tradition by naming a child after each of Benjamin’s parents a daughter, Ann, was christened in 1740, followed by another Ann in 1742, another in 1743 and another in 1744, as infant mortality took its toll. Benjamin junior apparently hadn’t survived either because another Benjamin was christened in 1745, and another in 1746, followed by a final Ann on 28^th May 1749. Lancelot probably went on to be the Lancelot who was a Lieutenant in the 71^st Foot on half pay in 1766, and maybe the Lieutenant in the Guernsey Companies of Invalids from 1780 to 1794. There is no record of what became of any of the others.

My e-book about these, and other members of the Baugh Family, The Baugh Family of England, Scotland, East Indies and the USA, from their earliest origins until modern times, is an invaluable aid for anyone interested in researching the Baugh Family history.
Starting by outlining the various spellings of the name and where they originated, the book goes on to show how, since there were so few people who went by the name of Baugh and its variations in early times, most of these people were related both to each other, and to the branch of the family who first bore the coat of arms during the fifteenth century.
Several possible alternative origins of that branch of the family, in Normandy and in the Welsh Marches, are examined. Each one being weighed up against the evidence in official documents of the time, as well as information provided by the College of Arms, to see which, in the author’s opinion, have the most credence. 

I first became interested in the Baugh family when I was researching the history of the house where I live, and their name kept cropping up.

They weren't the only family who had lived in the house before me nor even, as it turned out, the ones who had first built it, but they did seem to pop up in my researches more than any other family, and they did seem to have been very important in south Shropshire, so I began to jot down anything I read about them, whether it was related to my house or not.

There had been another branch of the family bearing the same coat of arms living some miles away in Gloucestershire at the same time as those who had lived in my house had been living there, but without any obvious connection between them other than the shared coat of arms, and I began collecting facts about them as well, intent on finding out what the connection between the two families was.

It took me sixteen years of spare moments spent poring over documents in local record offices, reading wills, parish registers, lay subsidies and other official documents, and surfing the internet for other records kept further afield in Britain, as well as in countries such as Argentina, Canada and the USA, to settle in my mind what that connection was, by which time I had accrued so many facts about both branches of the family, about other people of the same name with no connection at all, and still others who hadn't seemed to have any connection with the Baughs who had lived in my house until my researches showed that they did, that I decided to share my knowledge with other people, by turning it into a book.

Not every branch of the family as it is today is represented, that would be impossible, but most of them get a mention, and where there are links to be shown between seemingly unconnected branches of the family they are shown. The Baugh Family of England, Scotland, East Indies and the USA, from their earliest origins until modern times, is available from Amazon Kindle for the give away price of $3.99, or £2.55.