Hi Colin
I promised you ages ago I would contact you with info on the Rock Swinhoes (and other Swinhoes) given me by my uncle, after I'd finished moving house. Well, I've finally been able to unearth those notes and go through them. They're mostly a hotchpotch of the history of Rock and its owners, and mentions of Swinhoes of places like Chatton, Mousen, Goswick and Cornhill.
As others have mentioned in this post, Rock descended via Margery Swinhoe, after the death of Ralph Swinhoe of Scremerston and Rock in 1525, to the Lawsons, but apparently there were also Swinhoe descendants of younger sons at Rock, one Robert being mentioned in 1538. However, Rock originally came into the hands of the Swinhoes at the death of Robert de Tuggal sometime in the late 1300s, probably by marriage, so they owned the land for a good long time before descending into obscurity!
The Goswick Swinhoes were a younger branch of the Swinhoes of Rock. William of Goswick was an 'English light horseman' stationed at Coldingham, and his nephew was Gilbert of Goswick and Cornhill, who married Dorothy Guevara, daughter of Sir Henry Guevara (who was in turn, a grandson of John Guevara of Segura in Spain). Dorothy was accused of being a witch in 1647 (by the looks of it because of family in-fighting). The Swinhoes seem to have been connected to most of the big families of the area by marriage, actually: Lady Margery Hamilton, wife of Sir Robert Hamilton, was a daughter of the above-mentioned William, and her sister Mary (Dorothy's accuser) was married first to George Muschamp(e), then Edward Moore.
Searching the National Archives online throws up a lot of Swinhoe and related names for the area you're interested in: for instance, a conveyance and covenant dated 29 August 1635 which mentions the Hamiltons, George and Mary Muschampe, Katherine Swinhoe and William Hamilton, so you might want to do a bit of browsing there! Anyway, if you'd like more detail, let me know, and I'll pm or email you with anything you think might be relevant.
