Edmund Derham's will

[LizzieL]

Please can anyone decipher the first sentence - I think it's something about grandchildren

[JenB]

I think 
.....and for my three grandchildren each of them a calf a pees... (i.e. apiece)

[arthurk]

and too my thre granchildren ech of
them one colt a pees

(and to my three grandchildren each of them one colt apiece)

Re the t/f confusion - I initially thought these were f's, but the second word doesn't end in 'r', and it starts with the same letter as 'thre' and 'them'.

[JenB]

them one colt a pees

yes, of course!

[LizzieL]

thank you both

Colt? as in young male horse? Or did it mean something else in the 1720s?

If I have the right family Edmund had three grandchildren (children of his son John) when he wrote his wiil, so that makes sense, but they were quite young. Earlier in the will he mentions older two by name and gives them money for when they reach age of twenty one, so that fits with them being minors.

[arthurk]

Colt? as in young male horse? Or did it mean something else in the 1720s?

I can't see anything else in the OED or Joseph Wright's dialect dictionary that would fit the context. Was there an inventory with the will which would confirm what he actually owned - hopefully in more conventional spelling?

[LizzieL]

no inventory, just a one page will in bad handwriting. Only mentions his son John and two of the three grandchildren by name. His wife must have predeceased him as she is not mentioned. There was a daughter Elizabeth but she is not mentioned. Either she predeceased him as well or had married and he considered her husband could provide for her. No property mentioned, only small sums of money.

[arthurk]

Looking at where your Derhams were (from your signature text), keeping horses and having colts to pass on seems possible.

[LizzieL]

This group were from Morden, a village just north of Wareham in Dorset, Edmund's grandson John moved to Christchurch, then Hants now Dorset.

John received five pounds a year from age twenty one, which seems to amount to quite a lot.

I'm wondering if the three actually read third, it looks like gran..then an s which has been overwritten as if the writer was going to put son, then remembered her name was Mary so changed it to child.

The will is dated 12 June 1728 and Edmund was buried 22 June 1728. (1724 on the image title is an error)

Edmund didn't sign, he made his mark. The will looks very much like the writing of one of the witnesses, Samuel Travers.