Anne Stanley

notes

from https://elizabethashworth.com/2013/05/15/melling-and-melling/

Melling in Lonsdale

This Melling is mentioned in the Doomsday Book as one of three manors belonging to Ulf, along with Hornby and Wennington. It was the seat of Ulf’s lordship, but when the lands were taken into the possession of William the Conqueror he granted them to the Montbegon family who built a castle at Hornby, making Melling part of the honour of Hornby.
The lands later passed by marriage into the Lungvillier family and then into the Nevill family when Margaret Lungvillier married Geoffrey Neville, the second son of Geoffrey Nevill of Raby. The Nevills held the land for several generations and when Margaret Nevill married Sir William Harrington the lands passed to them after the death of her niece and were held by the Harringtons until William’s son, Thomas, and his grandson, John, were both killed at Wakefield in 1460, fighting for the Duke of York during what has come to be known as the Wars of the Roses. Because Thomas died shortly before his son John the lands passed to John Harrington’s two young daughters – Anne aged five and Elizabeth aged four. It was Anne, the elder daughter, who inherited the honour of Hornby and along with it, Melling in Lonsdale.
The wardship of the girls was given by the king, Edward IV, to Lord Thomas Stanley who arranged the marriage of Anne to his son Edward who later became Lord Monteagle. I suppose it was assumed that Anne’s children would eventually inherit, but she died without any legitimate heirs and, despite petitions from members of the Harrington family, the lands went to Thomas Stanley, the son of Edward Stanley by his second wife, Elizabeth Vaughn.
It is thought that Thomas Stanley, 2nd Lord Monteagle may be buried in the church. There is no record of burials before 1619, but he left instructions in his will that he should be buried in the chancel. I don’t know if Anne Harrington was buried here. It is possible.