The Grindlay family (Old English: [compound] Grēne/Grynde + Leāh/Leā) is an Anglo-Scottish knightly family of medieval origin.
Among the oldest landed families in Great Britain, it now has two primary branches, one in the English Midlands and the other in the former Scottish Marches, with a small presence in Ireland, North America, Australasia, and South Africa. The family established themselves as landed lords, knights, and gentry, but more recently were prominent British bankers (see Grindlays Bank), officials, industrialists, soldiers, and freemasons during the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries.
As an armigerous family whose position arose from feudal manorial lordships and knightly service, the Grindlay family rank among the British minor nobility or noblesse d'épée.
Etymology Grindlay is a toponymic surname arising from the combination of the Anglo-Saxon words grēne or grynde and leāh or leā, meaning "green clearing" or "valley clearing". Traditionally held to have arisen in Northumbria, modern scholarship suggests the name may instead derive from medieval woodland clearance in the former Forest of Arden in the English Midlands, before later spreading northward with the family.
History
Origins
The family are reputed to be descended from the Anglo-Saxon thegns, Hereweald (Harold) and Æðel (Æthel or Adel) of Grēneleāh or Gryndeleā (c.850), transliterated as Greenlee or Greenley, of northern Northumbria. The surname is of territorial origin and historically attributed to either the ancient village of Grinnla, now Greenlaw in the Scottish Borders, or the medieval hamlet of Greenley near Haltwhistle in Northumberland, both formerly of the Kingdom of Northumbria.
According to records gathered by James Watt Jr. of Aston Hall in Birmingham and attested by John Thorpe of Duddeston Manor, the brothers were awarded the demesne of "Balsal Chase" recorded as Bordeshale or Bordeslea, now Balsall Heath and Bordesley, in Warwickshire and its manors by King Alfred the Great for "heroic gallantry" during the Norfolk Campaign against the Danes. Control of these lands and the surrounding region in northern Warwickshire, the then Kingdom of Mercia, established the family in the Midland counties in addition to the North of England and the Scottish Lowlands. Their kin who remained in the north, are considered to have largely become part of the wider lowland clanship of Home and Wedderburn."Of an ancient family "thorough Anglo Saxon" named Greenlee, called in the Midland Counties of England "The Greenlees"...two knights of this family...were gifted by King Alfred to a demesne in the County of Warwick...where this branch lived in opulence and high respect" – Archives of Aston Hall, WarwickshireSome modern historians trace the surname to a small cluster of settlements in the English Midlands, namely Grindley in Staffordshire, Grindley Brook and Tushingham cum Grindley on the Shropshire and Cheshire border, and Little Gringley in Nottinghamshire. Professor Patrick Hanks, instead suggests the family took their name from their lands in central England, where by the mid 11th century, the Warwickshire line of the family held territories across the county, centred around Bordeshale Manor, over which they held lordship into the Late Middle Ages as the resident Lords of Bordeshale (see Bordesley Hall).
After the Norman Conquest, the family became vassals of Ansculf de Picquigny, and Robert de Beaumont, when they were granted numerous manors across the English Midlands by William the Conqueror. Although some of the lands awarded included areas held by the family prior to 1066, they continued as manorial lords of many of their ancestral estates, holding them in fief or knight's fee in return for homage and fealty to their Norman overlords as tenants-in-chief. This arrangement is evident in the Domesday Book, which shows the family continuing to hold lands after 1086, primarily throughout the Coleshill Hundred of Warwickshire, and the medieval Book of Fees, which records the family paying scutage for their "old feffment" held on behalf of Roger de Somery, the feudal baron of Dudley and descendant of de Picquigny.Powicke, review of The Book of Fees [...] Part II, p. 495.
13th, 14th, and 15th centuries By the High Medieval Period, the English branch of the family were established landowners of the English Midlands, primarily in Warwickshire and Staffordshire, and later in Nottinghamshire and southern Cheshire. The spelling of the family name developed several variants over time, principally Greneleye, Grenlay and Grendleye or Grendeley. This is exemplified by the different ways the surname was recorded throughout this period, including William de Grenelega (c.1180), Simone de Greneleye or Greneley (c.1250), William de Grenlay (c.1275), and Richard de Grendeley or Grindley (c.1390).
They were involved in regional affairs of politics and governance as early as the 13th century onwards, and as one of the prominent landed families of the region, they appear regularly in the medieval records of the English Chancery and Exchequer, namely the Pipe, Fine, Close, Plea, and Patent rolls and escheats, regarding awards of lands and estates, collection of levies, legal disputes, and grants of office and position. Such instances include Hugh de Greneley (c.1289) of Carlton in Lindrick Manor, officiator for the abbot of Welbeck Abbey, Geoffrey de Greneleye or Grenleye, and his son Sir William de Greneley or Grenleye (c.1328), a knight or man-at-arms, wardens of the peace, knights of the shire, and witnesses, warrantors, and seal signatories for the Chartulary of the Priory of St. Thomas near Stafford, Thomas de Grenlay (c.1349), incumbent Rector of St John the Baptist Church, Clarborough, John de Grenlay or Grenley (c.1405), Crown Coroner of Nottinghamshire, Thomas Grenley or Greneley (c.1424), twice Vice Chancellor of Oxford University in 1436 and 1437, and Thomas de Greneley (c.1440), simultaneously the Lord of the Manor of Northill Rectory, Master of the College of Northill, and Parson of the Church of St Mary the Virgin following the death of Sir John Tailly and his son. He and his successors held the lordship, and a knight's fee in Tempsford, until the college was eventually dissolved in 1547 following the dissolution of the monasteries by King Edward VI, and subsequently bequeathed to Sir William Fitzwilliam in 1549.
The Middle Ages saw several generations of the family take up arms against the French during the Hundred Years' War, primarily beside the noble Midland families of Beauchamp, Beaufort, and Talbot, and spanning at least 70 years of the conflict. The first recorded was Sir William de Grenlay, William Greneleye, or Guillaume Greenlee (c.1372) of Edgbaston, Warwickshire, who, with his soldiers, fought alongside John Neville, 3rd Baron Neville and Thomas Beauchamp, 12th Earl of Warwick, but was slain at the first siege of Harfleur in 1415, and posthumously commended by King Henry V. His kinsmen, John Grenlay, Grenley or Greneley (c.1417), was also at the siege under the command of Thomas Beaufort, Duke of Exeter, and subsequently garrisoned at Harfleur until it fell to the French in 1435, and Thomas de Grenlay or Greynley (c. 1430), a man-at-arms mustered at Port-de-l'Arche, fought against the incursions of Étienne de Vignolles into the Basse Seine Valley during 1430, and at the siege of Louviers in 1431.
In the latter stages of the war with France, the family fought as part of the company of John Talbot, 1st Earl of Shrewsbury, and his second, John Beaufort, 1st Duke of Somerset, most notably Stephen Gredeley, Gredley or Greddelay (c.1440) and his brother Thomas de Gredelay or Grynnelay (c.1441). Stephen fought with the Earl of Shrewsbury during his campaign to reclaim Pays de Caux throughout the late 1430s, continuing as part of his close military affinity during the relief of Harfleur in 1440, and the sieges of Pontoise, Conches-en-Ouche, and Louviers in 1441. Thomas saw fighting alongside his brother at Conches-en-Ouche and Louviers, was detached to the garrison of Rouen to oversee the escorting of supplies to Sir William Peyto and his forces during the siege of Dieppe in 1442, before joining the Duke of Somerset for the Cherbourg offensive in the summer of 1443. Another relative, Robin Grynelay (c.1442), saw fighting at Le Neubourg under Henry Bourchier, 1st Earl of Essex until it was lost to the French in April 1444.
During this same period, a cadet branch of the English arm of the family rose to prominence under Sir William Gyrdeley, Gridley, or Grindlay (c.1415), a wealthy lancer, who fought at the siege of Harfleur and the Battle of Agincourt as a member of the personal retinue of John Holland, 2nd Duke of Exeter, the then Earl of Huntingdon, alongside Thomas Talbot, a relation of the Talbot Barons, and others. Seemingly of Boarzell Manor in Ticehurst, Sussex, in 1425 William granted a portion of his lands in East Sussex, as well as their tenements, rents, and services to his comrades in arms, the Duke of Exeter, Sir Thomas Echyngham, and others, following their return from the wars in France. Although William and this branch of the family had amassed a sizeable estate in and around Ticehurst, having been in the area since at least the 13th century, his widow later sold the manor and most of the remaining lands to the knightly Roberts family of Glassenbury, Cranbrook, in 1459 and 1460. However, later generations evidently remained influential with John Greneley (c.1495) made a Commissioner of the King's Peace under King Henry VIII in February 1509, alongside other Sussex patricians including Thomas Fitzalan, 10th Earl of Arundel, Thomas West, 9th Baron De La Warr, and Thomas Fiennes, 8th Baron Dacre. The 1524 Sussex Subsidy Rolls list John, and his cousin Thomas, as prosperous taxpayers.
Throughout the late 13th, 14th, and 15th centuries, the family were engaged in a number of notable land ownership disputes with neighbouring families, including those of de Denston, Bagot, Barons of Bagot's Bromley, Ferrers, Earls of Derby, Legh, Cheshire and Warwickshire gentry and aristocracy and others, regarding their lands in Nottinghamshire and Staffordshire. The family also frequently acted as arbiters for issues of succession for several others, including the Lyot, Purley, and Wolaston (see William Wollaston) families of Staffordshire and Leicestershire.
16th and 17th centuries Around the early 16th century, part of the family moved south west into the neighbouring county of Herefordshire, where they established landholdings near Kington. In December 1513, John Greneley or Greneleye (c.1510) was made an acolyte to Richard Mayew, Bishop of Hereford by dimissory letter. Then in 1525, he and his heirs were granted the estate of Woodhallhill Manor in Staunton on Arrow, formerly spelt Stanton, and the country house remained the seat of his successors thereafter. This branch subsequently rose to eminence, both directly and through marriage, becoming senior military officers, members of parliament, Baronets (see Coffin-Greenly Baronets), and Sheriffs of Herefordshire, as well as lords of various other manors across the county.