Family #16.
John Wright was born 1569, and died 30 May 1640. He married Martha Castell. She was born 1569, and died 1611.

Children of John and Martha Wright are:

   i. James Wright. 
  ii. Joane Wright. 
 iii. Martha Wright. 
  iv. John Wright,             b. 1599; Wrightsbridge, Essex, England
                               d. 1644;
                               (See Family #22) 
   v. Nathaniel Wright,        b. 1604; 
  vi. Deacon Samuel Wright Sr, b. 29 Jun 1606; England
                               d. 17 Oct 1665; Northhampton, Massachusetts.
                               (See Family #23) 
 vii. Robert Wright,           b.        1609;
                               (See Family #24) 

In a message dated 9/24/2002 7:08:09 PM Central Daylight Time, you wrote

My brother just returned from visiting the Kelvedon Hatch part of Essex and actually spent the night in the very nice inn which is the house from which Thomas Wright of Wethersfield emigrated. It isn't Kelvedon Hall: that went to the eldest son and was later rebuilt. Second son Robert Wright, who married Mary Green and was Thomas's gt grandfather, got the Moat House (alias Ropers or Brook Hall or Brook Street), recently renamed Mary Green Manor. When my brother discovered that there were guestrooms in the original Tudor part of the house, his sentimentality overcame his parsimony, for the first time in his life. He says that the Wright crest is all over the place - even the bathrobes. The inn has a website at www.marygreenmanor.co.uk . It's just outside the London city limits, in Brentwood, about two miles off the M25, London's beltway.

George Lloyd's 1997 book about the building - covering history, politics, construction, architecture, ownership, etc. - is still in print, though now softbound, and available from Marygreen. The title is "The Place at Brook Street." Some mailing list postings from 1997 and 1998 talk about it. The only glitch that I've found in it is the statement that the aviator Wright Brothers descend from Tom of Wethersfield. Isn't Samuel of Springfield their ancestor? Other than that, it's fascinating reading.

Anne Wright Brown (Mrs. G. S. ), Trustee
New York Marble Cemetery, Inc.
www.marblecemetery.org

Dear Ann,

Thank you so much for the message below that brought a very pleasant flashback for my wife and I. You didn't mention the very nice restaurant that is also in the west wing of the Mary Green Manor Inn. I am sure your brother dined there if he stayed at the Inn. My wife and I stayed there several days a few years ago while researching the location of the old Wrightsbridge/Dagnum Park estates of Lord John Wright, the Kelvedon Hall estate and the parish records for St. Nicholas Church in Kelvedon Hatch and St. Peters in South Weald. During our stay at the Mary Green Manor we met the Lord of the Manor, Paul Pearson, as he strode about the Inn in full riding gear and red tails. A wonderful sight to behold from right out of the days of England's glory years! He played the part to the hilt and was busy building this aspect of his management of the Inn into a tradition. I hope he is still doing it and your brother had a chance to chat with him.

George Lloyd's book was intended as an architectural history of the building and he included genealogical information on the owners of the manor as a bonus to that effort. As such, he was not primarily focused on genealogy, and his research into the genealogy of the Robert Wright family ownership was, understandably, not 100% accurate. The somewhat antidotal reference to the Wright Brothers descendant from Thomas Wright in the text is an example you gave that is clear to all that have spent any time on the Deacon Samuel Wright family, but there were other mistakes as well.

For instance, on page 187 (hardbound volume) of the book is Appendix K, the Wright family genealogy chart for the Robert Wright family. In that chart, Mr. Lloyd, has listed as a child to John and Grace (Glasscock) Wright a son, Anthony, born 1609. From our research in the South Weald church records, we believe this son was not the son of John and Grace Wright of the "Brook" but the son of his cousin, John and Martha (Castell) Wright of Romford. Both men used the South Weald church as their home parish and were contemporary with each other in that use. Not only that, but Lord John Wright of Wrightsbridge and another cousin, John Wright of Bishop's Hall also used the South Weald Church during some of these same years. So, parish register entries in the St. Peter's church register have to be read with special care as to which John Wright was being referred to as the father in a baptismal record. This is true for almost all the early St. Peter's registers because there were no less than four John Wrights using the church at the same time for nearly the entire time between the mid 1500s through the mid 1600's. As a result, the scribes usually, but not always, made some attempt to differentiate between them by adding a place name to the entry or other identifying title. Hence, because the Moat House was on the road called Brook Street running west from Brentwood (AKA early on as Burntwood) it was sometimes referred to as Brook Hall and the Wrights of that manor home were termed in the parish register as "... of the Brook", while Lord John Wright of Wrightsbridge, was usually referred to as John Wright "...of the Bridge", and John Wright of Romford was referred to as simply "Mr." John Wright or John Wright, "Esq.", and the various John Wright's of Bishop's Hall descent were referred to variously as John Wright of "White Notely" or of "Bishops", or "...of Burntwood", depending on where they were living at the time of the register entry.

The real father of Anthony Wright (b. 1609), John Wright of Romford (b. 1569), was a barrister and the eldest son of Lord John Wright of Wrightsbridge (b. 1546). Lord John Wright (Peerage granted 20 June 1590) was the son of Myddle John Wright (b. 1524), who, in turn, was Robert Wright's (b. 1522) younger brother.

John Wright of Romford was a prominent London lawyer and became the Clerk of the House of Commons in the second decade of the 1600s. Although he was married to Martha Castell in Cambridgshire, after entering the practice of law, he removed to one of his father's homes in Romford and used the nearby South Weald church to have his children baptized. South Weald was his family's historical parish home, just as it was the parish home of the Robert Wright family of Brook Street (The Mary Green Manor home). Incidentally, the Estate of Greater and Lesser Ropers you mentioned is separate from the Moat House estate grounds and the site of the Mary Green Manor Inn. It lies a little further east up Brook Street toward Brentwood from the Moat House and was considered a separate estate at the time of Robert Wright's inheritance.

At this time in our continuing research efforts on the parentage of Deacon Samuel Wright, we still believe the strongest candidate for his parents are John and Martha (Castell) Wright, and that the Anthony mentioned in Mr. Lloyd's book was actually the Deacon's younger brother, as well as being the last child born to John Wright and Martha Castell before her death the following year.

CHILDREN of John WRIGHT VII and Martha CASTELL:

   1. JOHN            b:        1599; Wrightsbridge Essex, England.
                     md:            ; , , .
                                      Mary MOLE
                      d:        1644; , , England.
    2. NATHANIEL       b:        1604; 
 + 3. Deacon SAMUEL chr: 29 Jun 1606; Wrightsbridge, Essex, England
                     md:        1632; Springfield, Hampden, Massachusetts.
                                      Margaret STRATTON
                      d: 17 Oct 1665; Northampton, Hampshire, Massachusetts.
   4. ROBERT       chr: 16 Jun 1609; St Peters South Weald, Essex, England.
                     md:            ; , , .
                                      Anne   _______
   5. ANTHONY         b:       1610; St Peters South Weald, Essex, England.

CHILDREN of John WRIGHT VII and Fortune GARAWAY:

   6. JAMES           b:    Abt 1612; , Essex, England.
   7. MARTHA          b:    Abt 1614; , Essex, England.
                     md:            ; , , .
                                      _____   DALBRIDGE
   8. JOANE           b:    Abt 1616; , , . 
                     md:            ; , , .
                                      John GREENE

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