Swindon in the Past Lane

You know you’ve got a bad case of this family history research malarkey when you spend hours trying to trace someone who died more than 280 years ago and who isn’t even a member of your family. I have recently set myself the task of researching all the women from the Goddard family called Priscilla (l know, it seemed a good idea at the time!) I began with Priscilla D’Oyley who brought the name into the family. Next, I traced her daughter Priscilla Sedgwick. All reasonably straightforward and very interesting. Then I came across a will written by Priscilla Vilett and proved in 1834. This will be nice and easy, I thought, coming across a whole bunch of names I recognised. ‘Priscilla daughter of Thos Vilett Esq & Mary [formerly Goddard] was baptised on March 18, 1754’ at Holy Rood Church, Swindon, according to the parish registers. Priscilla was one of quite a small family for the time and when her father made his will, he mentions just three children - a son Thomas...

In 1870 William Vilett Rolleston inherited an estate worth an estimated £20,000 (today approximately £2.3 million). By 1874 he was declared bankrupt and you have to ask the question – where did it all go wrong? The Vilett presence in Swindon is believed to date back to the sixteenth century when the family were among those who snapped up local properties during that great land dispersal event at the dissolution of the monasteries. But where did William's Vilett connection come from? The eldest son of George and Mary Augusta Rolleston, William Vilett Rolleston was born in Leamington Priors, Warwickshire in 1842. William's father George was the child of Samuel Rolleston and his first wife Elizabeth Herring. In 1827 the widowed Samuel married Harriet Vilett but there were no children from this second marriage. When  Harriet died in 1870 William Vilett Rolleston inherited the estate left to her by her brother Thomas Vilett. What became known thereafter as the Rolleston...