Swyndelves
A 'lost' estate in the manor of Bosden in Cheshire, just south-east of Stockport, which Charles Bardsley suggested as a possible origin of the Swindells surname in his dictionary of surnames in 1901.
There is a manorial map of Stockport barony at http://www.cheadlehulme.net/village/chmoremaps.htm#Barony
In his book 'East Cheshire : Past and Present, Or, A History of the Hundred of Macclesfield' published in two parts in 1877 and 1880, John Parsons Earwaker records, in relation to Bosden,
"A branch of the family of Honford held a small estate here in the 14th century called Swyndelves, which they parted with to the Leghs of Adlington in 1378-795. A family who bore the local name of Bosden or Boseden held land in Hurdsfield near Macclesfield in the 14th and 15th centuries, but the name is now rarely met with. A large part of the straggling village of Hazlegrove, formally called Bullock Smithy, is in Bosden".
(Text transcribed by Leon Knapper on the Cheshire list of Rootsweb in 2001. Bardsley states 'Howford' rather than 'Honford' but that is irrelevant to the discussion).
Due to the urbanisation of Manchester 'Bosden' is hard to define in terms of current place names but it was one of three hamlets - Norbury, Torkington and Bosden - which later became known as Bullock Smithy and now as Hazel Grove. The township of Bosden was to the south-east of Stockport and comprised an area to the north-east of the modern A6 running through Hazel Grove, lying on either side of the Poise Brook. The area is relatively flat and low-lying (80m) at the eastern edge of the Cheshire plain.
A view of the Poise Brook at Bosden - Swyndelves?
200 years later a George Dodge is reported as dying at Swyndills
in 1580
and in 1624, a Robert Dodge of Swyndells, gent.,
was a member of the jury at the Inquisition post
mortem in Stockport following the death of Henry Arderne,
of Harden. 6 Robert Dodge of Swindells died in
1628. (The Dodge family are associated
with Offerton, especially Holiday or Halliday Hill Farm which
lies just to the east of the Poise Brook).
In 1675 an inventory was taken on the 'Eighteenth day of January
Ano dom 1675 by us Robert Dodge of
Swindells de
Bossen...' 7 Thus the place name - transformed
from Swyndelves to Swindells - was still in use at that time.
A
Swindells Orchard is recorded just south of Bosden House in the
Victorian tithe maps (c1850) of Cheshire (map reference SJ
933880) but this is more likely to be named after a Swindell
rather than marking the location of the Swindells noted above.
(Click on thumbnail - plot 8). There are 17 locations involving
the name Swindell in the Cheshire tithe maps.
There is a high occurrence of the Swyndle(s) / Swindell(s) (etc) surname in the 16th and 17th centuries just a few miles to the south east of Bosden (in Disley, Titherington and Rainow) so Bardsley's suggestion of Swyndelves as a possible origin of the name is extremely plausible. This contrasts with the absence of Swindle surnames around any place now called Swindale. However there is still no positive connection between Swyndelves and the Swyndle surname - it would require a discovery in manorial documents of the 14th century to confirm the connection. (Since Cheshire, as a County Palatine, was exempted from taxation, lay subsidy rolls and poll tax lists are not available as a source of information. Tax was raised by means of a land value based levy called the Mize).
The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary gives:-
Delf/Delph:- An excavation; a pit, ditch, quarry etc.; a drainage canal
(in the fens) [OE dælf, (ge)delf]
The prefix 'swyn' might come from 'swing'. 4
Considering the nature of the land at Bosden, Swyndelves might
refer to the twisting ditch rather than anything to do with swine.
The circles on the map below are approximately 5km, 10 km and 15km radius from the presumed location of Swyndelves.
Notes
1 "As I am sure you are aware the Honforth Manor of Hanforth cum Bosden in Cheshire went to the Breretons when John Honforth, Lord of Honforth, was killed in battle with only a daughter as heir. She was married to a Stanley and the marriage resulted in divorce, he becoming a monk, and she ultimately marrying Uriah Breteton and the manor and titles passed to Breretons. For generations we have thought we were lineal descendants of Honforth (various spellings Handford, Hanford, Handforth, Hansford) but DNA testing does not support that. I believe you as a Brereton are a descendant of Honforth at there were many Brereton,Mainwaring, Leigh, Daventort, Stanley marriages with descent to Honforth. I am hoping to find a connection through one of these Irish lines to Brereton or Leigh. I am very interested to know the pedigree of these early Breretons in hopes that perhaps Ms. Geo. Barrington might have been related or perhaps the Harpoles, Gilberts, might have been related.
Glad to share any information with you.
Sincerely,
Bill Hansford, Birmingham, Alabama, USA
http://www.brereton.org/emails.htm
"
The titles 'Lord of Honforth' passed (many male generations) to William Hondford, Lord of Hondford, who was slain at Flodden 9-9-1513.With him the name Honforth became extinct and the titles passed to Sir Urian Brereton, who was on the privy cancel of Henry VII, who had intermarried with Lady Margaret Hondford, sole heir of William. It was Margaret who built Hondforth Hall. The titles then passed through the Breretons.
http://genforum.genealogy.com/hanford/messages/197.html
The Brereton Family of Cheshire
The Brereton family tree begins in 1175 with William de Brereton. His family had arrived from France with William the Conqueror, and that William was named after him as a tribute - it was to become a recurring name within the family. Later, another unfortunate William Brereton, along with four companions, was arrested and sent to the Tower of London charged with high treason as lovers of Anne Boleyn . Despite protestations of innocence, they were sentenced to death and beheaded on Tower Hill in 1536. The Brereton family exerted power and influence over Cheshire with holdings in Handforth, Malpas, Cheadle and at their country seat at Brereton Hall. It was a Sir William Brereton who also headed parliamentarian forces at the Battle of Middlewich and the siege of Nantwich in the English Civil Wars. The Brereton's established Handforth Hall when they became lords of the manor of the Bosden area in the early 1500s. One Sir Richard Brereton was the last owner of Tatton Park before the Egerton family took it over.
http://www.manchester2002-uk.com/history/old-families2a.html
2 Manorial map of Stockport barony http://www.cheadlehulme.net/village/chmoremaps.htm#Barony
3
Returns for Swindell etc in the IGI or other sources
Cheadle baptisms
1677 - 1713 Nil
Marple marriages
1656 - 1734 14
Disley Baptisms
1592 - 1731 197
Hyde (Gee Cross Unitarian) Baptisms 1710 - 1844 82
Macclesfield Baptisms
1572 - 1812 244
Stockport Baptisms
1586 - 1642 30
Poynton Marriages
1723 - 1753 2
Taxal Baptisms
1624 - 1800 81
1800 - 1904 38
Pott Shrigley Marriages
1685 - 1751 3
Prestbury Baptisms
1560 - 1636 79
Wilmslow Baptisms 1559 - 1652
1693 - 1803 10
Gawsworth Baptisms
(1557) 1741 - 1837 33
Marriages
1557 - 1837 23
Chelford Baptisms
1748 - 1794 Nil
4 In 'The Antiquary ' 1880 it is suggested "When a horse has difficulty drawing its load up a hill, it "swins" it - that is to say it goes obliquely from side to side of the road until it gets to the top. Before being quite certain about the derivation of a place name, I find it very important to get at the ancient local idioms and nomenclature of the district. May not Swindale in Westmoreland be derived from the ...."
5 MSS. of the Rev. John Watson, deeds penes Dodge of Offerton in 1779. See also Cheshire MSS., vol. iv.
6 East Cheshire : Past and Present, Or, A History of the Hundred of Macclesfield' published in two parts in 1877 and 1880, John Parsons Earwaker p.469
7 Ottiwell Higginbothum Inventory 1675 Transcribed by Dorothy Bates (cached)
Discussion of the origins of the Swindale surname.