Family and Education

1st s. of Simon Kelway, merchant, of Cullompton by his w. Joan. m. (1) bef. 1580, 1s.; (2) 1598, Edith, wid. of John Anthony; (3) Mary. suc. fa. 1569.

Offices Held

Biography

The Devon Kelways were related to the Courtenays, Drakes, Grenvilles and Wadhams. Other branches of the family lived in Dorset and Gloucestershire. Kelway himself was probably grandson of John Kelloway, merchant of the staple at Calais. From his will it appears that he was a physician or surgeon. He inherited the rectory and parsonage of Cullompton from his father, and with it a quarrel with Sir John More, who had at one time owned the property. In 1586 Kelway sold the rectory for £1,000, remaining, however, patron of the living certainly until 1601. By the time of his return to Parliament, Kelway was living at Dawlish, and it is not easy to account for his being chosen at Totnes. Possibly he owed it to his ‘honourable good friend, Sir William Courtenay I’, to whom, in the will he made in February 1623, he left his armour, a case of pistols and his ‘Spanish pike’. He asked to be buried at Dawlish, and left £10 to the church at Cullompton. He made provision for a former servant, John Thomas, a surgeon, who was then serving William Every, the purchaser of the rectory in 1586. Kelway left John Thomas half his ‘instruments, waters, compositions and drugs’, bequeathing the remainder, together with his books on physic and surgery, to his son Francis. The will was proved in June 1623.

Devon N. and Q. x. 321; Bristol and Glos. Arch. Soc. Trans. xxi. 315, 317-18; Exeter dioc. reg. act bk. 1555-64, f. 42; Cal. Proc. Chanc. Q. Eliz. ii. 246; PRO Lists and Indexes, vii. 231; Oliver, Eccles. Antiq. i. 115; Roberts thesis; PCC 22 Sheffelde, 63 Swann.

Ref Volumes: 1558-1603

Author: P. W. Hasler

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