• General Notes

  Edward D'Oy'ly, only surviving son, entered the East India Company's Merchants' service; and was sometime Purser of an East Indiaman. This gentleman, however, in the spring of 1767, was paying his addresses to one Anna Maria Black, the daughter and at last heiress of Jonathan Black, of Westminster, gent. a rich brewer in the metropolis, (by Elizabeth his wife, daughter, and at last sole heiress,
  of George Burnell, Esq. of Lofthouse, near Wakefield, in Yorkshire,) and, unknown to her parents, succeeded in inducing her to elope with him, and was married to her at Gretna Green. They returned, hoping for the usual forgiveness ; but, instead of this, her rich, purse-proud parents tore her from him, and forced her home, permitting no intercourse ; he soon after sailed for India, and determined, it would seem, to take no further trouble about the matter. But her parents had soon cause to repent their rashness: their daughter had proved pregnant; and Mr. D'Oyly was now beyond recall for a legal marriage to be solemnized before the birth of his child. Every attempt, however, was made to apprise him of the state of affairs; and though he, poor young man, made every haste to return, he only arrived in England Sept. 1768. But his child was born in the preceding March or April.
  
  Nevertheless, he was, immediately after his return, legally married to Miss Black; viz. on the 5th Oct. 1768, by licence granted the preceding day at the Vicar General's Office, Doctors' Commons : for privacy sake, the marriage was solemnized at St. Mary's Magdalen, Bermondsey, Surrey; and the whole was preserved a profound secret. His child so born, and christened after himself, was Edward D'Oyly, Esq. mentioned in the text. Edward D'Oyly, sen. made his will 4th Feb. 1769, leaving all the little property he had, to his wife, sailed for India not long after, and died at Beucoolen, in Sumatra. Anna Maria, his wife, survived him many years, and lived for some time in Marylebone, but latterly, and principally, in Palace-yard, Westminster. She made her will, 11 Oct. 1783, leaving all her property to her only son the said Edward D'Oyly, and appointing him sole executor. She died at her residence in Palace-yard, Westminster, 10th July 1788, of a cancer; and her son being not quite of age, he proved her will in no court, but being principally a devise of lands, it was registered 31 Oct. 1783, at the Wakefield Registry for instruments affecting real property in the West Riding, Book C. Y. page 354, No. 449. By her Edward D'Oyly, sen., whose death occurred about 1770, but was not heard of in England before Feb. 1772, had only the said I. Edward D'Oyly : the singular circumstances of whose nativity were such as to have always been kept a family secret ; and he appears on the court roll of the manor of Wakefield as "heir at law." Still it is presumed that his legitimacy, though unquestionable in Scotland, is doubtful in England. However, on the return to England of his cousin, Sir J. H. D'Oyly, after the long separation of the two branches of the family (both of them, Edward and Sir John, having been brought up by maternal relations), they made out their relationship, and it has ever since then been perpetuated, and a friendly acquaintance kept up, in India and elsewhere.
  
  [WDB Typographer]

Details of Edward's family with Anna Maria Black