There seems to be little doubt that we are descendants of Sir Thomas Domvile, Baronet (1650-1721), but where the link comes is open to much speculation. Our ancestor Dr James Domville (1778-1846) probably knew how, and maybe some of his children did too, but no written record survives, and owing to the destruction of official records in Ireland earlier this century none is ever likely to be found. These were the findings of Miss Stella Domville and Mrs Mary Ross-Ross, who in 1938 went to Ireland to investigate the position, in the course of which they were received by the Deputy Ulster Herald in Dublin who was of the same opinion.
As pointers to this assumption of descent Dr James Domville called one of his sons Jones, presumably after Thomas Jones (1550?-1619) Archbishop of Dublin (see 'tree'), and other descendants have been named Compton and Lake; in addition it was mooted at one time in the family that Edward James Domville (1848-1925) should prosecute a claim to the lapsed baronetcy, but was inhibited by the expense.
Sir Thomas Domvile married three times, and by his first wife, Elizabeth (the daughter of his cousin Sir Launcelot Lake), he had a daughter, Bridget (died twenty-first August 1750), who married on the ninth of February 1702 Henry Barry, the third Lord Santry, and they had a son, Henry, born on the third of September 1710, who eventually became the fourth and last Lord Santry. He married twice and died on the thirteenth of March 1751 in Nottingham without issue. It appears that he lived a dissolute and riotous life, and on the twenty-seventh of April 1739 he was convicted by the House of Lords of murder by stabbing a porter, named Laughlin Murphy, in a public-house at Palmerstown. He was sentenced to be beheaded and this conviction involved automatic attainder of his estates and title. He was pardoned on the seventeenth of June 1739, and although his title remained attainted from the date of his conviction, his estates were restored to him in 1741. By his will this Henry Barry left all his property, including Santry House and lands to his mother's half-brother, Sir Compton Domvile, second Baronet (1696-1768), the son of Sir Thomas and his third wife Anne, daughter of the Hon Sir Charles Compton, second son of the second Earl of Northampton.
Henry Domville (or Hendry as he was known), the father of Dr James Domville, was born in Ireland in 1725, and he married in Lisburn Cathedral on the thirtieth of November 1753 Margaret Bell, the daughter of a Linen Merchant, a direct result of which was his banishment from Santry House, which Sir Compton Domvile had inherited two years earlier. It is said that Hendry was given £100 and his choice of horse from the stables, and told he was never to return. The reason for this is given variously that Margaret Bell was a papist, which was untrue, or that Sir Compton did not approve of the marriage because the bride's family were 'in trade', but for our purpose the main point is that he must have been a very close relation (allegedly a nephew) to have been brought up by Sir Compton and lived in his house.
Hendry went into the business of Linen Merchant in Ballymena and in June 1772, at the request of Henry Bell, a very close relative of his wife, went to Edinburgh as the Scottish agent of the business. James Bell, Henry's son, joined in the partnership in 1774, but later left to become a doctor. Hendry died in Edinburgh in 1789.
In the preparation of the Domville tree I make no claim to any original research, but have relied on information obtained from Burke's Peerage and notes left by the late Miss Stella Domville; also on important information given me by Mrs Mary Ross-Ross and Thora Davies to both of whom I am most grateful. I must also tender my best thanks to Mr Martin Dunville, of Deerborn Heights Michigan for his incalculable help. He says he has twenty-four volumes of data on the Domville family, however spelt, from which he was able to supply me with family information, adding, as well as many dates, some fifty names of descendants (and/or their spouses) of Dr James Domville.
I have included as a child of Dr James Domville a daughter, Katherine, which, so far as I know, only appears on a pedigree done by Mrs Mary Ross-Ross. Her name is not in the Bible of Dr James Domville with his other children yet despite this I feel loth to leave her out. If she existed she must have died very young, I should imagine.
The Bible of Dr James Domville (published in 1634) is now in the possession of my brother, Nicholas Francis Domville Coleridge, who acquired it from Miss Stella Domville. In the front it is recorded that David Edward Domville bought the Bible at the sale of his father's effects for eight shillings, since when it has been used solely to record his own family's events.
It might also be worth pointing out that General James W. Domville, according to Mrs Thora Davies, married Mrs Gow, a widow with a young son (James), who took the name of Domville. He is therefore no blood relation although included in the family tree.
The John Bradford of Poughill (1603-74), the son of John Bradford of nearby Stockleigh English, who died in 1654, is by strong family tradition said to be the great nephew of John Bradford (1510?-1555) who was Chaplain to Bishop Ridley, Prebendary of St Pauls 1551, as well as Chaplain and tutor to Edward VI, and was burned at Smithfield as a Protestant martyr in 1555.
The Bradford family tree I compiled from a pedigree prepared by Mrs Sarah Mary Coleridge and some notes of a cousin of hers. Mrs Monica Duncan I thank for gathering together for me the particulars of her own family and other Cooper descendants. The Coleridge family details were collected by me a few years ago and are now brought up to date. Sarah Mary, the daughter of William Bradford and Elizabeth Margaret Domville, married Ernest Hartley Coleridge, the grandson of Samuel Taylor Coleridge.
Alwyne H.B. Coleridge
Shalford, Whitford,
Axminster, Devon
June 1976
This essay says 'James Bell, Henry's son, joined in the partnership in 1774', whereas James Bell Domville was born on the first of September 1778 in Edinburgh.
James Bell Domville MD (1778-1846): First Marriage
James Bell Domville MD (1778-1846): Second Marriage
Edmund Dumville (c1701-1762), grandfather of Dr James Bell Domville (1778-1846)