MRP: Maximilian Dallison
Maximilian Dallison
b.?, d.1671
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Maximilian Dallison was the eldest and only son of William Dallison, son of Sir Maximilian Dallison, and of Elizabeth Dallison (née Oxenden). He was christened at Deane, Kent, the childhood home of his mother, where he was probably born.
His father died at a young age, in 1641, leaving Maximilian in his minority. He was raised by his mother at the Bishop's Place, or Palace, in Halling, Kent, the home of his father and several generations of Dallison. On his marriage to Frances Stanley, the only daughter and heiress of Thomas Stanley, brewer, he and his young wife moved to the Hamptons, in West Peckham, Kent, which his mother and he had leased from his father-in-law. It is unclear whether his mother continued to live at the Bishops Place or whether she too moved to the Hamptons. Whatever the case, Elizabeth Dallison, his mother, administered the Halling, Snodland and other estates on his behalf for a period of seven years in the 1640s
He was admitted to Gray's Inn on May 8th 1650, on the same day as Francis Raworth junior, a nephew of his mother's legal advisor Robert Raworth.[1] It is unlikely that he ever practised law.
His mother later described him in a letter to her brother Sir George Oxenden as unsuitable for commercial life, and best suited to the country. He was of doubtful character, and was much critised for his behaviour by members of the Oxenden family and the Master family after the death of his mother in 1665/66. Comments by these family members suggest that Maximilian was of of a rash and ill-considered temperament, and that he showed great disrespect and lack of love and affection to his mother.
His mother, according to his own account, refused to allow him access to her sick bed when she made her final will and testament. The reason, as it emerged in subsequent Chancery litigation, was that he had allegedly taken a crucial indenture from his mother's possession whilst she lay ill, which was the only documentary proof of a major financial obligation he had towards his uncle Sir George Oxenden. It is hard to place any other construction on this act, which was attested to by Sir George Oxenden's cousin Richard Oxinden under oath, except that he intended to deny and default on this obligation.
The parish church of West Peckham contains a monument to Maximilian Dallison, who died June 22, 1671, aged thirty-eight.[2]
Sources
Greenwood, C., An epitome of county history, wherein the most remarkable objects, persons, and events are briefly treated of, the seats, residences, etc. of the nobility, clergy and gentry, their architecture, interior decorations, surrounding scenery, etc. described, from personal observations, and the names, titles and other distinctions, civil, military or ecclesiastical, inserted, with notices of the principal churches, and the monuments and memorials of distinguished families (London, 1838), p. 141
- ↑ J. Foster, (ed.), The register of admissions to Grays Inn, 1521-1889 (London, 1889), fol. 1051, p. 253, http://www.archive.org/stream/cu31924029785452#page/n247/mode/2up, viewed 07/10/11
- ↑ C. Greenwood, An epitome of county history (London, 1838), p. 141
