15th century

It took four years and several appearances in Court for Thomas Tramallier (III) to force Pierre Carey to hand over papers concerning Thomas' grandfather, Thomas Tramallier Senior's (I) estate. Carey's wife was Thomas (I)'s cousin, the daughter of his uncle, the late William Tramallier, and an heir to her father's estate. William had been appointed Thomas Tramallier (II)'s guardian, and Carey had come into possession of the relevant papers on William's death. Carey was fined several times for non-appearance in Court; the Court had delayed sittings at his request, and grew noticeably exasperated. Eventually, on the 12 February 1719, Carey produced a set of books and documents before them. Thomas (II) had appointed his son to act for him.  These documents are listed and bound in a ledger entitled Copie de l'Inventaire de partie des Ecrits de la Succession du Sr Thomas Tramalier. 1715. [Note: the surname is written several ways in various documents: Tramallier, Tramailler, Tramaillier, even Tramalier.]

In a MSS book in the Library (Staff). 'Sir Stafford Carey's MSS. Taken by the Smiths and, after being kept in an barn, handed over by them to Wilfred Carey. March 1921.'

List of the contents of the bound volume entitled only MSS 1309-1464. The transcriptions are by various hands, and mostly appear to be late 17th century. The individual documents are in Latin or French and most have been published elsewhere.

Letter to Monsieur de Pontaumont, archivist of the Société académique de Cherbourg.'My dear friend, I am taking the liberty of sending you a copy of a document which you might think appropriate to present to our colleagues at the Society. I feel it provides interesting evidence of the relationship between the people of Alderney and those of Basse-Normandie at the end of the 15th and the beginning of the 16th centuries. It is a document of safe-conduct from the French admiral, Louis Malet, Seigneur de Graville, dated 20 April 1513.  We were then at war with England, but, as had long been the case with the people of Alderney, even though they were  subjects of the English Crown, they were very keen not to be treated as enemies by French soldiers and sailors.'[The portrait above is of Louis Malet de Graville.]

A list of the partages transcribed in the notebook Partages No. 1, Staff.

From Edith Carey Notebook, Visits to Guernsey. 

From Guille family file in the Library. St Peter Port and St Martin 15th and 16th centuries. Typescript transcription.

MS source material from the family files in the Library, Bonamy no. 40. MS English version of original.

A newspaper report of a trip by the Société Guernesiaise to the Les Quartiers Estate in the 1920s. The photograph is from MacCulloch's Guernsey Folk Lore.

Trade with Southampton, 1428 and 1430, from Studer, Paul, The Port Books of Southampton, 1913. 27 merchants and ship-owners from the Channel Islands are mentioned in these books, and there are others whose names indicate a strong connection. Copies of these and similar volumes are available at the Library, as well as a comprehensive file of extracts. Please contact the Library for further information.