Part One: Thomas Blackmore senior
Thomas was apprenticed to Robert Ware in 1657 and his father was named as Mark Blackmore of Bowewood Devon:
https://www.londonroll.org/event/?co...ent_id=MCML466
Bowewood might be Boyd, near Sidmouth.
There is this entry, to the burial of a Marke Blackmore IN 1651/2 on FMP:
https://www.findmypast.co.uk/transcr...812%2F00017829
Source City of London Burials 1538-1812 Vol.1
Burial date 02 Feb 1652
Occupation Gentleman, clerk to sir p. ball, one of the masters of the bench of the middle temple
Address Harpford, Devon
Relationship Son of marke blackmore of harpford in the county of devon, gentleman
Burial place In the Temple Church, in the Round Walk on the Middle Temple Side, under the Black Marble Stone under the Corner of the Monuments
Mark was baptised in Ottery St Mary in 1628, presumably as the eldest son.
A Matthew, also son of Mark was baptised in Harpford in 1640, but the register there only starts in the late 1630s, so the baptisms of Abraham, Joseph (Grace’s father) and Thomas (as well as any daughters) do not survive.
Thomas obtained his freedom by servitude in 1658/9. Since this is only two years later, one suspects that money may have speeded the process. He was obviously on excellent terms with Robert Ware as he married Elizabeth Meredith, the daughter of one of Robert’s friends. They procured a licence, where he stated that he was 30 and she was 21, and married at St Mary Aldermanbury on 30th September 1662.
The couple may have had daughters, but Elizabeth predeceased him and he mentions only sons and his six grandchildren in his will. (Though there is a legacy to his daughter's maid Mary)
The object of a sensible father is to provide careers for his children, so they consolidate their wealth.
Thomas, bp 1666, became a mercer like his father, and is helpfully called Thomas junior in most records
Humphrey, bp 1670 is mentioned as in Aleppo in his father’s will. He had been granted a licence to trade there in 1704
http://www.levantineheritage.com/pdf...4-D-Wilson.pdf and he presumably died there.
Abraham went to Trinity College, Cambridge University in 1692/3 aged 15. He had previously attended Sherborne School, and went on to join the Inner Temple in 1694, where he is described as the third son of Thomas.
https://archives.innertemple.org.uk/...c-f8f7c70d2cd2
He pays tax in Westminster, having inherited a property there from his father.
According to Musgrave’s Obituary, he killed himself, in Fleet prion in 1732.
https://archive.org/details/obituary...up?q=blakemore There may be further information in The Gentleman’s Magazine, but unfortunately I cannot find online copies prior to 1736.
After the death of his first wife, Thomas remarried, to Mrs Margaret Webster. She also predeceased him. Thomas’ six grandchildren: Raymond, John, Charles, Henry, Elizabeth and Ann were all the children of his son Thomas. His will original consisted of nine sheets of paper, and included a bequest to the poor of Harpford, and another towards the building of the new hospital at Greenwich.
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/imageview...ce5&pId=754149
If you search Discovery, there are masses of court cases involving Thomas. It's a project for several spare hours, since in at least two cases he is joined with a brother in a dispute.
TBC