In 1788 the abeyance of the ancient barony le Despencer was terminated in favour of the sixth Baronet, who became the twelfth Baron le Despencer. On his death, the baronetcy was inherited by the sixth baronet's youngest son Francis Joseph, who became the seventh Baronet. The 1679 baronetcy became extinct on the death of Sir Henry Alfred Stapleton, 10th Baronet, in 1995.
Hon. and Rev. Sir Francis Jervis (or Joseph) Stapleton, 7th Baronet (1807–1874), Rector Mereworth and Vicar of Tudeley Kent, (fourth son of the 6th bart.).[8][12][13]
Sir Francis George Stapleton, 8th Baronet (1831–1899)[8][14]
Sir Miles Talbot Stapleton, 9th Baronet (1893–1977)[15]
Sir Henry Alfred Stapleton, 10th Baronet (1913–1995), who died leaving no heir[16]
Plantation owners
The 1st and 3rd baronets owned and managed Caribbean plantations and enslaved people; the 4th, 5th and 6th baronets were absentees.
With deaths among the male heirs, control of the plantations in the earlier 18th century was largely in the hands of Lady Anne, widow of the 1st baronet, and Lady Frances Stapleton, widow of the 3rd baronet.[17] Lady Frances outlived her two sons, the 4th baronet and James Russell Stapleton.[7] She began to purchase property in England.[17] On her death in 1746, her house in Cheltenham went to her granddaughter Catherine Stapleton (1734–1815), daughter of James Russell Stapleton.[7]
A lengthy legal battle ensued after 1746, not settled for 15 years, over the will left by Lady Frances. It was settled in 1760–1 with a division of the estate between surviving parties and spouses.[17] Catherine Stapleton, who did not marry, then became an absentee but active manager of plantations and enslaved people. She moved to Burton Pynsent, where she was the companion of Hester Pitt.[18] The final division gave the 5th baronet 25%, Sir James Wright, 1st Baronet 12.5%, with 62.5% divided equally four ways between Catherine, Ellis Yonge (1717–1785) the husband of Catherine's sister Penelope (1732–1788), Elizabeth Stapleton and Frances Stapleton.[17]
The will of Catherine Stapleton left most of her plantations to nephews, principally to two brothers, the Rev. William Cotton (died 1853), son of Sir Robert Salusbury Cotton, 5th Baronet who had married Frances Stapleton, and Baron Combermere. They went in time to Combermere.[17][18] He received compensation as joint owner of the Stapleton estates on Nevis and St Kitts.[19] The other joint owner was Barbara Yonge (1760−1837), daughter of Ellis and Penelope Yonge.[20]
The will of the 6th baronet left on his death in 1829 the plantations to Francis John Stapleton, subject to an annuity payable to his daughter Frances, while his British estates went to the 7th baronet.[21] The 7th baronet, as his father's executor, made an unsuccessful claim in the 1830s for compensation for the enslaved people on the Montpellier estate in Nevis.[22]
Extended family
James Paul, the son of William Paul the bishop of Oxford (1663–5), a Fishmonger and Linen Draper, of St. Michael Cornhill,[23] London and Bray in Berkshire, bought Greys Court in 1688. By his second wife Martha, fourth daughter of Sir Thomas Duppa, usher of the black rod from 1683 to 1694, he had a son William, whose daughter Catherine married Sir William Stapleton, 4th Bt., to whom it passed in 1711 on her father's death. It then remained with the Stapletons until 1937.