The Stanleys, of Great Eccleston, were descended from Henry, the fourth earl of Derby, who was born in 1531, through Thomas Stanley, one of his illegitimate children by Jane Halsall, of Knowsley, the others being Dorothy and Ursula. Thomas Stanley settled at Great Eccleston Hall, probably acquired by purchase, and married Mary, the relict of Richard Barton, of Barton, near Preston, and the daughter of Robert Hesketh, of Rufford. The offspring of that union were—Richard Stanley; Fernando Stanley, of Broughton, who died unmarried in 1664; and Jane Stanley, who was married to Henry Butler, of Rawcliffe Hall. Richard Stanley, the eldest son, succeeded to Great Eccleston Hall and estate on the death of his father, and espoused Mary, the daughter and sole heiress of Lambert Tyldesley, of Garret, by whom he had one son, Thomas Stanley, who in course of time inherited the Eccleston property, and married Frances, the daughter of Major-General Sir Thomas Tyldesley, of Tyldesley and Myerscough Lodge, the famous royalist officer slain at the battle of Wigan-lane in 1651. Richard Stanley, the only child of this marriage, resided at Great Eccleston Hall, and espoused Anne, the daughter and eventually co-heiress of Thomas Culcheth, of Culcheth, by whom he had two sons—Thomas and Henry Stanley. Richard Stanley, who died in 1714, was buried at St. Michael’s church, and the following extract is taken from the diary of Thomas Tyldesley, of Fox Hall, the grandson of Sir Thomas Tyldesley, and consequently Richard Stanley’s cousin, who at that time appears to have been in failing health, and whose death occurred on the 26th of January in the ensuing year:— “October 16, 1714.—Wentt in ye morning to the ffuneral off Dick Stanley. Partᵈ with Mr. Brandon att Dick Jackson’s dor; but fell at Staven’s Poole; and soe wentt home.” It may here be mentioned that for two years the cousins had not been on very friendly terms, owing to Richard Stanley having at a meeting of creditors, summoned by Thomas Tyldesley in 1712, when he had fallen too deeply into debt, objected to an allowance being made to Winefride and Agatha, daughters of Thomas Tyldesley by a second marriage. We may form some idea of the strong feeling existing between them from an entry made on the 7th of May, 1712, by Thomas Tyldesley in his diary:—“Stanley—Dicke—very bitter against my two poor girlles, and declared he would bee hanged beffor they had one penny allowed; yet my honest and never-to-be-forgotten true friend Winckley, with much art and sence, soe perswaded the otheʳ refferys that the slaving puppy was compelled to consent to a small allowance to be sedulled—viz.: £100 each.” After the decease of Richard Stanley, Great Eccleston Hall, for some reason we are unable to explain, passed into the possession of Thomas Westby, of Upper Rawcliffe. TYLDESLEY OF FOX HALL.