Thomas Tailor had lived through all the stress of the Civil War, without either himself or his house having apparently been affected by it. In the course of it Lincoln had been twice besieged and taken; Cromwell’s forces had encamped on the neighbouring moor of North Scarle, and must have passed within sight of Doddington as they marched thence to defeat the Royalists at Gainsborough. The house and parish must have been well within reach of the Parliamentary forces at Lincoln, as well as of the King’s troops at Newark, who on one occasion extended their forays past it as far as Kettlethorpe, and on another burnt the very similar hall of the Jermyn family at Torksey, which was garrisoned by the Parliamentary troops. Yet he and his estates seem to have escaped unscathed. It was far otherwise with the family into whose possession Doddington now passed. Elizabeth, Lady Hussey, who now inherited it, was the only child of the first Thomas Tailor’s daughter, Jane, by her marriage with George Anton, Esq., Recorder of Lincoln, 1598-1612, and M.P. for that city in 1588 and 1592. She married Sir Edward Hussey, of Honington, Knt. and Bart., and so added Doddington to the possessions of that distinguished Lincolnshire family. Sir Edward, her husband, was eldest son of Sir Charles Hussey, of Honington, Knt., and grandson of Sir Robert Hussey, who was a younger brother of John, Lord Hussey of Sleaford, beheaded by Henry VIII. for his supposed complicity in the Lincolnshire rising of 1536. He was already a knight at the time of his father’s death in 1609, having received that honour at Whitehall in 1608, and shortly afterwards, on 29th June 1611, he was advanced to the dignity of baronet. The original bond, cancelled by being cut into shreds, by which he bound himself to furnish £1095 by three yearly instalments for the maintenance of thirty foot soldiers in Ireland for three years, is still preserved at the Hall. He was High Sheriff in 1618 and 1637, and Knight of the Shire in the Parliament summoned to meet at Westminster, 13th April 1640. When the Civil War broke out he exerted himself zealously on the Royalist side as one of the King’s Commissioners of Array; and in 1642, when the loyal gentry of Lincolnshire resolved to provide horses for the King’s service, Sir Edward undertook to supply six, his brother Sir Charles Hussey, of Dunholme, providing two. Later he and his brother and other Lincolnshire loyalists assembled at Newark for its defence, and there Sir Charles Hussey died. Shortly before its surrender by the King’s order in 1646, we find Sir Edward at Honington endeavouring to make his peace with the Parliament. He was very aged and infirm, he says; he had taken the Covenant; his estates had been sequestered; and he asks that his wife may be allowed to compound for him. In spite of his pleading, the great fine of £10,200 was imposed. This was finally reduced to £8750, of which £4500