“The manor of Paddington was leased in the reign of Henry the eighth to Richard Reade for a long term, which being expired, Bishop Abbot demised it in the year 1626, (together with the capital mansion and rectory) to Sir Rowland St. John, fifth son of Oliver Lord St. John, of Bletsoe), for the lives of himself, his wife Sibyl, and their son Oliver. Sir Rowland, died in 1645. The next year a survey of the manor was taken by order of Parliament; which states the demesne lands to have been six hundred and twenty-four acres, the reserved rent forty-one pounds, six shillings and eight-pence. The great house in which Sir Rowland St. John had lived was then in the occupation of Alderman Bide. The manor was afterwards sold by the Parliamentary Commissioners to Thomas Browne, esquire. After the restoration (in the month of January, 1661), Oliver St. John, the only survivor in the lease (then a baronet), died without having renewed; upon which the estate fell in to Bishop Sheldon, who granted it to his nephews Sir Joseph Sheldon, knight, and Daniel Sheldon, esquire. The lease continued for several years in that family, being renewed from time to time. In the year 1741, it was purchased by Sir John Frederick, baronet, and is now vested in Sir John Morshead, baronet, and Robert Thistlethwayte, esquire, in right of their wives, Elizabeth and Selina, daughters and co-heirs of Sir Thomas Frederick, baronet, deceased, and grand-daughters of Sir John Frederick.” We have already seen that Alderman Rede’s lease was not the original one granted by King Henry; and there are other additions, and corrections required to make the statement above quoted strictly correct. Both the manor, and rectory, of Paddington were held by the citizen’s family “for a long term,” although their first lease was but for twenty-one years; for I find no mention of any other lessees till the reign of Charles the first. I think it probable, however, that Sir Rowland St. John, to whom it was leased in that reign, held it in the reign of James the first; for in the eighteenth year of this reign I find him charged on the subsidy roll twenty pounds for Land in Paddington. An ancestor of Sir Rowland St. John was related to the Countess of Richmond, was appointed her chamberlain, and one of the executors of her will. The mother of Sir Rowland, lady Dorothy, was the only daughter and heir of Sir John Rede of Oddington, in Gloucestershire; and it was through her, as I suppose, that the Paddington lease came into this family of St. John.