GOULSTON (GULSTON), Richard (c.1612-86), of Wyddial Hall, Wyddial, Herts.

The Goulstons were first recorded in the mid-sixteenth century at Wymondham in Leicestershire. The MP’s paternal grandfather, William Goulston, was the rector of Thrapston, Northamptonshire and later of Wymondham.14Vis. Herts. 1572 and 1634 (Harl. Soc. xxii.), 46; Clutterbuck, Herts. iii. 472; Cussans, Herts. Edwinstone, 121; Berry, Pedigrees Herts. 202. William’s eldest son, Theodore (1575-1632), became a successful London physician.15‘Theodore Goulston’, Oxford DNB. The second son, John, prospered as one of the prothonotaries of the court of common pleas and was able to purchase an estate at Wyddial in Hertfordshire in 1627. Richard, his eldest son, inherited those lands on John’s death in 1643.16Chauncy, Herts. i. 222-3; Cussans, Herts. Edwinstone, 117; VCH Herts. iv. 116. At some point Richard Goulston enlarged the house, Wyddial Hall, and created a park.17J.T. Smith, Herts. Houses (1993), 216; H. Price, Parks in Herts. since 1500 (2008), 47.

Goulston ‘voluntarily’ subscribed £5 for the Scots in early 1644, but soon after he was assessed for a further £10, and a horse and ‘other arms valued at £40’ were later taken from the estate.18SP28/231, pt. 1, unfol. He otherwise played no discernible part in the civil war. But he was evidently regarded as being loyal enough to Parliament to serve as a Hertfordshire justice of the peace, which he did from early 1646.19C231/6, p. 37. In June 1657 he was also appointed to the local assessment commission for the first time.20A. and O. At about the same time he took the lead in organising the repairs to the Ford Bridge over the River Rib at Braughing.21Herts. County Recs. v. 493, vi. 8, 22.

In 1659 Goulston became the first member of his family to sit in Parliament when he was elected as the junior Hertfordshire knight of the shire. An inactive Member, he was named to just one committee, that set up on 11 April to consider the dispute between George Coney and the Paulet family over the ownership of lands sequestered from the 5th marquess of Winchester (Lord John Paulet†).22CJ vii. 634b. He did not stand for Parliament again.

Goulston continued to serve as a justice of the peace after the Restoration.23Herts. County Recs. i. 149, 156-7, 260-1, 308, 328, vi. 87, 228, 294, 330. Bridge repairs seem to have remained one of his particular interests.24Herts. County Recs. vi. 78, 88, 225. He also served as the treasurer for the tolls collected in the various Hertfordshire parishes through which the Great North Road passed.25Herts. County Recs. vi. 294, 330-1, 333, 334, 337, 408, 409. In 1675 he sought to prosecute several nonconformists under the Conventicle Acts.26Herts. County Recs. i. 260. At the very end of his life he was appointed by James II as one of the new deputy lieutenants for Hertfordshire.27CSP Dom. 1685, p. 101.

Goulston died on 2 September 1686 and was buried at Wyddial.28Clutterbuck, Herts. iii. 475-6; RCHME Herts. 244. His will specified that he was to be interred at the feet of his parents ‘with little or no expense of money’ because ‘pompous funerals are justly thought vain things’. He bequeathed 10s apiece to the poor cottagers of Wyddial with multiple children, but specifically excluded those who did not attend church regularly and who ‘separate themselves from the corporation therein’, indicating that he continued to disapprove of religious nonconformity. 29PROB11/384/372. His lands mostly passed to his eldest son, James. His other son, Sir William†, who survived him by just one year, had sat for Bletchingley in 1681 and for New Romney in 1685. A grandson, Richard†, twice represented Hertford as a tory under Queen Anne. The family remained at Wyddial until 1772.30Cussans, Herts. Edwinstone, 120; VCH Herts. iv. 116.