SILLY, John (c.1621-72), of St Wenn, Cornw.

The Sillys of Trevelver claimed descent from the Sillys of Rackenford, Devon, who may have been distantly related to the Ceely family, as the names were often confused by contemporaries, and the Sillys used the Ceely coat of arms.9Maclean, Trigg Minor, ii. 517; Cornw. RO, B/BOD/286; Recs. Quakers Cornw. 29, 40, 59. The family only came to Cornwall in 1612, when John Silly senior acquired the manor of St Wenn through marriage.10Maclean, Trigg Minor, ii. 515. John senior, a successful lawyer, extended his land holdings with the purchase of the barton of Trevelver in St Minver parish, in 1630, and this became the main family seat.11Maclean, Trigg Minor, ii. 515. He soon ingratiated himself and his family into the upper echelons of Cornish gentry society. His son-and-heir, Richard, married the daughter of Sir Richard Carew of Antony, in 1637, and thus became brother-in-law of the future royalist, (Sir) Anthony Carew*.12Vivian, Vis. Devon, 241. Another important connection was with the Nicolls family of Penrose. When John Silly junior was admitted to the Middle Temple in June 1638 his manucaptors (or sureties) included Francis Nicoll, and at this time his father may already have been negotiating his second marriage, to Philippa, daughter of Humphrey Nicoll (and sister of the prominent Cornish parliamentarian, Anthony Nicoll*), which was solemnised in January 1640.13MTR ii. 872; Maclean, Trigg Minor, ii. 520-1. Richard Silly went on to take as his own second wife another of the Nicoll sisters in 1649.14Maclean, Trigg Minor, ii. 515, 520-1; Vivian, Vis. Cornw. 344.

The Nicoll influence may have encouraged the Sillys to side with Parliament during the civil war, but it is by no means clear that they were strong opponents of the crown in 1642, as in that year John junior married a daughter of William Cotton, the precentor of Exeter Cathedral and son of a former bishop.15Maclean, Trigg Minor, ii. 516, 520-1. However lukewarm their support for Parliament, their decision to oppose Charles I had serious consequences for the Sillys. On 4 September 1644 the king appointed the sheriff of Cornwall, Sir Francis Bassett, as governor of St Michael’s Mount, with a 50-strong garrison funded by the sequestered rents of John Silly, his father, and his brother, estimated at £500 per annum.16Cornw. RO, AU/2; Coate, Cornw. 365. It was calculated by Bassett that the real income from these estates amounted to £433 19s, and in October it was claimed that the revised sum was already in arrears.17Cornw. RO, B/35/52-3, 231. Whether the Silly family had left the county by this stage is uncertain, but it is likely that they joined other parliamentarian refugees in Plymouth or more distant garrisons.

John Silly senior died in 1646, and by his will (originally drawn up in 1640) divided his lands, giving Richard the main estate at Trevelver in St Minver parish, while John junior was allowed the lands at St Wenn. John Silly took up residence at St Wenn once Cornwall was safely in parliamentarian hands in 1646, but there is no record of his involvement in public life in the late 1640s and early 1650s.18Maclean, Trigg Minor, ii. 515. He was first named as one of the assessment commissioners for Cornwall in June 1657.19A. and O. On 20 January 1659 Silly was elected as MP for Bodmin, which lay only a few miles west of St Wenn, and on 31 January he was entertained by the borough, ‘when he went for London’, although there is no record of his activity at Westminster thereafter.20Cornw. RO, B/BOD/286. Silly was considered a possible militia officer by Colonel Robert Bennett’s* sidekick, Richard Lobb*, in August 1659, but he does not seem to have been appointed; and he went on to join the conservative Presbyterian gentry who signed the Cornish declaration, in support of a free Parliament, at Truro on 27 December 1659.21FSL, X.d.483 (127); Publick Intelligencer no. 210 (2-9 Jan. 1660), 998 (E.773.41).

Silly was appointed as militia commissioner for Cornwall in March 1660, and was again returned for Bodmin, after a double-return, in the Convention in May 1660, being accounted a friend of the Presbyterian interest by Philip, 4th Baron Wharton. He was removed from the Cornwall commission of the peace in 1662 – perhaps as a result of his non-conformity.22C193/12/3, f. 15v; HP Commons 1660-1690. Silly may have been the ‘John Ceely’ recorded as a persecutor of Quakers in Cornwall between 1660 and 1665, working with his brother-in-law, William Cotton of Botreaux Castle.23Recs. Quakers Cornw. 29, 40, 59; Vivian, Vis. Cornw. 217; Vivian, Vis. Devon, 241. On the death of his nephew, Marke Silly, in 1667 John Silly acquired the family estate at Trevelver, including a fairly substantial 12–hearth mansion.24Cornw. Hearth Tax, 47. This inheritance was not without its problems, however, as it triggered a bitter legal battle between various members of the family in 1669 and 1670.25C10/153/142; C10/154/123; C10/159/149. John Silly died on 11 April 1672, and was succeeded by his elder son, William, who was unsuccessful candidate for Bossiney in the elections of 1688.26HP Commons 1660-1690.