(To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR.") SIB, — The following links
to the reign of Henry VIII. in a family somewhat remarkable for the steady longevity of its seven generations back may interest your readers, (.1 propos of the article thus headed in the Spectator of January 5th. My father, born 1795, died let. 87 in 1883. His father, Abel Chapman, of Woodford, Essex, died December 30th, 1849, at. 97. He was an Elder Brother of the Trinity House, and trea- surer for forty years of St. Thomas's Hospital. Born in 1752, be was as a young man a friend of the General Oglethorpe, a courtier in Queen Anne's reign, who is said to have shot snipe in the conduit where Regent Street now stands (ride the first chapter of Macaulay's History). His father, Abel Chap- man, of Whitby, deceased wt. 83, born August, 1694, had for his father William Chapman, of Whitby, born April 19th, 1646, and deceased 1720, al. 74. His father, Robert Chap- man, of Whitby, born 1603, died 1685, a4. 82. His father, John Chapman, of Whitby, did not maintain the record for longevity, as he was born in the seventeenth year of Elizabeth. 1570, and died March 31st, 1614; but his father, Robert Chapman, of Whitby, lived during Henry VIII.'s reign, dying in 1607, probably born circa 1530-40. Beyond this my records do not go. But it is remarkable that my great- grandfather takes me back to within six years of the Great Settlement of 1688, two generations further back to the date, 1603, of James I.'s accession, and two more to the times of Henry VIII. A strong infusion of Scandinavian blood but. treased by the briny air of the Yorkshire coast had no doubt something to say to the longevity of the race; perhaps the somewhat austere morality of the Puritans, certainly the plain, simple mode of life in the times when open-air exercise and the morning draught of spiced ale held the place of our whiskies or even tea and coffee beverages, conduced to longevity, and enables the writer to reckon up only seven lives between himself and Henry VIII.'s reign. The lives reckon- ing backwards are : (1) 87, 1795 ; (2) 97, 1752; (3) 83, 1694 ; (4) 74, 1646 ; (5) 82, 1603 ; (6) 44, 1570 ; (7) uncertain, but average would be 78, say circa 1540.—I am Sir, &e., CHARLES EDWARD CHAPMAN, .of. 68, .
I.C.S. (late).
Cairnmore, Dovercourt, Essex.
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