C ROM W E LL-- WILLIAMS.
[TO THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR."]
have lately had my attention directed to a letter in the Spectator of the 16th inst. by Mr. Hain Friswell. If Mr. Friswell will refer to Cussans's " History of Hertfordshire" he will be able to correct several errors in his letter. In the first place, Sir Richard Williams married Frances, daughter and co-heiress of Sir Thomas (not Sir John) Murfyn, who was neither sister, sis- ter-in-law, nor any other relation of the Earl of Essex. It was Sir Richard Williams's father who married a sister of Thomas Cromwell, Earl of Essex; and Sir Richard Williams, their son and grandfather of the Protector, assumed the name and arms of Cromwell by royal authority. Your correspondent concludes his letter with another error. He says, " The last descendant of the Protector, or he who claimed to be so, was Oliver Cromwell, Esq., Barrister-at-Law." I fancy he must have meant the last lineal male descendant, or he must have been unaware that this Oliver Cromwell left a daughter, who married Thomas Artemi- dorus, only son of John Russell, of Aldbury House, Cheshunt, from whom there are numerous descendants. Moreover, a sister of Oliver Cromwell the barrister, by a former wife of his father, married John Field, of London, physician, the name of whose descentants is legion.—I am, Sir, &c., Blackdown Hill, Leamington, January 26. HENRY FIELD.
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