Jane Leigh Perrot (née Cholmeley)

Aunt and patron of Jane Austen and her family, and reportedly heiress to land (and almost certainly the enslaved people attached to it) of her father Robert Cholmeley of Barbados, who died intestate c. 1754. She later married in England in 1764 James Leigh Perrot, the brother of Cassandra Austen nee Leigh. Her mother Ann remarried, to Thomas Workman of Barbados. The estate, given as the Cholmeley/Workman estate in St Michael, has not yet been traced by LBS, and was presumably sold by the Perrots.

1. Her own will, proved 09/12/1836, is silent on property in Barbados (she left £5000 each to her nieces Wilhelmina Welby and Caroline Glascott wife of Rev. Thomas Glascott, and £5000 to Cholmeley Glascott, described as son of Rev. Thomas Glascott: after further monetary legacies of some £13,000 she left her remaining estate to Rev. James Edward Austen). In the will of her husband James Leigh Perrot of Wargrave proved in 17/04/1817 he left his wife his houses at Scarlets and at Great Pulteney Street in Bath, and £10,000; the remainder of his estate he left in trust for his wife for life, and then at her death £6000 to his nephews and nieces including Jane Austen, and the remainder to Jane's brother James.

Hampshire Local Archives 'Account of the legacies of Robert Cholmeley who died intestate in 1754, and the state of Miss [Jane] Cholmeley's fortune once the debts have been taken care of', 10 Oct 1764 - ref. 23M93/E/B1 - date: 1764 [LBS has not examined this document]; American Vital Records from the Gentleman's Magazine, 1731-1868 showed her as 'Miss Warkham' on her marriage to James Leigh Perrot, presumably a corruption of her step-father's name. The executors of Ann Workman sold an estate named Brace's in St George Barbados in 1791 to Thomas Applewhaite, who consolidated it into Walkers, Barbados Department of Archives. Hughes-Queree Index of Plantations.

1. PROB 11/1870/502; PROB 11/1591/251.