Gertrude Aylmer then Browne (née Brewer)

Whitgift Aylmer, gentleman of St Andrew, Holborn, bachelor, married Gertrude Brewer, spinster, in Holborn, London, in September 1714. This was a 'clandestine marriage', presumably because the bride was heavily pregnant or had already given birth to his child. Whitgift Aylmer and Gertrude had a son, Whitgift, baptised 18/12/1714 in Holborn, London. It is assumed this child died before 1719 as he is not mentioned in his father's will.

Whitgift Aylmer bequeathed one moity of Aylmers estate in St John, Jamaica, to Gertrude. He died in 1720.

"Gertrude remarried soon after Whitgift’s death. Her new husband, Stephen Browne, was a Supreme Court judge; they attempted in 1721/1724 to create a fraudulent debt using the name of Rowland Eustace of £6000, alleged to be against the deceased Whitgift. Gertrude swore the debt was valid, but the attempted fraud was discovered; the Governor Sir Nicholas Lawes turned her husband out of all his offices, ordered him to be prosecuted, and the couple suffered a large fine." Gertrude died in Bordeaux, France, in 1729. After her death, Stephen Browne attempted to gain possession of Aylmers by claiming that Catherine, Whitgift's daughter, was illegitimate.

Ancestry.com, London, England, Clandestine Marriage and Baptism Registers, 1667-1754 [database online]; Ancestry.com, London, Church of England, Baptisms, Marriages and Burials, 1538-1812 [database online].

PROB 11/871/1.

'The Aylmers of Jamaica' [unsourced], http://aylmer.org.uk/who-we-were/aylmers-on-the-land/the-aylmers-of-jamaica/ [accessed 29/09/2018].