Brige, by which name it is simply so called before the Norman Conqueror bestowed it upon Reginald[1] Adobed, and hence it took the adjunct of its owner." The original of the primitive name is the bridge connecting the two parts across the Tamar.
The manor of Tackbere, in Domesday called Tacabere, was one of those which the Conqueror bestowed on his half-brother the Earl of Morton.
THE EDITOR.
This manor of Tacabre, or Takkebere, which appears to have been very extensive, is said by Mr. Lysons to have been bestowed by King Edward the Third on the Abbey of St. Mary of Graces, which appears in Tanner's Notitia Monastica to have been founded by that king in the years 1349—50, in the new church-yard of the Holy Trinity, eastward of the Tower of London. The manor has since acquired the name of Merrifield, probably Maryfield, from the monastery. It was for many years the property of Gilberts, a branch from the Gilberts of Crompton Castle, near Torbay. The only daughter of the last Mr. Gilbert, of Tackbere, married Mr. Cotton Amy, of Botreaux Castle, who left two daughters; Anne, who survived her sister, but died unmarried after a long insanity; and Grace, married to Mr. Jonathan Phillipps, of Camelford, and of Newport, near Launceston, who was subsequently knighted in 1786, on the memorable occasion afforded by Margaret Nicholson. This lady had several children: two daughters were alive at the time of her decease in 1788, but they both died in twelve months after their mother, and Tackbere has ascended through the two female lines, and become vested in the right heirs-at-law of Mr. Samuel Gilbert, the father of Mrs. Amy.
- ↑ The Domesday surname, however, is still nearer to the modern orthography; being, not Reginald, but Ruald.—Edit.
