Richard Cocke

Richard Cocke
Portrait of Richard Cocke at Bremo
Born	1597 (1597) Stottesdon, Shropshire, England
Died	1665 (1666) (aged 68) Henrico County, Virginia

Richard Cocke (1597 – 1665) was a prominent colonial Virginia planter and politician. He established a politically and social dynasty that firmly seated itself as among the most prominent in Virginia. Among his more prominent descendants are General Robert E. Lee and U.S. presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, George H. W. Bush, and George W. Bush.

Richard Cocke was born in 1597 at Pickthorn, Stottesdon, Shropshire and baptized Dec. 13, 1597 at Sidbury in Shropshire. He was the son of Thomas Cocke a yeoman farmer. His early education is not known but it is clear he was educated as he was both literate and of enough education to represent as an attorney in court.

The first Virginia record of Richard Cocke is of December 24, 1627, when he appeared at the court in Jamestown to give testimony as the purser of the Thomas and John that four men of Mr. Sharples had run away while being transported to Virginia. Cocke again appeared on February 10, 1629 as Patrick Canada’s attorney and ordered to take custody of Thomas Hunter’s estate on behalf of Patrick Canada.

Cocke was definitively settled in Virginia by 1632, as record on June 5, 1632 Court learned that Richard Cocke had married Temperance Bailey, the widow of John Browne and settled his estate with a fee of 6,397 pounds of tobacco. Temperance was born about 1617 in Virginia, the daughter of Thomas Bailey and Cicely Jordan Farrar who had arrived at Jamestown in August 1610, as is indicated by the 1623 and 1624/25 Muster. Temperance married between the age of 13 and 14 John Browne with whom she had children. Richard Cocke and Temperance had two known sons, Thomas and Richard. Following the death of Temperance he married Mary Aston, a daughter of Walter Aston, with whom he had children including another son Richard, Elizabeth, John, William, and Edward. His two sons named Richard have traditionally been differentiated as Richard the Elder and Richard the Younger.

Richard Cocke “Gentleman” patented 3,000 acres near the lands of John Price, Thomas Hallam and Thomas Harris in Henrico County on March 6, 1636 and expanded his holdings further on March 10, 1639 with an addition 2,000 acres. On December 6, 1652 he added 2,842 more acres in Henrico County with an added 100 acres on the Chickahominy on Aug 24th, 1664. Cocke’s last acquisition was in partnership with John Beauchamp on June 21, 1664 consisting of 2,974 acres on the south side of the Chickahominy. Beauchamp confirmed his portion to Cocke’s sons after his death. By the time Richard Cocke died he was in possession of 10,916 acres of land spread over three sites named, ‘Bremo” (his home site), ‘Malvern Hill’ and ‘Curles’. He is also known to have owned property in present-day Surry County, Virginia where he first resided in the early 1630s.