Editing Thomas Docwra (section)

==Origins==
[[File:Datestone HighdownPirton Herts ThomasDocwra1504.gif|thumb|1504 datestone of Thomas Docwra, with his arms and a [[Chief (heraldry)|chief]] of the Order of St John. Highdown House, Pirton, Hertfordshire. Of uncertain provenance]]
He was a member of the Docwra family of Hertfordshire, a junior branch of the ancient Docwra family of Docwra Hall in [[Kendal]],<ref>{{Cite web|title=Dockwray Hall, Kendal (The Gatehouse Record)|url=http://www.gatehouse-gazetteer.info/English%20sites/449.html|access-date=2021-03-02|website=www.gatehouse-gazetteer.info}}</ref> [[Westmorland]]. According to an old pedigree he was a son of Richard Docwra by his wife Alice Green, a daughter of Thomas Green of [[Gressingham]] in [[Lancashire]].<ref>{{Cite DNB|wstitle= Docwra, Thomas |volume= 15 |last= Gairdner |first= James |author-link= James Gairdner |pages= 142-144 |year=  |short=1}}</ref> He may however have been a grandson of Richard and a son of Thomas Docwra.<ref>{{Harvnb|Burton|1905|p=324}}; {{Harvnb|Chibi|2006}}.</ref> His ancestral home appears to have been Highdown House<ref>Cussans, Hertfordshire, Vol.2, p.18, quoted in Dictionary of National Biography</ref> (or possibly Old Hall, an inn in 1912<ref>'Parishes: Pirton', in A History of the County of Hertford: Volume 3, ed. William Page (London, 1912), pp. 44–51. http://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/herts/vol3/pp44-51</ref>) in the parish of [[Pirton, Hertfordshire|Pirton]],<ref>[https://britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/101175442-high-down-house-with-buildings-and-walls-around-courtyard-on-north-side-pirton Listed building text]</ref> Hertfordshire, where survives a datestone (of uncertain provenance) set into a wall of the east gable of the north courtyard (stables) range displaying the Docwra arms, inscribed "Thomas Docwra, Miles, 1504", the date he built [[St John's Gate, Clerkenwell]]. The Latin motto of the Order is inscribed below<ref>Listed building text</ref> ''Sane Boro'', interpreted by [[Thomas Cromwell (antiquary)|Cromwell]] (1828)<ref>History and description of the parish of Clerkenwell By Thomas Kitson Cromwell, 1828, p. 190 [https://archive.org/details/b29309013/page/189 <!-- quote=sane boro motto -->]</ref> as signifying "truly a baron" or "a baron indeed", ''a motto, signifying in two words so much, and that so pompously, is explained at once by the assumption of these Lords-Priors to be, not barons merely, but the very premiers of the Baronage of England''.