Spencer Combe

Spencer Combe in the parish of Crediton, Devon, is an historic estate. The grade II listed farmhouse known today as "Spence Combe", the remnant of a former mansion house, is situated 3 miles north-west of the town of Crediton. Spencer Combe is given in several traditional historical sources as the seat of Sir Robert Spencer (d.pre-1510) who married Eleanor Beaufort (1431–1501), the daughter of Edmund Beaufort, 2nd Duke of Somerset (1406–1455), KG, and who was father to two daughters and co-heiresses who made notable marriages. The arms of this Sir Robert Spencer were Sable, two bars nebuly ermine, as shown in the Percy window in the chapel of Petworth House and as quartered by Cary, Viscount Falkland. The American genealogist Douglas Richardson suggests however that Sir Robert Spencer was in fact the son and heir of John Spencer, Esquire, MP for Dorset, of Frampton in Dorset, Ashbury in Devon and Brompton Ralph in Somerset, by his wife Jone. The arms given by Pole for Spencer of Spencer Combe, are: Argent, on a bend sable two pairs of keys or, and are shown quartered by Prideaux on the monument in Farway Church, Devon, to Sir Edmund Prideaux, 1st Baronet (died 1628) of Netherton Hall, and are shown in stained glass impaled by de Esse of Thuborough in the Thuborough Chapel of Sutcombe Church.

The earliest holder of the estate as recorded by the Devon historian Tristram Risdon (died 1640) was the Lancells family. However the Devon historian Sir William Pole (died 1635) stated Comb Lancelles to be a separate estate to Cumbe, held by the Hody then Spencer families. Indeed, the grade II listed farmhouse known today as "Combe Lancey" survives, situated within the parish of Sandford, to the immediate north-west of Crediton. Pole gave the descent of Comb Lancelles as follows:

...
Wikipedia