| Administrative History | Francis Noel Clarke was born at Osbaston Hall, the eldest son of Wrightson Mundy of Markeaton and Osbaston and Anne Burdett. He married Elizabeth Ayrton (d.1768), who died at the age of 22. In 1770 he married his second wife, Elizabeth Burdett (c.1743-1807), with whom he had two sons, Francis and Charles Godfrey.
Francis Noel Clarke succeeded to the Markeaton estate on the death of his father. In 1781 he sold Allestree Hall to Thomas Evans. He was the author of two well regarded descriptive poems: Needwood Forest (1776) and The Fall of Needwood (1808). |