Hugh Sargent was born circa 1530. He married
Margaret Gifford circa 1560. Hugh Sargent died on 23 February 1598. He Hugh Sariant (Sargent), the earliest known ancestor of the family, lived in Courteenhall, County of Northampton. Corteenhall was the inheritance of the Wake family, which traces its descent back to Hereward the Wake, to a time anteerior to the Norman Conquest. It is five and a quarter miles south of the town of Northammption and in 1831 contained 144 ihhabitants. The church is dedicatred to St. Peter and St. Paul.
Prefixed to the first volume of the parish register, which begins in 1538, is a large piece of parchment, on which is very neatly transcribed many pedigrees. One of them is of the family of Sargent. There can be no doubt that this piece of work, which is both most useful and rare, was written by a former rector, who had a first hand view of the facts he recorded.
The rector of the church, Rev. Archibald Wake (1895) says, "The parchment shows that the family was in Courteenhall in 1554, and were of gentle blood; and possibly the Sargents were in the parish before a Wake entered it.
Margaret, wife of Hugh Sargent, was the daughter of Nicholas and Agnes (Masters) Gifford, of the Abbey of St. James, was a western suburb of Northampton. This abbey was a religious estate of considerable note, founded before the year 1112 by William Peverel, natural son of William the Conqueror, and to which he gave 40 acres of land. It is called St. James End.
