Part 21 (1/2)
”From the Close Roll we learn 'that the Lord Cardinal, Archbishop Kempe, on 25 Feb. 1432, delivered up to the King, the gold and silver seals, and the Duke of Gloucester immediately took them and kept them till the fourth of March, on which day, he gave them back to the King and they were delivered by his Majesty to John Stafford, Bishop of Bath and Wells for the despatch of business.'
”He filled the office of Chancellor till 1450 a longer period than any one had before continuously held the Great Seal. This took place on 31 Jany. 1450, the day the Parliament pursuant to the last adjournment, when 'the Archbishop of Canterbury was discharged from the office of Chancellor, and John Kempe, Cardinal and Archbishop of York was put in his place.'
”He retired from politics and died at Maidstone, in Kent, on 6 July 1452. He was _pars negotiis neque supra_, one of those sensible, moderate, plodding safe men, who are often much relished by the leaders of political parties, as they can fill an office not discreditably, without any danger of gaining too much _eclat_, and with a certainty of continued subserviency.”
”Sensible--moderate--plodding--safe,”--words which may be condensed into, and construed to embody that most useful, homely, yet withal rarest, of all endowments,--common-sense--whose practice in the long run is of far greater value from its reliability, than the too-often-found instability and hazard of careers termed brilliant,--and ever forms a most desirable, if not a great character.
To return to the descent of Stafford and the four children of Sir Humphrey ”_with the Silver Hand_.”
Sir Richard Stafford the eldest son, married Maud daughter and heir of Richard Lovell, Esq., by Elizabeth daughter and coheir of Sir Guy de Briene, knt. By her he had one child only, a daughter, named Avice, ob. 3 June, 1457, ”a great heiress,” married as his second wife, to James Butler, fifth Earl of Ormonde, created Earl of Wilts.h.i.+re and K.G. in 1449. He was also Lord Treasurer of England and a staunch adherent of the Red Rose, was taken prisoner after the battle of Towton, by Richard Salkeld, Esq., and beheaded at Newcastle 1 May, 1461. Sir Richard died about 1427, his wife afterward married John Fitzalan, thirteenth Earl of Arundel, K.G., ob. 12 June, 1435, by whom she had a son Humphrey, fourteenth Earl. She died 19 May, 1436, and was buried with her first husband in the Chapel of St. Anne in the Abbey Church of Abbotsbury.
Sir John Stafford, second son, married Anne daughter of William the third and last Lord Bottreaux, ob. 14 May, 1462, by his wife Elizabeth daughter of John, Lord Beaumont. By her he had one child only, Humphrey, who died in Scotland 6 Aug., 1461. Sir John died 5 Nov., 1427, and was buried with his kindred at Abbotsbury Abbey.
The presumed tomb with effigies of Lord and Lady Bottreaux, the parents of Anne, is in the church of North-Cadbury, Somerset. Its original position was in the Founder's place, on the north side of the chancel, but it is now relegated to a corner of the tower at the west end. The knight is in complete plate armour, the lady in richly ornamented horned head-dress, and long robes. A canopy is over their heads. Lord Bottreaux married first Elizabeth, daughter of John, Lord Beaumont, she died about 37 Henry VI. (1459). By her he had two sons and two daughters. William, who died before 1434; Reginald, ob. 1420; Anne, married to Sir John Stafford; and Margaret, who died 7 Feb., 1478-9, eventually sole heiress to the large property and t.i.tles of Bottreaux and Mules, married to Robert, Lord Hungerford, ob. 14 May, 1459. Lord Bottreaux married secondly Margaret daughter of Thomas, Lord Roos. He died seized of fifty manors, in the western counties, among them North-Cadbury, which they possessed through the heiress of Mules, and in that church (which they probably rebuilt), by his will he ordered himself to be buried. Reginald, the second son, and brother of Anne, was buried at Aller church, near Langport, which parish was part of the family property. On a flat stone formerly in the pavement of the chancel, but now set upright, on a ledger-line is incised the following inscription,--
=Hic jacet Roginaldus filius William dom' de Botreaux qui obiit x.x.x die mensis Julii anno dom' m^o cccc xx=
In the centre is a s.h.i.+eld,--_A griffin rampant_ (BOTTREAUX), impaling _semee of fleurs-de-lys, a lion rampant_ (BEAUMONT).
William Stafford, Esq., third son, was of Suthwyke; he married Katharine daughter of Sir John Chidiock, knt., by whom he had one son Humphrey, subsequently created Lord Stafford of Suthwyke and Earl of Devon. More with regard to him presently. William Stafford, together with his relative Sir Humphrey Stafford of Grafton, knt., Commander of the King's forces, were both killed in the encounter with Jack Cade and the Kentish insurgents (who came off victorious), at Sevenoaks, 18 June, 1450. His wife married secondly Sir John Arundell of Lanherne, Cornwall, knt., ob. 12 Nov., 1473, and thirdly Sir Roger Lewkenor, knt., ob. 4 Aug., 1478. She died 10 April, 1479.
Alice, their only daughter, married first her neighbour Sir Edmond Cheney, of Broke, Wilts, and by him had two daughters, Elizabeth and Anne.[35] Secondly she married Walter Tailboys of Newton-Kyme, Yorks.h.i.+re, ob. 13 Apl., 1444; by him she had one daughter Alianore, married to Thomas Strangeways, Esq., by whom she had two sons Henry and Thomas, and one daughter Joan. Thomas Strangeways died in 1484, his wife Alianore 2 April, 1502, and both were buried in the Lady Chapel of the Abbey church of Abbotsbury.
[35] See page 5.
Our thoughts now concentrate on the last--most greatly honoured, yet withal most unfortunate--representative of Stafford of Suthwyke, who rose to the highest dignity conferred on the family, but whose possession of the distinction was indeed short, and his life still more suddenly and disastrously extinguished.
This was Humphrey, the only son of William Stafford of Suthwyke, killed at Sevenoaks in 1450. His cousin Humphrey, son of his uncle Sir John Stafford, dying in Scotland in 1461, he became the sole male heir left remaining. He was born about 1440, and appears to have identified himself with the cause of the White Rose, and to have been in much favour with Edward IV.
Stafford is accused of having been ill-disposed toward the Courtenays, Earls of Devon, who were zealous adherents of the Red Rose; naturally so, for they were descendants of that branch of the royal blood, and with such devotion, that the three brothers, Thomas, Henry, and John, who were the last representatives of the elder descent of that ill.u.s.trious house, lost their lives, either in the battlefield or on the scaffold, and their property by confiscation, in support of its claims. They were the sons of Thomas Courtenay, first of that name, Earl of Devon, who died 3 Feb., 1458, by his wife Margaret Beaufort, second daughter of John, Earl of Somerset, eldest son of John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, by his third wife Katharine Swynford.
A necessary digression respecting the Courtenays takes place here, as Stafford bears the sinister reputation of acquiring, by means not the most honourable, a large portion of their property and their t.i.tle.
Thomas Courtenay, Earl of Devon, the eldest of these brothers, fighting for the Red Rose, was made prisoner after the battle of Towton, 29 March, 1461, taken to York, attainted and beheaded by order of Edward IV., and all his property confiscated to the crown.
He appears to have been one of the most lawless and unscrupulous men of that lawless era,--his father it was, who is said to have fought with Lord Bonville on Clyst-Heath, and himself, the son, the leader of the outrage and murder of poor old Radford the lawyer, at Poughill, near Crediton, so graphically described in one of the Paston letters, and which as a picture of the ferocity of the time will bear extract here,--
”Also y'r is gret varyance bytwene ye Erll of Devens.h.i.+re and the Lord Bonvyle as hath be many day and meche debat is like to growe y'rby for on thursday at nyght last pa.s.sed ye Erll of Denshyres sone and heir come w't lx men of Armes to Radfords place in Devens.h.i.+re which was of counceil w't my Lord Bonvyle and they sette an hous on fyer at Radfords gate and cryed and mad an noyse as though they had be sorry for ye fyer, and by that cause Radfords men set opyn ye gats and yede owt to se ye fyer and for w't th'erll sone foreseid entred into ye place and intreted Radford to come down of his chambre to spike w't' them p'myttyng him that he shuld no bodyly harm have upon whiche p'mysse he come down and spak w't ye said Erll sone.
”In ye mene tyme his menye robbe his chambre and ryfled his hutches and trussed suyche as they coude gete to gydder and caryed it away on his own hors.
”Thanne y'erll sone seid, Radford thou must come to my Lord my Fadir, he seid he wold and bad oon of his men make redy his hors to ride w't 'hene whiche answerd hym yt alle his hors wern take awey, thanne he seid to y'erll sone s^r yo'r men have robbed my chambre and thei have myn hors yt I may not ride w't you to my Lord yo'r fadir, wherfor I p'y you lete me ride for I am old and may not go.
”It was answerid hym ageyn yat he shuld walke forth w't them on his feete and so he dede till he was a flyte shote or more from his place and yanne he was ... softly for cawse he myght not go fast and whanne yei were thus dep'ted he t'ned ... oon forw't come ix men ageyn upon hym and smot hym in the hed and fellid ...
of then kyt his throte.” (28 October 1455.)
We fear the feud between Bonville and Courtenay, that began with the 'valiant performance' on Clyst-Heath, was still raging, and it may be, the cause of poor old lawyer Radford's death, as it is mentioned he ”_was of counceil w't my Lord Bonvyle_,” which circ.u.mstance the Courtenays appear to have resented in this terrible manner. Six years afterward the edge of the axe fatally crossed the throat of ”_ye said Erll's sone_,” and leader of this outrage, at York.
The place from which this free-booting party set out was Tiverton Castle, the family residence, where his father the Earl was then living. The castle and manor of Tiverton formed part of the Courtenay possessions afterward given by Edward IV. to Stafford.
Henry Courtenay, the next brother, and Earl of Devon, for alleged complicity with Richard Nevill, Earl of Warwick, and his brothers, then exerting their influence for the restoration of Henry VI., was with Sir Thomas Hungerford of Farleigh Castle, seized, attainted of treason, and after a short trial before the King's Justices, both beheaded at Salisbury, 4 March, 1466.