Volume Vi Part 18 (1/2)

JOHN, DUKE OF NORFOLK, TO JOHN PASTON[73-1]

_To my right welbeloved frynde, John Paston, be this delivred in hast._

[Sidenote: 1483 / OCT. 10]

Right welbeloved frynde, I comaunde me to you. It is soo that the Kentysshmen be up in the weld, and sey that they wol come and robbe the cite, which I shall lett yf I may.

Therefore I pray you that with alle diligence ye make you redy and com hidder, and bring with you six talle felaws in harnesse, and ye shall not lyse yowr labour, that knoweth G.o.d, Whoo have you in His keping.

Written at London, the x^th day of October.

Yowr frend,

J. NORFFOLK.

[Footnote 73-1: [From Fenn, ii. 314.] Sir John Howard was created Duke of Norfolk on the 28th June 1483, and was killed in the battle of Bosworth on the 22nd August 1485. This letter seems to have been written in October 1483, when it first became known that a series of insurrections were about to take place in different counties, of which the Duke of Buckingham was the princ.i.p.al leader. It was on the 12th October, just two days after this letter was written, that King Richard himself at Lincoln heard of Buckingham's intended treason.]

995

ABSTRACT[74-1]

[Sidenote: 1484]

Proviso to be inserted in an Act of Parliament in favour of Margaret, widow of John Paston, touching her right to the manor of Castre.

Below is written--'Guy Fayrefax, Knyght, [Ric. Pygot, one of the King's Serjeants of the Law,][74-2] and Roger Townesend, [another of][74-2] the King's Serjeants of the Law.

[This proviso must have been drawn up in connection with some measure that was to have come before the Parliament of January 1484.

Earlier it cannot be, as Roger Townesend was not appointed King's Serjeant till June 1483; and as Margaret Paston died in November 1484, it could not possibly be later.]

[Footnote 74-1: [From a MS. in the Bodleian Library.]]

[Footnote 74-2: Scored out.]

996

ABSTRACT[74-3]

[Sidenote: 1484 / FEB. 8]

Release by John, Duke of Norfolk, and William, Earl of Nottingham, kinsman and heir of John, late Duke of Norfolk, to John Paston, Esq., brother and heir of Sir John Paston, Knight, of all right and t.i.tle in the manor of Caister called Redehams, Vawx, and Bosouns by Great Yarmouth, of which Sir John Paston was disseised unjustly by the said late Duke.

[Footnote 74-3: From a Doc.u.ment transcribed by Sandford in his Genealogy of the Paston Family, and printed by Mr. Wors.h.i.+p in the _Norfolk Archaeology_.]

997

THE DUKE OF SUFFOLK TO THOMAS JEFFREYS[74-4]