COLMAN, Robert

The Colmans were a family of tanners persistently involved in disorder. Robert first appears in the records in 1427 when fined 40d. before the Derbyshire j.p.s for an unknown offence. Fined along with him were Richard and William Colman, and on the evidence of indictments taken before commissioners of oyer and terminer in 1434 all three of them were members of the violent confederacy formed by Nicholas Meysham* in 1430. Our MP’s return to Parliament at the election held in March 1432, in company with another of Meysham’s allies, William Orme*, thus came at a time when the townsmen were riven by faction.1 E101/122/9; KB9/11/17; C219/14/3. Interestingly, according to the indictments of 1434, one of the seven attestors to this election, Nicholas Gomon, was murdered in May 1433 by Meysham, with our MP, Richard Colman and Orme among the accessories to the crime.2 KB9/11/18. Our MP was also named as an accessory in a parlty. petition and an appeal by Gomon’s widow: SC8/113/5619; KB27/691, rot. 55d. Although Gomon is said to have been murdered in Derby, he did not die until the following Sept. when he succumbed to his injuries in London: KB27/779, rex rot. 21. There is, however, no direct evidence to connect the two events. Nor did the borough jurors of 1434 claim that the 1432 parliamentary election had been improperly determined, and there is no reason why they should have sought to conceal the fact (they did allege that Meysham’s election as bailiff in 1433 had been the product of intimidation). Another of the indictments laid against our MP raises the possibility that the faction headed by Meysham had the support of one of the town’s powerful neighbours, Henry, Lord Grey of Codnor. One of the grand juries indicted Grey for distributing livery on 20 Apr. 1433 to three townsmen involved in Meysham’s confederacy and the murder of Gomon, including both our MP and Orme.3 KB9/11/15d.

In Hilary term 1435 Robert and William Colman appeared personally in the court of King’s bench to plead not guilty to involvement with Meysham. They were acquitted in the following Michaelmas term by a jury from Derby. Significantly, even though the case had been put out nisi prius to the Derbyshire assizes, the jury appeared at Westminster, and it is a reasonable inference that the defendants had successfully argued that they would not receive a fair trial in the town. Our MP was also called upon to answer the appeal of Isabel Gomon as one of the accessories to her husband’s murder, but she quickly defaulted, presumably after the defendants had compounded with her for damages, and acquittal on the King’s suit followed. Colman was thus left only with the indictment for receiving livery pending against him. In Easter term 1435 he claimed that he was one of Grey’s household servants and hence entitled to take livery. No verdict is given. Nothing else is recorded about our MP after this date. The family did, however, maintain its connexion with Lord Grey for William Colman was among the many of his servants indicted when oyer and terminer commissioners again visited Derbyshire in 1440.4 KB27/691, rot. 55d; 694, rot. 4; 695, rex rot. 16; 696, rex rot 16d; KB29/75, rot. 27d.