BELLINGHAM, Thomas

This MP was one of as many as eight sons of Sir Robert Bellingham of Burneside near Kendal, whose ancestors originally hailed from Bellingham in Tyndale. The sons shared a remarkable ability to establish cadet branches of the family in places far distant from their home in the north of England, and, probably through the patronage of the earl of Arundel, Thomas forged a place for himself among the gentry of Sussex.5 J. Nicolson and R. Burn, Westmld. and Cumb. i. 125; Hist. Northumb. vii. 191-3. His departure from his native county was prompted by the violent events which occurred in Westmorland following the murder of Robert Crackenthorpe* in 1438. The principal protagonists were (Sir) Thomas Parr* and members of his family, ranged against the Bellinghams, with Thomas’s eldest brother, Henry, at their head. The causes of their quarrel are now obscure, but since the Parrs and Bellinghams were related through their mutual kinship with the Tunstalls it may be the case that it originated in a dispute over land or a wardship. Tempers ran high. As Henry Bellingham later informed the chancellor, Parr brought a great ‘multitude of people’ to destroy his house at Burneside, and was only prevented from succeeding ‘through treaty of good gentlemen of the county’. Parr took advantage of his position as deputy sheriff to Lord Clifford, and the fact that he numbered among his ‘menial men’ the coroners of Westmorland, to continue to menace the Bellinghams, who eventually sought their own remedy in a place where their adversary was more vulnerable. On 14 Mar. 1446, when Parr set out from his lodgings in London to take a boat up-river to Westminster (where he was representing Cumberland in the Parliament of 1445-6, then in its fourth and final session), two of the Bellingham brothers, Robert and Thomas (the future MP), aided by servants, made a murderous attack on him on ‘Cornewalesse grounde’ next to the crane in Vintry ward. The Commons regarded this as an affront to their body and addressed two petitions to the King asking for stern measures to be taken, not only in this case but in order to afford protection from assault and affray to all members of Parliament, be they Lords or Commons, when coming to, attending, or returning from sessions. A proclamation was issued on 6 May to cite the would-be assassins to the King’s bench 11 days later, threatening that if they failed to appear they would be attainted felons, and that they would not be allowed the benefit of any royal pardon or letters of protection. The Bellinghams later claimed that ‘for feir and drede of the seyd Acte and proces therupon dependyng’ they dared not come to stand trial; they were duly attainted of felony, thus forfeiting their lands and goods. Despite this sentence, three years later Thomas managed to secure election to the first Parliament of 1449, as a representative for the Sussex borough of Arundel. As ‘on of the Burgeys of this present Parlement’ and with his co-defendants he reported to the assembly that the Bellinghams and Parrs had now been reconciled, thereby successfully gaining the support of his fellows in the Commons for the revocation of the ‘Act’ of 1446. The Commons sent his petition up to the Lords for their approval, and it was accepted by the King, albeit with certain important reservations. He insisted that any (chief) lord to whom, on account of the attainder of felony, freehold land had escheated, should retain the property, and that any special royal grant of forfeited goods should hold sound.6 R.L. Storey, End of House of Lancaster, 120-1; PROME, xi. 490; RP, v. 168-70 (cf. PROME, xii. 69); SC8/27/1348.

In his petition of 1449, Bellingham was described as ‘formerly of Burneside’, and it may be presumed that he had moved to Sussex well before his election for Arundel, perhaps immediately after his attainder. Quite likely he had entered the service of the lord of the borough, William, earl of Arundel, and certainly in later years he farmed land at Arundel and nearby Lyminster as one of the earl’s tenants.7 Arundel Castle mss, receiver’s acct. A253; SC11/645. His kinsman, Robert Bellingham, was a ‘servant of the earl of Arundel’ by 1450: E403/777, m. 14. While the Parliament was still in progress he appeared, described as ‘of Arundel, gentleman’, as a surety in the King’s bench on behalf of the Shropshire esquire Walter Hopton of Hopton, and for four other men from the same county, where the earl held substantial estates. It is of interest to note that among those who also provided bail for Hopton were three other Members of the Commons (Thomas Acton*, John Lawley* and John Horde*), one of whom, Acton, was also linked to Earl William, and, indeed, was to be elected as a parliamentary representative for Arundel a year later.8 KB27/752, rex rot. 22d.

Bellingham himself secured re-election to the subsequent Parliament, which assembled on 6 Nov. 1449, this time for another west Sussex borough, Midhurst. His brother Richard joined him in the Commons as a shire knight for Cumberland. There is no indication that Thomas was a reformed character, and his violent disposition led him into trouble again a few years later. On 6 Nov. 1455, now called ‘of Arundel, esquire’, he was required in the court of common pleas to provide sureties to keep the peace towards one John Knot, whose life he had threatened. It is a measure of his acceptance into the community of Sussex that he was able to call on a number of prominent men from the county to stand bail for him. (Sir) Roger Lewknor*, Nicholas Hussey, John Wood III* and Richard Alfray* each offered pledges in £40 and undertook to bring him to court in the following law term, while Bellingham himself was bound under pain of £100 not to molest Knot. On the day ordained he presented himself in court as required, whereupon Wood and three different mainpernors (John Gaynesford II*, John Knottesford* and William Erneley*), guaranteed his appearance in Trinity term. On that occasion, however, Knot released Bellingham from his bonds, and he was left free to go sine die.9 CP40/779, rot. 125.

Bellingham was elected to Parliament for the third time in 1459, this being the assembly held at Coventry, which attainted the Yorkist lords.10 While the Parliament was in progress, he brought an action in the ct. of c.p. against a barber of Arundel for the sum of £4: CP/795, rot. 31d. Whether since he had first entered the Commons he had remained closely involved with the concerns of his older brothers in the north of England is now hard to ascertain. During the 1450s at least three of them had become firmly committed retainers of the Percy earls of Northumberland.11 R.A. Griffiths, King and Country, 332, 348. Their reconciliation with Sir Thomas Parr had not proved long lasting, and the continuing feud does much to explain both families’ political alignments in the civil wars, with Parr becoming a supporter of the Neville earl of Salisbury and thus the Yorkist faction. In contrast, Henry Bellingham, the head of his family, took an increasingly prominent role as an esquire to Henry VI and retainer of the King’s half-brother Edmund, earl of Richmond,12 CPR, 1452-61, pp. 335, 342. and so staunchly loyal to the King did he remain that he was charged by Salisbury’s widow with responsibility for his murder on 31 Dec. 1460. As a consequence he was attainted in Edward IV’s first Parliament a year later.13 Storey, 121, 125, 130, 142, 144, 148, 183. While his actions earned him a knighthood from King Henry, the change of regime enabled his enemies the Parrs to exact their revenge, and in 1463 Sir Thomas’s sons, Sir William† and John Parr†, were granted all the lands in Westmorland previously held by Sir Henry Bellingham, up to the value of £100 p.a., to hold in tail-male. In the following year Sir Henry and Alexander Bellingham, remaining among the faithful adherents of Henry VI at Bamburgh, helped the deposed monarch to flee the realm. This was followed in December 1467 with a further grant to the Parrs and their issue of the Bellingham manor and castle of Burneside, together with 40 messuages and some 1,100 acres of land. Despite obtaining a general pardon, Sir Henry stayed loyal to the house of Lancaster, and in July 1471 the Parrs were commissioned to arrest him and four other members of the family and bring them before the restored Edward IV.14 CPR, 1461-7, p. 224; 1467-77, pp. 45, 98, 288; PROME, xiii. 123. Although our MP appears to have escaped the general proscription of his family, and his lands in Sussex do not seem to have been confiscated, his brothers’ actions and the favoured position enjoyed by the Parrs may well have determined his exclusion from royal service during Edward IV’s reign. He saw fit to sue for a pardon, doing so in September 1468, but even so he was not to be placed in positions of responsibility under the Crown until much later.15 C67/46, m. 31. Another brother, Robert Bellingham of Parke, Lincs. had done likewise a few months earlier: m. 34.

Bellingham’s pardon gave his place of residence as Lyminster, where he had acquired land through his marriage to Joan Wiltshire. This marriage, while providing him with an income and standing among the Sussex gentry, nevertheless led to extensive litigation over property to which Joan claimed a title. In the late 1450s the couple had defended their rights to the manor of ‘Charlokkeston’, which they asserted belonged to Joan as heir to her maternal uncle John Mestede, after the failure of the male line and in accordance with an entail on her ancestor Sir Andrew Mestede and his issue. It was, however, typical of Bellingham’s behaviour to make an illegal entry into the manor, for which the Mestede feoffees claimed damages of £100 in the King’s bench.16 Add. 39376, ff. 99, 111, 116; CP40/802, rot. 287; 809, rot. 134; KB27/790, rot. 111. Joan also claimed to be the heiress of the Clothall moiety of the manor of Thakeham. This manor had been split in two in the late fourteenth century, with one half descending to the Clothalls, the other to the Apsleys. Disputes over property there had begun by 1463 when Bellingham was suing the rector of Thakeham for the sum of £10;17 CP40/809, rot. 13d. and escalated in the 1470s when he and his wife, not content with their own estate, attempted to seize the moiety belonging to John Apsley†. Their quarrel eventually went to arbitration, with the arbiters, who included the former under treasurer John Wood III, making their award in June 1477. This led to Bellingham’s capitulation: by a final concord made in November he confirmed Apsley and his heirs in possession of a number of properties in Thakeham, including a moiety of ‘Le Manor Place’. The large group of feoffees whom he asked to put the settlement into effect included, besides six members of his immediate family, leading figures from the local gentry such as Sir Roger Lewknor and his brother Thomas*. A second fine, registered in the following year, concerned property in Lyminster, Wyke, Hampton and Yapton, which Bellingham and his wife also relinquished.18 E. Suss. RO, Suss. Arch. Soc. mss, SAS/D/18-21; CP25(1)/241/93/20, 22; VCH Suss. vi (2), 35. Even so, our MP was not prepared to retreat gracefully, and in the early 1480s Apsley had to take him to court again over his refusal to give up the right to present to the church at Thakeham.19 Add. 39376, ff. 211, 216, 219, 220.

Bellingham does not appear to have been elected to Parliament again after 1459, although he was present at the shire court at Chichester to attest three of the Sussex elections of Edward IV’s reign.20 C219/17/1-3. That he was accepted among the gentry of the region is also suggested by his nomination to the body of feoffees, headed by the archbishop of Canterbury, which in 1465 received seisin of the manor of Braybourne in Kent after John Lewknor* and his wife were permitted to sell it to Sir John Scott†.21 CPR, 1461-7, pp. 429, 493; CIPM Hen. VII, i. 1078. Nevertheless, a number of allegations made against him suggest that he remained an untrustworthy and unstable character. For instance, in a violent outburst at Arundel in 1476, he attacked one Thomas Bury with a dagger;22 Arundel Castle mss, ct. roll honour of Arundel, M25. and after John Hilly*, the only surviving feoffee of the lands of William Bekke* of Chidham, entrusted him with the property, instead of complying with the terms of the enfeoffment to the benefit of the coheir, John Goring†, he allegedly offered part of the estate for sale.23 C1/61/226. Bellingham secured for himself the stewardship of Pynham priory, near Arundel, but at the episcopal visitation conducted in 1478 the prior revealed that without his consent, indeed with his express and entire disapproval, Bellingham had charged the cost of keeping a ‘superior’ servant to the house, and retained for his own use one of the priory buildings, thus depriving the monks of the annual rent of 10s.24 Suss. Arch. Collns. xi. 106-7. In a suit brought into Chancery at Easter 1481, Robert Langton*, the former constable of Bramber castle, alleged that Bellingham had renegued on a promise to give him 40 marks for procuring the marriage of Langton’s nephew Richard Waterton for Bellingham’s niece Elizabeth. After some delay, a new chancellor ordered on 8 Nov. 1484 that he should pay the £20 still owing.25 C1/62/237.

Towards the end of Edward IV’s reign there are signs that the Bellinghams were still trying to gain acceptance by the Yorkist regime.26 Roger Bellingham, probably Thomas’s son (as he was described as formerly of Lyminster, Sussex, and Kendal, Westmld.), received a gen. pardon in Apr. 1480: CPR, 1476-85, p. 195. Nevertheless, the continued presence of the Parrs in the good favour of the King ensured that their adversaries would remain under a cloud for some time longer, indeed until after the deaths of Sir William and John Parr. Thomas himself was not appointed to any ad hoc royal commissions until Richard III’s reign, when he served on a commission of array. There can be little doubt that he supported the accession of Henry VII, for on the same day in September 1485 he was not only appointed by the new King as a member of the Sussex bench, but also as collector of customs in Chichester; and he then remained a j.p. until his death. About the time of these changes, Bellingham arranged the marriage of his daughter Joan to Ralph Shirley (d.1509) of Wiston, newly promoted by as an esquire for the King’s body. He was also expanding his landed interests. Shirley had leased to him the manor of Erringham Braiose, and he was now able to acquire on a more permanent basis that of Erringham Walstead nearby, probably by purchasing it from its new lord, Thomas West, Lord de la Warre, who had been granted the barony of Bramber forfeited by the duke of Norfolk. This allowed him to farm the whole of Erringham as a single unit.27 Suss. Arch. Collns. liv. 168; cxviii. 261; Vis. Suss. 7. Doubtless so that he could claim exemption from taxation as a baron of the Cinque Ports, Bellingham had become an advocant (foreign freeman) of Rye in east Sussex, where he held property in the market place.28 E179/189/96; E. Suss. RO, Rye mss, acct. bk. 60/3, ff. 4, 12v; 77/3.

Bellingham died on 25 Mar. 1490. He had apparently settled Erringham Walkstead on his second son, Edward, but the rest of his holdings, including the manor of Yapton, passed to his eldest son, Ralph, then not far short of attaining his majority.29 CIPM Hen. VII, i. 641; VCH Suss. v. 250; vi (1), 151. In the course of the next few years Bellingham’s executors, his widow Joan and son-in-law Shirley, were active in the court of common pleas in pursuit of his debtors.30 Add. 39377, ff. 45, 49, 52. The place of his family in Sussex society was confirmed in 1498 when Joan arranged the marriage of the heir to Agnes, daughter of Sir John Devenish, and grand-daughter of Thomas Hoo I*, Lord Hoo and Hastings.31 E. Suss. RO, Gage of Firle mss, SAS/G4/29B; Suss. IPM (Suss. Rec. Soc. xiv), 21-22.