GOSSE, Richard

Richard’s father, William Gosse, who had represented Bridgwater in Henry V’s first Parliament, held property in the town as well as at Stogursey and elsewhere in Somerset which was estimated for the purposes of taxation to be worth £20 13s. 4d. a year. His standing in the county was sufficiently high for the bishop of Bath and Wells to grant him a licence to have masses celebrated anywhere in the diocese.5 The Commons 1386-1421, iii. 213-14; Reg. Bubwith, i (Som. Rec. Soc. xxix), 105; Feudal Aids, vi. 503. Although William may have derived an income from trade, his activities in the service of the abbot of Cleeve, his feoffeeship of the Poynings and Beauchamp estates, and his executorship of the will of Sir Richard Stury’s widow,6 CIPM, xxi. 284; Reg. Chichele, ii. 8, 9, 31. all imply that he had received some training in the law and was a person of some distinction. He is last recorded in June 1427,7 Bridgwater Bor. Archs. 1400-45 (Som. Rec. Soc. lviii), no. 632. but it is uncertain when he died and his son Richard came into his inheritance. The latter is first mentioned, as a parishioner of St. Mary’s church in Bridgwater, in September 1429,8 Bridgwater Bor. Archs. 1400-45, no. 648. although his usual residence later in life was at Kidsbury in Wembdon, a family property just outside the town.9 VCH Som. vi. 330. That Richard’s income from land was assessed for taxation in 1436 at £16 p.a., somewhat less than his father’s, may be ascribed to his engagement in ‘diverse debates, actions and quarrels’ with regard to certain holdings in Somerset which his father had previously occupied, as well as to properties formerly belonging to John Cole†, a prosperous local merchant. He proved ultimately successful in establishing his ownership, for in May 1447 his adversary, Robert, son of John Henton†, publicly admitted that he had never had title or right to the disputed estate, that all his actions had been neither ‘just ne lawfull’ and that all the ‘pretenses’ made by Gosse were in fact true.10 E159/212, recorda Hil. rot. 14 (vii); The Commons 1386-1421, ii. 626; CCR, 1441-7, pp. 472, 490-1.

Although his home was in or near Bridgwater, Gosse sat in Parliament for two different parliamentary boroughs, those of Weymouth and Taunton. The link between Bridgwater and the Dorset borough of Weymouth was one of feudal lordship, for the young Richard, duke of York, inherited both that of Weymouth and a third part of Bridgwater on the death of his uncle Edmund Mortimer, earl of March, in 1425. It may be the case that Gosse was involved in the administration of the Mortimer estates during York’s minority, yet no record has been found of an association between him and the burgesses of Weymouth who elected him to the Commons four years later. There is a greater likelihood that he was personally acquainted with the townsmen of Taunton, not far away from Bridgwater, for his father had been party to a grant of land there to the prioress and sisters of the White Hall, Ilchester. Indeed, he himself may well have had interests in property in the town; at least, in the summer of 1451 he alleged that Walter Portman* had forged muniments relating to his holdings in Taunton and elsewhere, after stealing the originals along with goods worth 20 marks from his house at Bridgwater.11 C143/445/19; CP40/762, rot. 53.

Gosse’s participation in the affairs of Bridgwater is well documented, and lasted for at least 25 years. As one of the leading burgesses he attested parliamentary elections in the 1430s; acted as a feoffee of local property;12 Ibid. nos. 678-9. and served as steward of the merchant guild in 1441 (as such formally presenting a chaplain to the chantry of the Virgin in his parish church). From 1434 until the mid 1450s he witnessed many deeds in the town, his standing being affirmed by his allotted place at the head of the list of witnesses. This also suggests that he held a position of considerable authority, perhaps as steward or recorder.13 Ibid. nos. 666, 680-2, 690, 696, 698, 700, 706, 725; Bridgwater Bor. Archs. 1445-68 (Som. Rec. Soc. lx), no 772; CCR, 1435-41, pp. 338-9. Furthermore, the bailiff’s account of 1438 recorded a payment to him (for an unexplained reason), of 40s., a sum greatly in excess of the annual fee of 13s. 4d. regularly paid by the commonalty to the prominent local lawyer Alexander Hody*.14 Bridgwater Bor. Archs. 1400-45, no. 686.

Gosse’s prominence in Bridgwater derived in part from his office as collector of customs and subsidies in the port, which he occupied from November 1433 for a remarkably long period of over 22 years. It is worthy of note that he was not replaced in all that time, and that one of his fellow collectors, Richard Walshawe, served at his side for more than a decade. Gosse received regular rewards at the Exchequer for his diligence,15 E403/721, m. 5; 729, m. 4; 740, m. 7; 743, mm. 6, 7; 753, m. 3; 755, m. 10; 762, m. 1; 769, m. 4; 773, m. 7; 777, m. 5; 781, m. 5; 796, m. 4. although in 1451 he and Walshawe were fined 40d. on the technicality that they had lacked sufficient warrant to exercise the office of collectors of tunnage and poundage from 1 Apr. 1449 and of customs from November 1449, and in the following year 5s. was extracted from Gosse’s property in Kidsbury as a distraint for contempt.16 E159/227, recorda Hil. rot. 13; E199/40/20. His duties while customer included commissioning ships for the passage of the duke of York to France in 1436 and of that of the earl of Huntingdon from Plymouth in 1439; and he was instructed to seize for the Crown a vessel illegally taken at sea in 1443. As customer, too, he was responsible for handing substantial sums of money to Sir John Radcliffe* as repayment for his loans to the Crown, and made a final account with Radcliffe’s executors in May 1452.17 CPR, 1436-41, p. 247; E122/113/57, no. 13. His duties sometimes took him overseas. For instance, in April 1446 he was granted letters of protection for a year as engaged in the victualing of the fortress of Le Crotoy in Picardy, under its captain Lord Bourgchier, only for the letters to be cancelled eight months later as he had been too busy at Westminster to set sail.18 CPR, 1446-52, p. 27.

Gosse, usually styled ‘gentleman’, was often involved in the affairs of other members of the gentry of Somerset. For example, he was enfeoffed of the property in Bridgwater and elsewhere belonging to William Thomas esquire, and witnessed deeds relating to his estate.19 Bridgwater Bor. Archs. 1400-45, nos. 684, 701-2, 725. Furthermore, he attended the shire elections held at Ilchester for the Parliaments of 1447, 1449 (Feb.) and 1450, on the first of these occasions attesting the indenture for the return of Sir Edward Hull*, the constable of Bridgwater castle, and on the others doing so on behalf of Bridgwater’s legal counsel Alexander Hody. Gosse was personally acquainted with both men. He had stood bail for Hody in the autumn of 1447 when he had been appealed in the King’s bench as an accessory to the murder of Edward Cullyford*, one of the coroners of Somerset,20 KB27/745, rot. 28. and he was to provide securities at the Exchequer for Hull in December 1448, so that he might obtain keeping of a manor to which he had laid a dubious claim.21 CFR, xviii. 105. Not infrequently, Gosse was called upon to be a juror at inquisitions post mortem held in the county, doing so following the deaths of such important landowners as Sir Thomas Stawell†, Sir Thomas Brooke*, Elizabeth, Lady Audley, and Richard Beauchamp, earl of Warwick.22 CIPM, xxv. 184, 204, 268; xxvi. 576.

Following Gosse’s dismissal as customer in 1455 little more is recorded about him. His tenement on the north side of High Street, Bridgwater, and his plot in the ‘Blakelonde’ were mentioned in the local records in 1455, but two years later another house of his, in St. Mary Street, was said to be no longer in his possession.23 Bridgwater Bor. Archs. 1445-68, nos. 780, 795. Perhaps he had recently died. His death certainly occurred before November 1461, for it was then that his widow and executrix Margery, together with William Gosse, described as the heir and tenant of his lands, obtained royal pardons for any outstanding debts and arrears arising from his post as collector of customs.24 CPR, 1461-7, p. 55.. William, Richard’s son, who had represented their home town of Bridgwater in the Parliaments of February 1449 and 1460, was retained as legal counsel by the local authorities in succession to Hody, with the same annual fee of one mark.25 Som. Archs., Sanford of Nynehead mss, DD\SF/1562; Bridgwater Bor. Archs. 1445-68, no. 850. He inherited our MP’s land in Kidsbury, but he was not Richard’s only child, for after his death in 1501 the heirs to this and to very substantial properties in Bridgwater, Taunton, Cossington and Stogursey, were his two nieces.26 VCH Som. vi. 330; C1/240/31. Another putative son of Richard Gosse achieved even greater distinction, albeit in the Church. This was Master Nicholas Gosse, B.Th., who rose by 1466 to be chancellor of Exeter cathedral, where he remained for 20 years.27 Biog. Reg. Univ. Oxf. ed. Emden, ii. 795.