HAYNE, John

Hayne’s family background cannot be established with absolute certainty, for his name was not an uncommon one in fifteenth-century Somerset.4 It seems unlikely that the MP was the son of Walter Hayne to whom John Hill I* of Spaxton granted a tenement in Edington in 1425: E210/9472. Equally, it is impossible to be certain whether it was the Bath citizen who was the husband of Isabel Hayne who in 1435 was complaining of being assaulted at Stogursey by a local husbandman: CP40/697, rot. 54. By the time of Henry V’s death John, who manufactured and traded in cloth (being variously described as a weaver, cloth-maker, chapman or merchant), had acquired property in Bath, including a tenement with outbuildings situated opposite the Cross Bath, previously held by Alice, wife of William Bartlett, the daughter and heiress of John Compe.5 Bath Ancient Deeds, BC151/5/27-29. Other property transactions further afield became subject to legal challenge. It was probably he who along with Richard Setter alias Milers* of Wells and others was accused in 1420 of unlawfully depriving John and Alice Rewe of two messuages and seven acres of land in Wells, and he may have been settling this score when in April 1438 he as part of a presenting jury accused Rewe of having concealed a treasure of £500 formerly belonging to King Richard II which he had extracted from its hiding place in the fireplace of a house at Mark.6 C1/5/200; KB9/230B/231, 233. Only limited evidence of Hayne’s trading connexions has been discovered, but in the summer of 1424 he (alongside two fellow Bath burgesses, William Honybrigge and Robert Newlyn†) was suing John Galbridge, a Gloucester gentleman, for a debt of £6.7 CP40/654, rot. 236d. In general terms, Hayne was evidently well regarded by his neighbours. He was occasionally empanelled on local juries,8 KB9/230B/231, 233. in 1432-3 he served as cofferer of Bath, and at some point before availing himself of the general pardon granted by Henry VI in 1437 (at the end of Hayne’s third Parliament) he had probably also served as a bailiff of his city.9 As the pardon covered offences committed before 2 Sept. 1431, Hayne may have held the office before that date: C67/38, m. 8. He later went on to act as one of the city coroners, and was serving in that office at the time of the brutal murder of the former mayor, Walter Rich*, in 1446.10 KB9/256/64. He is not heard of subsequently.11 It was a different man, a burgess of Bristol, who in 1459 was appointed searcher of ships in that port: CFR, xix. 220.