CHICHELE, William

Probably related to John Chichele, a resident of Bedford in the early fifteenth century,2 C.F. Farrar, Old Bedford, 111; Bedford bor. recs., subsidy roll 1416-17, Bor. BD1/6; CP25(1)/3/78/13. There is no evidence that Chichele was a relative of Henry Chichele, abp. of Canterbury, and his elder brothers, the London grocers William† and Robert† (the suggestion of HP Biogs. ed. Wedgwood and Holt, 189). The William and Robert Chichele who were parties to the conveyance of a manor at Great Barford, Beds., to the abp. in 1424 must have been the cleric’s grocer brothers: CP25(1)/6/78/6. Chichele was one of several burgesses who quarrelled with a local gentleman, Hugh Hasilden† of Goldington, in the late 1420s. In July 1427 Hasilden’s servant, John Meskeburgh, suffered a serious assault at Bedford from which he died a few days later. According to an inquest held immediately after his death, Chichele and Thomas Cheltenham, acting at the behest of the mayor of Bedford, Thomas Kempston*, had attacked him with sticks, dealing him several mortal blows to the head. A member of the commission of the peace for Bedfordshire, Hasilden was able to call upon the powerful support of three of his fellow j.p.s, John Mowbray, duke of Norfolk, John Holand, earl of Huntingdon and John Enderby*, and in due course Kempston, Chichele and Cheltenham found themselves in the Marshalsea prison in Southwark. In Easter term 1428 Meskeburgh’s widow (no doubt at Hasilden’s prompting) brought an appeal for murder against the three men in the court of King’s bench. Her appeal came before a jury, although the court released Kempston, who possessed an influential patron in the person of Sir John Cornwall, and Chichele on bail in the meantime. Chichele himself had at least one important friend, since his leading bailsman was Robert Scott*, a prominent member of the Huntingdonshire gentry. In the end the appeal came to nothing, for in the following autumn a jury sitting at Westminster found him and his fellow defendants not guilty.3 KB27/668, rot. 79; 671, rex rot. 3. Scott demonstrated some independence of mind in acting as Chichele’s surety, since he was associated with Hasilden’s supporter, the earl of Huntingdon, but the Meskeburgh affair suggests that the pattern of alliances and divisions within Bedfordshire in this period was not as clear cut as might appear. Particularly worth noting is the apparent willingness of Huntingdon and the duke of Norfolk to co-operate on behalf of Hasilden, given the antagonism said to have existed between the two peers in the late 1420s.4 As posited by R.E. Archer, ‘The Mowbrays’ (Oxf. Univ. D.Phil. thesis, 1984), 258-61.

Whether, like Kempston, Chichele was associated with Sir John Cornwall when Meskeburgh died is unknown. If ever linked with Cornwall, that association had ended by the time he came to attend the sessions of the peace held at Bedford in January 1439. The sessions, which he attended as a follower of Cornwall’s rival, Reynold, Lord Grey of Ruthin, degenerated into a violent confrontation between Grey’s supporters on the one hand and Cornwall (now Lord Fanhope) and his servants on the other. In the following May, he was among a large group of Grey’s men whom the Crown jointly pardoned for their part in the fracas.5 CPR, 1436-41, pp. 282-3.

The pardon, just like those he received on an individual basis in November 1446 and September 1470, described Chichele as a ‘yeoman’ but like his putative relative John Chichele he was a spicer by trade.6 C67/39, m. 20; 47, m. 3; Bor. BD1/6; CP25(1)/3/78/13. It was perhaps through his commercial activities that he came to know Walter Innyng of Bristol. Frequently known by his trade-name alias, it was as ‘William Spicer’ that he was returned to the Commons in 1447 (an election in which the attestors included Edward and Roger Spicer), although he was named as William Chichele in the indenture recording his election to the Commons of 1450. Away from Parliament, Chichele’s career as an office-holder in Bedford spanned a period of nearly 30 years. He completed the last of his three terms as mayor in 1476 and was still alive in June 1481 when party to a conveyance of borough land to Henry Rudyng, master of the local hospital of St. John the Baptist.7 Bedford bor. recs., deed 1481, Bor. BE2/78. There is no evidence that the MP had a younger namesake at Bedford. He had had previous dealings with the hospital, having in January 1450 obtained a lease of a meadow and five acres of arable in Bedford from William Hall, one of Rudyng’s predecessors. The lease had been for 30 years but in the event he had passed on his interest in these lands to the London mercer, William Redeknap, in early 1453. There is no other evidence for Chichele’s holdings, although it is possible that he had inherited the three messuages and other properties in Bedford that John Hervy and his wife had conveyed to John Chichele and his heirs in 1424.8 Ibid. deed 1454, Bor. BE2/64; CP25(1)/3/78/13.