GAYNCOTE, Walter

A merchant, Gayncote may have been a younger son or other kinsman of the man who represented Dartmouth in the Parliament of 1426. Whereas his putative elder brother John and their kinsman Nicholas Gayncote were trading from Dartmouth in the 1460s, Walter sought his fortune in the north of the county and settled at Barnstaple, from where he may have traded with Ireland.3 CP40/779, rots. 184d, 452d, 453, 573; 780, rot. 154; 781, rot. 256. Nevertheless, he maintained close ties with his relatives in the south, particularly Joan, widow of John Gayncote senior (perhaps his mother) with whom he was associated in September 1453 in a bond for £4 6s. 8d. to the mayor of Dartmouth, Nicholas Stebbing*.4 CP40/779, rot. 452d; Watkin, 400.

Yet, the focus of Gayncote’s life and commercial activities unquestionably lay in the Bristol Channel and despite occasional clashes such as one in about 1455 with the local merchant Bernard Bromwych whom he accused of housebreaking,5 CP40/779, rots. 452d, 453, 573. he generally seems to have commanded respect among his Barnstaple neighbours, who called upon him (alongside the prominent lawyers William Boef* and John Vampage*), for tasks such as the representation in Chancery of the interests of the local orphan Joan, daughter of Robert Barry, against powerful opponents who included the influential lawyers and Crown servants Thomas Brown III*, William Hyndeston* and John Wydeslade*.6 C254/145/274; C1/17/315. By the mid 1450s, Gayncote’s standing in Barnstaple was sufficient for him to be elected to the mayoralty of the town, but even before assuming this office he had been chosen to represent the townsmen in Parliament, and while sitting in the Commons he was appointed searcher of ships in the Bridgwater district.7 Gribble, 200; CFR, xix. 111, 173. Walter’s sudden appearance on the public stage is difficult to explain, but may have owed something to the political crisis that was shaking Devon at this time. Even while Parliament was in session Thomas Courtenay, earl of Devon, had sought to settle his long-running quarrel with William, Lord Bonville*, by violent means, and bands of both peers’ armed retainers were sweeping across the region. Central government and local communities alike found difficulty in finding men who were prepared to undertake administrative tasks under these circumstances, and it is possible that a willingness to discharge such duties was alone sufficient to secure Gayncote’s election to both House of Commons and mayoralty, as well as his appointment to office under the Crown. His dismissal from the searcher-ship not long after completing his term of mayor in the autumn of 1456, by which time the situation in the south-west had stabilized, may lend some support to this interpretation.

Gayncote’s Barnstaple neighbours were evidently content with his conduct of the mayoralty, and re-elected him for a second term of office just a year later, and it may have been in the course of his official duties that he came to arrest one John Gregory, a man who proved to be exceptionally well connected. Two of his patrons, the local gentleman John Orchard, and – far more importantly – William Bourgchier, Lord Fitzwaryn, challenged Gayncote’s actions in the court of common pleas, and litigation over the matter continued into Edward IV’s reign.8 CP40/788, rot. 304; 803, rot. 38.

Little else is known of Gayncote’s career. In April 1468 his knowledge of shipping in the Bristol Channel was once more called upon when he was included in a commission to investigate acts of piracy off the coast near Barnstaple, and Walter, who may himself have suffered at the hand of pirates in his trading ventures, took this task seriously and was one of the men who actually executed the commission.9 CPR, 1467-77, p. 168.