REDNESSE, Robert

How this Yorkshireman came to be elected for the Sussex borough of East Grinstead is a mystery. The answer may lie in his employment in the administration of the duchy of Lancaster estates, of which East Grinstead formed a part, although such employment is not recorded before Rednesse’s appointment as feodary in Sussex in June 1461. Perhaps he had held an undocumented subordinate position as deputy feodary when elected to the Commons two years earlier. The Coventry Parliament of 1459 notoriously passed acts of attainder against Richard, duke of York, and his allies, but the government of York’s son Edward IV bore no grudge against the likes of minor officials such as Rednesse. The duchy estates in Sussex came into the hands of Elizabeth Wydeville following her marriage to the King, so Rednesse collected revenues on her behalf for the rest of the reign,4 SC6/1028/6. in the 1470s being described as bailiff of her liberties. His post as feodary may have encompassed that of coroner of the honour of the Eagle, and it was in the latter capacity that he conducted inquests in 1479 and 1480.

Perhaps it was Rednesse’s position as a long-serving minister of the queen which led to his downfall when Richard III seized the throne and the Wydevilles fell from power. He joined the rebellion of the autumn of 1483, and as a consequence his lands in distant Holderness (which he had presumably inherited from his family) were forfeited. His son John, who also numbered among the rebels, was arrested at their Sussex home at Hailsham. John’s captors, neighbours of theirs, were rewarded with 30 of the ‘beestes called noot’ confiscated from him.5 BL Harl. MS 433 ed. Horrox and Hammond, i. p. xxvii; ii. 35. Robert obtained a royal pardon on 23 Feb. 1484, in which he was described as a ‘gentleman of Hailsham and Redness’, but the duchy offices he had held for more than 22 years were taken from him.6 C67/51, m. 12; Somerville, 619; DL41/838, f. 117. He is not recorded thereafter.