SPENCER, John I

It was as ‘of Beverley’, another borough in the East Riding, that Spencer purchased the freedom of Hull in 1424.5 Bench bk. 2, BRE 1, p. 265. He appears to have maintained links with Beverley in later years, since in the mid 1450s he and William Spencer senior of that town (perhaps his brother or father) pursued a lawsuit against John Grantham, a merchant from Lincoln, over a debt of £30 6s. 8d.6 CPR, 1452-61, pp. 185, 266. As an earlier lawsuit at Westminster of the previous decade in which he was involved – on that occasion as the defendant – indicates, Spencer also had dealings in London. In pleadings of Michaelmas term 1445, the plaintiff, John Clampard, a smith from the City and a master of the ordnance for Richard, duke of York, sought repayment of a loan of £6 he claimed to have afforded Spencer in June 1441. In response, the latter sought to treat with his opponent and it is possible that the matter was settled out of court.7 CP40/739, rot. 138.

Clampard’s suit identified Spencer as a ‘merchant’ and a couple of customs accounts show that he imported iron worth £13 6s. 8d. in 1452-3 and exported a small quantity of unfinished cloth seven years later.8 E122/61/71, 74. Spencer appears to have had a business partner in Richard Anson* and each of them possessed a share in La Marie, one of the vessels that put to sea to defend local shipping in 1449.9 Bench bk. 3a, BRB 1, f. 11. In the same period he and Anson were involved in a dispute with the mayor of York, John Karr*, to whom the King had entrusted the task of inquiring into illegal trade with Iceland after the Hull authorities had failed to act on an earlier commission to do so. In 1448 or early 1449, Karr and several fellow York merchants sued Spencer, Anson and the mayor of Hull, John Steton*, in the Chancery, claiming that the defendants had secured false indictments against them in revenge for the making of that inquiry and that, as a result, the merchants of York dare no longer pursue their commercial activities in the port. This prompted the King to order the Hull authorities to desist from their intimidation on pain of £500.10 C1/17/111; Kingston-upon-Hull recs., corporation letters BRL 1.

The first office Spencer is known to have held at Hull was a Crown appointment, that of a searcher of ships, which he took up alongside Richard Scoles* on 1 Feb. 1438. He and Scoles assumed their responsibilities in spite of a lawsuit that their predecessors, Robert Haddlesey and Robert Beaume, had begun against them just two days earlier. Haddlesey and Beaume informed the barons of the Exchequer that Spencer and Scoles, along with Adam Douce, a woolman from Beverley, and 16 other unknown accomplices, had assaulted them and prevented them from carrying out their duties. On the following 12 Feb. Spencer and Scoles appeared before the barons in person and entered a plea of not guilty. Douce, however, could not be found and thereafter the case was continually postponed from term to term amidst problems in assembling a local jury. It was still pending when Scoles died in late 1440 or early 1441.11 E159/214, recorda Hil. rots. 11d, 20d. Ironically, Spencer and Beaume found themselves serving together in the meantime, since the Crown named them for the same office when it made a fresh appointment of searchers at Hull in October 1438.12 CFR, xvii. 58. Just under a year later, Spencer was chosen as one of the bailiffs of the town. He did not serve a full term as such, since after the burgesses secured a new charter in May 1440 he took up office on the 23rd of that month as the first sheriff of the newly-constituted town and county of Kingston-upon-Hull.13 Kingston-upon-Hull bench bk. 3, BRE 2, f. 9v.

By January 1447 Spencer was an alderman, and his status as of one of Hull’s leading burgesses was reflected in a royal pardon, referring to him as a ‘gentleman’ as well as a merchant, that he obtained on the 20th of that month.14 C67/39, m. 13. But he was described as a merchant only in another such pardon on 11 July 1452: C67/40, m. 25. Later in the same decade, he was elected to his first Parliament, after his fellow aldermen had nominated him as one of their four candidates for the Commons.15 Bench bk. 3a, BRB 1, ff. 5v, 7v. There is, however, no evidence of the activities of him and his fellow MP, Seman Burton*, during this long and politically contentious assembly. At Michaelmas 1451 he was appointed to the first of his terms as an auditor of the chamberlains’ accounts, and he was elected mayor a year later. His mayoralty appears to have passed without incident and, as was traditional for outgoing holders of that office, he was appointed one of the town’s coroners at the end of his term. On 12 Jan. 1454 Spencer was among those aldermen who decided to send the then mayor, Richard Anson, to London to plead with the Council over the town’s farm of the office of deputy admiral.16 Ibid. f. 31v. The burgesses’ petition was successful, and on 1 Oct. 1455 Spencer was himself chosen to hold the admiral’s court, a duty he performed for at least the next two years.

In July 1455 Spencer was again nominated for the Commons. On this occasion the commonalty did not choose him, although he put his name to the indenture naming Richard Anson and Nicholas Ellis* as the town’s MPs.17 Ibid. f. 46. When Parliament was next summoned, in the tense atmosphere following the battle at Blore Heath, Spencer’s name was once more put forward and on 12 Nov. 1459 he and William Eland* were returned to the Commons. Late in the following year he took an active part in organizing the town’s defences. With Ellis and Hugh Clitheroe* he was appointed to oversee the works at the North Gate and, like his fellow aldermen, he contributed to the cost of a heavy iron chain put across the south end of the haven. His own political sympathies are unknown, but, despite service in the contentious 1459 Parliament, he was easily able to adapt to the change of regime. On 2 Apr. 1461 the new King, Edward IV, wrote to the burgesses to direct them to choose a new mayor in place of Anson who had fallen on the Yorkist side at the battle of Wakefield. Two days later, Spencer was elected and he immediately set about reconciling the town to the new regime. On 1 May Lancastrian sympathisers were expelled and four days later a delegation of aldermen rode to York to submit to the new King, to whom the burgesses made a gift of wine.18 Ibid. ff. 67v, 74, 76v-79.

Following the end of his impromptu mayoralty in September 1461, Spencer served another term as one of the coroners of Hull. In early 1463 he was again elected to the Commons, this time alongside Hugh Clitheroe, but in the event neither of them sat. Originally summoned to meet at York on 5 Feb., the Parliament was twice postponed, and when the sheriff of Hull held a fresh election on 3 Apr. William Eland and John Day† were returned to the Commons instead.19 Ibid. ff. 74, 81, 87. Later in the same April, the warden of the east march, John Neville, Lord Montagu, wrote to the burgesses of Hull requesting 20 men to serve against the Lancastrians in the north. Spencer, along with Nicholas Ellis and Robert Auncell*, contributed one man, fully armed and arrayed, to the town’s contingent and 40d. to meet its costs.20 Ibid. ff. 92-93.

By now Spencer was nearing the end of his life, and he made his will on 5 Sept. 1464. Unusually for an alderman, he sought burial in the small parish church of St. Mary, to which he left 40s., rather than that of Holy Trinity. He left property in Hull that had once belonged to Simon Bedale to his eldest son, Simon, with remainder to three other sons, Thomas, Edmund and Nicholas, and a daughter, Joan, and he also gave his younger children £10 each. The remainder of his property there he left to the mayor and commonalty, with instructions that they were to establish a priest in St. Mary’s to pray for the souls of himself and his first wife, Katherine, and of Simon Bedale and his wife, Margaret. He made further provision for his spiritual welfare in the form of bequests to the mendicant orders in the town, and by instructing his executors to fund a priest from the sale of his goods to sing for his soul for one year. Spencer provided for his widow, Joan, by assigning her all his property in Beverley for her lifetime with remainder to his heirs. He appointed his wife and eldest son as his executors, along with the chaplain, Thomas Dalyson, and John Titelote*. He was dead by 30 Sept. 1464, when John Day was elected an alderman in his place, and probate was granted on the following 4 Nov.21 Ibid. f. 96; York registry wills, prob. reg. 2, ff. 485v-6, 489.