BEST, Thomas, of Southover by Lewes, Suss.

It is possible that this MP was related to a namesake who lived at Caterham in Surrey and was appointed to collect parliamentary subsidies in his home county on four occasions between 1419 and 1430. That Thomas Best, a sheep farmer, was among those required to take the oath against maintenance as administered in Surrey in 1434. Suss. Arch. Collns. xcvi. 29; CPR, 1429-36, p. 381. He was assessed for taxation in 1436 on land worth £5 p.a.: Surr. Hist. Centre, Woking, Loseley mss, LM/1719. However, Best the MP is known to have lived in Southover, a suburb of the borough of Lewes, which he first represented in the Parliament of 1447. In the sixteenth century it was to be claimed that it had long been the custom for the inhabitants of Southover to elect one of the Members for Lewes at their own costs to every alternate Parliament. If the practice had indeed been going on in Henry VI’s reign then perhaps Best was Southover’s choice; yet if such a provision did exist for Southover to elect Members to alternate Parliaments the suburb would not have been entitled to return Best again in 1460. Meanwhile, on 7 July 1450, after the outbreak of Cade’s rebellion, Best had taken out a royal pardon with others resident in the same township, including William Delve*. This need not imply that they had been out with Cade; merely that in a period of considerable turbulence it seemed prudent to gain exoneration from any legal processes which might be started against them. CPR, 1446-52, p. 372.

In November 1451 Best obtained at the Exchequer a lease for 20 years of a virgate of land pertaining to the Crown in Piddinghoe, not far from his home. CFR, xviii. 249. One of his mainpernors was William Fagger, son of the former MP of the same name, with whom he was often to be associated subsequently. Although he had been described in his pardon as a yeoman, it is possible that like Fagger he had been trained in the law. At least, this is the inference to be drawn from his frequent appearance in conveyances of land in Sussex in association with others of the legal profession. For instance, transactions undertaken on Fagger’s behalf regarding the manor of Oram, which culminated in a collusive suit in the court of common pleas, brought him into contact with Edmund Mille*, Bartholomew Bolney* and Humphrey Heuster*. CP25(1)/241/90/19, 91/25; Add. 39376, f. 107. Furthermore, a final concord relating to property in Rottingdan and Baldesden which was apparently conveyed to Best himself in 1457, saw him associated not only with Fagger and Bolney but also with the prominent lawyer Thomas Hoo II*. CP25(1)/241/91/14. Best was also party to transactions of the late 1450s and early 1460s concerning the manor of Worth in Little Horsted, which was conveyed by members of the Honyton family to that of his former colleague Delve. CP25(1)/241/91/24, 92/7. In April 1467 he was linked with Heuster in completing the foundation of a chantry in Chichester cathedral in memory of the late William Okehurst*. They purchased a royal licence to endow the chantry with land worth £10 p.a. CPR, 1467-77, p. 14. Three months later Best’s unexpired Exchequer lease was granted to someone else, CFR, xx. 205. but he appears to have lived on a few years more, and was probably the ‘gentleman’ formerly of Southover and Lewes who in 1472 was sued in the court of common pleas by John Sherman† for a debt of £33 10s. CP40/844, rot. 35.

There is the possibility that the Thomas Best who was engaged as an official on the earl of Northumberland’s estates in Sussex as deputy receiver in 1486-7 and receiver in the following year, was the son of our MP. Petworth House mss, 7232-4 (MAC/25-27). The latter may also have left a daughter. Visitation pedigrees of the Thatcher family of Sussex begin with a John Thatcher who lived at Ringmer, near Lewes, and is said to have married ‘Margaret, daughter of Thomas Best’. Vis. Suss. (Harl. liii), 53-54. It may be that the pedigrees were mistaken about the name of Thatcher’s wife, for in the will made in 1499 by John Thatcher of Ringmer he requested prayers for his late wife Alice and for the souls of Thomas Best and Joan his wife. Although no relationship is specified it seems likely that the Bests were Alice’s parents. PCC 16 Blamyr (PROB11/13, ff. 139v-140).