ELLINGBRIDGE, John (d.1473), of Bletchingley and Merstham, Surr.

Until the fifteenth century this MP’s family had been most prominent in Worcestershire, where an ancestor, Adam de Elmerugg (d.1308), held the manor of Elmbridge near Dodderhill, as well as lands in Herefordshire and Shropshire. CIPM, v. 90; C.J. Robinson, Mansions and Manors of Herefs. 151; R.W. Eyton, Antiqs. Salop, iv. 318, 333-4. These estates descended to Roger Ellingbridge, our MP’s father, who was granted the reversion of Elmbridge in 1398 when he came of age. CIPM, vii. 13, xiv. 120-1, xv. 41-42; VCH Worcs. ii. 61. It was probably soon afterwards that the family moved to Surrey, and Roger was subsequently named as one of the gentry of the county who were to take the oath against law-breakers in May 1434. By then he had married Joan, widow of Nicholas James, the wealthy London ironmonger and alderman and in the summer of 1434 Joan and her new husband took receipt from Thomas Badby, one of James’s executors, of the 500 marks settled upon her by her late husband. Joan may have kept as her dower the property James had held in Croydon, for Roger was now described as ‘of Croydon’ and developed the family’s interests in the neighbourhood. CPR, 1429-36, p. 380; Cal. P. and M. London, 1413-37, p. 274. Our MP was among those who held property near the King’s highway in Croydon in 1471: CCR, 1468-76, p. 225. In the autumn of 1437, shortly before his death, Roger was appointed sheriff of Surrey and Sussex, an indication of the extent to which he had become established in his adopted county. CFR, xvii. 3; Surr. Arch. Collns. iii. 12. He left an impressive collection of estates: in the income tax assessment taken the previous year he had been said to hold lands worth a total of £80 p.a. in Surrey, Worcestershire, Shropshire, Staffordshire and London. Loseley mss, LM/1719. As well as Elmbridge these estates almost certainly included the manor of Tilsop in Shropshire, long held by the family, and perhaps Aspley in Staffordshire which still pertained to the Ellingbridges in the sixteenth century. Eyton, iv. 333-4; C142/24/64.

Little is known of our MP before his father’s death, although as early as 1431 he had succeeded to the family’s lands in Mawne Nicholl in Herefordshire. Feudal Aids, ii. 420. His earliest appearance in a Surrey context was as one of the recipients of a gift of goods and chattels made by a London carpenter in January 1439 when he was described as a ‘gentleman’ of Surrey. CCR, 1435-41, p. 361. It seems very likely that his marriage to his stepmother’s daughter Isabel James had been arranged by their respective parents before his father’s death. It was to be a successful union for together the couple may have produced as many as 18 children. Isabel eventually inherited a number of properties in St. Olave’s parish, Southwark, which, in his will of 1433, her father had bequeathed to his widow, Joan, with the specific instruction that after her death Isabel should have them. She and her sister Anne (who likewise inherited certain of their father’s holdings, in Croydon), received a bequest of £200 each for their marriages. PCC 18 Luffenham (PROB11/3, ff. 138v-141). Following the death of Roger Ellingbridge, our MP’s stepmother took as her third husband William Hextall*, a prominent figure in Kent and Surrey, and this marriage led to the further intermingling of the Hextall and Ellingbridge families. Anne James (our MP’s step-sister and sister-in-law) was married to Hextall’s brother Thomas*, while a third one of Joan’s daughters (most likely the child of Roger Ellingbridge), married Humphrey Hextall, another member of their family. When William Hextall made his ‘last will’ in April 1446 he provided that if his daughter Margaret happened to die without issue then his wife’s three daughters (Isabel Ellingbridge, Anne Hextall and Joan Hextall) were each to receive 100 marks from the sale of his lands. Loseley mss, LM/2011/40. William, who lived on for several years more, asked our MP to be a feoffee of his lands in Kent. Loseley mss, LM/341/73. Ellingbridge’s interest in his wife’s inheritance in Southwark was to be strengthened and confirmed by transactions with Thomas Hextall and his wife several years later in 1462. CP25(1)/232/75/4.

Ellingbridge’s links with William Hextall proved important for his career, and played a part in his first appearance in Parliament, as a representative for Bletchingley, at a time when he was still relatively young and inexperienced, having not yet been appointed to any commissions or other administrative duties in Surrey. Bletchingley may have been his main place of residence at this stage: he held land called ‘Blackbusshes’ there and was a tenant of ‘Hernersland’, a plot included on a 1451 rental of the manor of Pendell, which belonged to William Uvedale II*. He was a near neighbour of Thomas Eylove* who, in 1453, conveyed to him 12 acres of land in Bletchingley known as ‘Sarysland’ and ‘Le Hyde’, and eight acres of meadow. Ibid; U. Lambert, Blechingley, 205, 290-1; VCH Surr. iv. 259. Nevertheless, it is likely that he owed his election to the Parliament of 1442 to the influence of Hextall, who was receiver of the estates in Kent and Surrey of the lord of the borough, Humphrey, earl of Stafford and later duke of Buckingham, as much as to his local connexions. The association was to lead to Ellingridge’s eventual appointment as steward of the Stafford estates in Surrey, a post that he seems to have held from about 1453 until his death.

In the meantime, Ellingbridge’s growing standing in the county, indicated by his presence among those who attested the shire election in the autumn of 1449, may have benefited the duke in other ways. In particular, his election to the Parliament of 1450 as a shire knight would have been welcomed by Buckingham in the aftermath of Cade’s revolt, during which two of the duke’s kinsmen, (Sir) Humphrey Stafford I* and William Stafford*, were murdered near his estate at Sevenoaks in Kent. Ellingbridge’s own concerns about the events of that summer prompted him to obtain a pardon in July. this he was described as a resident of Bletchingley. CPR, 1446-52, p. 373. general, the influence of the Staffords undoubtedly helped to establish Ellingbridge as a man whose landed wealth was complemented by a powerful network of allies and friends, many of them gained through his employment by Buckingham.

Ellingbridge consolidated his position in Surrey’s political society during the 1450s. Although not, apparently, chosen as an MP again, he attested the county election on another four occasions and was a member of a number of important royal commissions appointed after 1452. He began his long service on the county bench in January 1457, when his appointment as one of the quorum points to his having received training in the law. Even so, his admission as a fellow of Lincoln’s Inn was delayed until the autumn of 1467. C219/16/2, 6, 17/1, 2; L. Inn Adm. i. 16. At no time do his links with the Staffords appear to have affected his career adversely and he was still a regular presence on commissions during the reign of Edward IV, serving as a j.p. until his death. During this period Ellingbridge became a popular choice as a feoffee for prominent members of the Surrey gentry including Thomas Slyfield* and the Gaynesford family, such as John II* and Nicholas*, for whom he acted in the 1460s for transactions concerning the manor of Poyle. He was an executor of John II’s will, CPR, 1452-61, p. 599; 1461-7, p. 423; PCC 4 Godyn (PROB11/5, f. 27). and this connexion proved a fruitful one, for it was probably around this time that Ellingbridge’s eldest son and heir, Thomas, married Elizabeth, one of Nicholas Gaynesford’s daughters. VCH Surr. iv. 186. He was also connected with the Arderne family of Warwickshire which owned estates in Surrey: in early 1449 he had been appointed as an executor of the will of John Arderne and was subsequently included among the feoffees appointed by his heir, also named John, for lands near Reigate. Surr. Arch. Collns. xi. 145-6. In May 1451, while still serving in the Commons, he had been chosen as an arbitrator in the lawsuits between Nicholas Carew* of Beddington and his two nieces, as nominated on behalf of the latter. Add. Ch. 23656. As well as these relatively mundane administrative tasks, Ellingbridge was occasionally singled out for other duties. In October 1461, for instance, he was among those appointed to sequester the goods and income of the priory of Tandridge as a result of an inquiry which had uncovered evidence of waste and bad management. Surr. Arch. Collns. ix. 58.

In 1445 Ellingbridge had been named as the executor of the will of Ralph Astley*, who had earlier represented Hertfordshire, Lambeth Palace Lib., Reg. Stafford, ff. 135-6. but otherwise he rarely involved himself in affairs outside Surrey. On one of the few occasions that he did so it was a result of his connexion with the Staffords and their associates. A dispute of the late 1440s concerning property in Kent shows him acting as a feoffee with John Pympe, a Stafford councillor, for one Hugh Stanlowe who had been trying for some time to take possession of lands in Yalding, Brenchley and Tridley. The matter was submitted to the arbitration of two men, one of whom was William Hextall, who awarded that the property should be released to Stanlowe on payment of £40. When Stanlowe’s opponent, John Orgar, refused to release the property Ellingbridge and Pympe resorted to a petition to Chancery. CCR, 1441-7, pp. 446, 448; Rawcliffe, 224; C1/16/502. Ellingbridge himself was not averse to holding up transactions involving property, for around the same time another petition to Chancery alleged that he and other feoffees, including Thomas Hoo II*, had failed to settle lands in Wooton and Oakley in Surrey upon Robert Bardsey and his wife Agnes (daughter of William Skerne) as required by their marriage contract. C1/26/447.

The extent to which Ellingbridge enlarged the family’s landed inheritance during his career is difficult to assess, although there are several indicators to suggest that he did make some additions to the Ellingbridge estates, particularly in Surrey. The most significant of these was the manor of Albury near Merstham which subsequently became the family’s main place of residence. The manor seems to have been acquired, possibly in the early 1450s, from John Timperley I*, who had been granted a royal licence in 1449 to ‘empark’ lands at Gatton and Merstham. O. Manning and W. Bray, Surr. ii. 258; VCH Surr. iii. 216; CChR, vi. 112; It was as ‘of Merstham, senior, gentleman’ that he was pardoned in 1468: C67/46, m. 36. At some stage the manor of Croham was also added to the family’s Surrey estates which, on the death of John’s grandson, Thomas, in 1507 were said to be worth £41 13s. 4d. p.a. CIPM Hen. VII, iii. nos. 467, 1137; E150/1066/3. Elsewhere, however, our MP apparently disposed of part of his inheritance. In 1465 he conveyed to Thomas Acton*, another who had represented Bletchingley as a servant of the Staffords in the 1440s, his manor of Aldenham near Bridgnorth in Shropshire, together with the hereditary office of chief forester of Shirlett. Salop Archs., Acton mss, 1093/2/170.

Ellingbridge’s first wife, Isabel, died in 1472 and was buried in Merstham church, where a stone effigy, apparently of her father, Nicholas James, dressed in his fur-edged aldermanic robes, had been erected, perhaps on Ellingbridge’s instructions. VCH Surr. iii. 220. Such an expression of sentiment did not, however, prevent him from marrying for a second time within five months of Isabel’s death. His new wife, Anne, was the daughter of a prominent Surrey gentleman, John Prophet, and, perhaps more significantly, widow of Ralph St. Leger of Ulcombe in Kent who had died in 1470, shortly after being appointed constable of Leeds castle. Archaeologia Cantiana, xci. 112; W.D. Belcher, Kentish Brasses, ii. 139. It was two of St. Leger’s relatives, Thomas† and James St. Leger, who acted as trustees when, as part of the arrangements for the marriage, the manor and advowson of Chaldon in Surrey were settled upon Anne for life, with remainder after her death to our MP and his heirs. CIPM Hen.VII, iii. 1137. The marriage proved short-lived, however, for on 8 Feb. 1473 Ellingbridge died, having barely had time to settle the other family estates upon Anne and his heirs. No inquisition post mortem survives, but the writs sent to escheators reveal that he was believed to hold lands in at least six counties. The family estates in Worcestershire, Herefordshire and Shropshire were augmented by his own acquisitions which seem to have also included property in Warwickshire, perhaps acquired through his connexion with the Arderne family. CFR, xxi. 38. He was buried in a high marble tomb in Merstham parish church where a monumental brass depicts him and his two wives, as well as a group of seven daughters and an unknown number of sons, possibly as many as 11. VCH Surr. ii. 445; iii. 219-20; Collectanea Topographia et Genealogica ed. Nichols, v. 168-70. He was survived by Anne who presented to the church at Chaldon in 1476 as his widow and did so on two further occasions, initially with her third husband, Sir William Pecche* of Lullingstone in Kent, in 1481-2, and then alone following the latter’s death in 1488. VCH Surr. iii. 216; iv. 189; Surr. Arch. Collns. ii.11-12; v. 276; Belcher, i. 75; PCC 12 Milles (PROB11/8, f. 99v). She appears to have taken a keen interest in running Ellingbridge’s estates in Surrey and on several occasions during the reign of Henry VII held courts at Croham. VCH Surr. iv. 221.

Ellingbridge’s estates were eventually inherited by his eldest son, Thomas, the husband of Elizabeth Gaynesford. He died seised of the family lands in May 1497 and his burial took place in the Gaynesfords’ parish church at Carshalton where one of his sisters, Joan, was also to be buried on her death in 1524. PCC 15 Horne (PROB11/11, f. 120v); CFR, xxii. 24, 255. In the meantime the Ellingbridge lands passed to our MP’s grandson, also named Thomas (d.1507). CFR, xxii. 391-2; C142/24/31, 59, 60, 64; E150/1066/3. Like his grandfather, Thomas was buried in Merstham parish church. The subsequent marriage of his infant daughter Anne took the Ellingbridge lands to the family of Sir John Dannett of Leicestershire, in whose keeping they remained well into the seventeenth century. Surr. Arch. Collns. iii. 11-12; C142/24/31; CIPM Hen. VII, iii. 467, 1137; VCH Surr. iii. 216.