FAGGER, William

More can be added to the earlier biography. The Commons 1386-1421, iii. 49.

In Michaelmas term 1439, William Fagger of Steyning brought a suit in the court of common pleas against a husbandman of Hartfield for failing to pay the agreed price of six marks for some malt he had purchased. CP40/715, rot. 119d. His son, William junior, was active as an attorney in the same court from the mid 1440s until 1461 or later, taking on briefs from clients from Sussex; CP40/740, rots. 316, 437, 461, att. rot. 6; 799, rot. 111; 800, rot. 179d; 802, rots. 108, 214. and was also employed as receiver of writs for the sheriff of Surrey and Sussex for several of the years between 1450 and 1463. CP40/756, rot. 109d; 759, rots. 120d, 264d; 779, rot. 118; 780, rot. 102; 795, rot. 138d; 799, rots. 116, 309d; 802, rots. 104, 287; 809, rot. 101d. From then until after February 1472 he served as clerk of the peace in his home county. E. Stephens, Clerks of Counties, 169: KB9/332/61d.

William Fagger ‘senior’, the MP, is last recorded in July 1448 when Thomas Northton made a quitclaim to him and his son of title to lands and tenements in Henfield, a few miles from Steyning. CP40/754, cart. rot. His namesake and descendants took their place among the gentry of the county, with manorial holdings at Horton and Oram (in Henfield), Add. 39376, ff. 106-7, 154; VCH Suss. vi (3), 142; CP40/797, rot. 264. and Ewelme in Steyning, VCH Suss. vi (1), 228; (3), 144; Add. 39376, ff. 189, 189v. and also possessed an estate at Weybridge in Surrey. CCR, 1476-85, no. 589; C1/34/45; Add. 39376, f. 197.