JOHN, David, of Dartington and Exeter, Devon.

David John’s origins are obscure, but his later claim to be holding property at Dartington by a grant of the abbot of St. Dogmael’s (near Cardigan) may point to Welsh roots. CP40/829, rot. 353. He evidently owed his entry into south-western political society to the Holand family and may himself have hailed from their manor of Dartington, where he resided by the autumn of 1450. That September he was one of the mainpernors of Henry Holand, duke of Exeter, to whom custody of the duke of Gloucester’s former manor of Hadleigh in Essex was granted. CFR, xviii. 179. The following January, John received a first official appointment when he was included in a commission to arrange the sale of a Prussian ship, the Danyelleshulk, which had been taken at sea, an appointment which he may be thought to have owed to the duke of Exeter, who had then succeeded to the hereditary admiralty. CPR, 1446-52, p. 437. More permanent office followed a year later, when he became searcher in the ports of Exeter and Dartmouth, a post which he would retain intermittently until the autumn of 1456.

The extent and nature of John’s own mercantile interests, if any, are hard to fathom. In 1475 he was owed a debt of 73s. 4d. by a Reading cordwainer, and it is possible that in the 1460s he was supplying ale to the royal household: in the early summer of 1471 a group of London brewers complained to Chancellor Stillington that a man of his name had conspired with the Exchequer official Thomas Pound* to defraud them of £60 owing to them for such supplies. C1/12/10; C253/44/456.

It seems clear that John’s return to Parliament for the city of Exeter in 1453 was a direct result of his patron’s intervention. Although his office of searcher made him a familiar face in the city’s port, he lacked the local credentials which were normally the prerequisite for Exeter’s MPs. Indeed, in a further break with convention he was not admitted to the freedom of the city until 23 Sept. 1454, some months after the dissolution of Parliament. Exeter Freemen ed. Rowe and Jackson, 52. John was one of several Holand retainers returned to the Commons by the south-western boroughs in 1453, but the loss of the Exeter receiver’s account for the year 1453-4 makes it impossible to tell in what way the duke exerted his influence over the citizens. S.J. Payling, ‘Ampthill Dispute’, EHR, civ. 895-6. In 1450 they had willingly acquiesced in an agreement between him and Thomas Courtenay, earl of Devon, which provided for the election of a supporter of either magnate, Exeter receiver’s acct. 29-30 Hen. VI, mm. 1d, 2. and it is unlikely that they put up much more resistance in 1453. John’s colleague in that year’s Parliament was John Hammond*, a tailor, who for his part was also of lower status than was normal for Exeter’s MPs, pointing to a reluctance of the greater citizens to take the onerous duty of the city’s representation upon themselves.

It is unclear whether John’s dismissal from the searchership owed anything to the increasingly erratic and violent behaviour displayed by the duke of Exeter between 1453 and 1456, but such an explanation seems at least possible, for he remained excluded from any Crown appointments not only until the end of Henry VI’s reign but also for the first decade of that of Edward IV, ten years which the duke spent mostly in exile. Little is known of John’s activities during this period, but he seems to have remained in Exeter where he was periodically empanelled on local juries. C140/22/46, m. 6; 30/53, m. 11. Eventually, the tables turned once more. In the years following King Edward’s marriage to Elizabeth Wydeville, Richard Neville, earl of Warwick, and the King’s brother George, duke of Clarence, became increasingly disenchanted with Edward’s rule, and (having failed in an attempt in 1469 to hold him captive and govern in his name) had resolved to seek the restoration of Henry VI. In September 1470 Edward IV was forced into exile, King Henry was released from the Tower and replaced on the throne, and the way was paved for the return of the Lancastrian exiles like John’s old patron, Henry Holand. It was not, however, until February 1471 that the exiled lords finally sailed for England, and the patronage they could offer their old servants. Nevertheless, there is an indication that John did indeed rally to his former master’s cause, for a few years later it was claimed that on 10 Apr. 1471 he and two fellow citizens of Exeter, John Attwyll† and Thomas Hayley, had received some 500 marks’ worth of robes and jewels belonging to Margaret of Anjou and her son, the Lancastrian prince of Wales, whose arrival from France was expected imminently. E207/20/14, no. 20. If, as seems likely, the valuables in question had been provided for the reception of the otherwise largely destitute queen and prince, the timing of the transaction proved unfortunate, for on Easter Sunday, the very day of the queen’s landing at Weymouth, the earl of Warwick was defeated and killed by the newly-returned Edward IV at Barnet. Accompanied by their south-western supporters, the dukes of Exeter and Somerset, John Beaufort, marquess of Dorset, and John Courtenay, earl of Devon, the queen and prince rode via Exeter to Bristol, gathering forces as they went, but despite their efforts they were decisively defeated by King Edward at Tewkesbury on 4 May. An armed contingent from the city of Exeter had gone to Tewkesbury in the retinue of the earl of Devon’s cousin, Sir Hugh Courtenay*, but there is no evidence to show whether David John was himself present.

In February 1472 John took the precaution of suing out a royal pardon, but it is uncertain whether this was connected with his activities during the previous spring, or simply intended to protect him from other litigation pending against him in the royal courts. C67/48, m. 9. Meanwhile, John had taken up more permanent residence in Exeter, following his marriage to Joan, the heiress of the former mayor John Germyn, and kinswoman of Hugh Germyn, one of the leading citizens of Exeter in the mid fifteenth century. Joan, who had previously been married to Thomas Herle, the bastard son of the prominent Cornish landowner Sir John Herle*, brought her husband a claim to extensive property in Exeter and its suburbs, at her death valued at almost £3 p.a. CIPM Hen. VII, ii. 267. In the autumn of 1471 John was elected one of the city stewards for the first time, and over the course of the subsequent decade proceeded to hold a string of other civic offices, becoming steward once more during Hugh Germyn’s final mayoralty in 1474-5, and serving as city receiver in 1476-7. This apart, his activities were unexceptional. As previously, he was occasionally empanelled on local juries, and attested his neighbours’ deeds or served them as a feoffee. C47/37/22/90; C140/42/51, 80/42; JUST1/199/13, mm. 2, 3; E199/9/12, no. 8; N. Devon RO, Chichester of Arlington mss, 50/11/12/10, 20; Plymouth and W. Devon RO, Yonge of Puslinch mss, 107/636; Devon RO, St. Mary Major parish recs., 51/1/4/12; Petre mss, 123M/TP49. Nevertheless, these were not trouble-free years for him. In 1476 the attorney-general began litigation against him and his associates over the matter of Queen Margaret’s jewels, and although it seems that John, then city receiver, was able to use some civic funds in his and his associates’ defence (he was allowed 20s. for a bribe to the sheriff of Devon for the return of the writs issued against them, as well as £4 for their expenses travelling to London to appear in court and 41s. for their expenses at the assizes, to which the matter had been referred by writ of nisi prius), the affair was nevertheless a drawn-out and time consuming one. E207/20/14, nos. 20, 47; 15 (no internal foliation); Exeter receiver’s acct. 16-17 Edw. IV, mm. 1d, 3, 3d. If anything, more dramatic was an incident in 1478, which saw John assaulted by the Devon esquire John Fulford and his servants. Bishop Courtenay of Exeter seized Fulford’s men, but the citizens nevertheless took the precaution of mounting armed guards at the city gates at night. Exeter receiver’s acct. 18-19 Edw. IV, mm. 1d, 3.

Even more protracted was the squabble over his wife’s inheritance. John Germyn had appointed John Bonefant alias Pyggyston, a local innkeeper, as his executor, and the latter, maintaining that the testator had in fact left some of his property to him, began a lengthy legal battle to assert his claim. His machinations in the law courts aside, in August 1479 Bonefant took more concrete action by entering the houses of David and Joan John and of Germyn’s widow, Joyce, and carrying off plate, silver spoons and money. The dispute continued beyond David John’s death, the exact date of which has not been established. He was, however, certainly dead by the early months of 1484, when his widow alone defended her property in the court of Chancery. KB27/876, rex rot. 4d; C1/34/118; 62/11-14; 183/26. The MP must be distinguished from two contemporary namesakes, the Cornish landowner David John Laurence (C1/53/124-5; 131/50; 145/63), and the tailor David John alias David Morgan, variously based in London and Worcester, but frequently associated with south-western mariners in his illicit activities (KB9/332/6, 40-41). John was succeeded by his son, John John, who some time after his father’s death was reduced to suing his own mother (who had remarried and again been widowed) in Chancery for his paternal lands in Wollaton and elsewhere in the county. C1/143/66.