LEYBOURNE, Sir Robert, of Longsleddale and Cunswick, Westmld.

Leybourne’s knighthood can be dated slightly earlier than in the previous biography: he attained the rank shortly before Easter term 1402, when he brought an action for close-breaking in respect of his property at Strickland Ketel. The Commons 1386-1421, iii. 598-9; CP40/565, rot. 140d. He was a county attestor when his putative younger son was returned for Appleby in 1429. During his brief period as a j.p. he was active on the bench: between 4 Oct. 1428 and 2 Oct. 1430 he sat on four of the nine days on which the j.p.s met. Soon after the death of Sir John Lancaster in 1434 he joined the royal justice, James Strangeways, and Sir Richard Musgrave* at Kendal to hear an important assize of novel disseisin arraigned by Sir John Lancaster’s feoffees against his widow and male heirs. The verdict went against the latter in a dispute that was to have serious ramifications. C219/14/1; E101/92/3; C260/145/23. Leybourne had an indirect interest in the matter, for his nephew, Thomas Fleming of Coniston (Lancashire), was the husband of Sir John’s daughter and coheiress, Isabel, whose inheritance was threatened by her male kinsmen. In 1396 Sir Thomas Leybourne had married our MP’s sis., another Isabel, to Thomas Fleming, and in about 1409 the couple’s son, another Thomas, was married to one of Sir John Lancaster’s four daughters: Cumbria RO, Kendal, Le Fleming of Rydal mss, WDRY/92/64, 73.