RADCLIFFE, Sir Nicholas (c.1396-c.1454), of Castlerigg, Cumb.

More may be added to the earlier biography. The Commons 1386-1421, iv. 159-60.

In November 1446, when Sir Nicholas headed the jury at Penrith which proved the age of Richard Salkeld†, he gave his own age as over 50. CIPM, xxvi. 586. Such estimates are not always to be relied upon, but in this case it is consistent with all else known of his career. In the subsidy returns of 1435-6 he was assessed in Cumberland on an income of £66 p.a. derived largely, if not exclusively, from the lands he held in right of his wife, in both that county and Westmorland. There were only four higher assessments in Cumberland, and it is not surprising that Radcliffe should have played so active a part in the affairs of both counties. E179/90/26. His assessment would have been higher still but for the survival until 1449 of his wife’s paternal grandmother, Margaret Strickland, wife successively of Sir John Derwentwater† and Sir Robert Lowther†: The Commons 1386-1421, ii. 780; C139/33/2. Indeed, few were more involved, and, given the frequency with which he attested elections in both counties, one might have expected him to sit in more than just two Parliaments. He was also a frequent juror, sitting before the gaol delivery in both counties. JUST3/70/4, m. 3d; JUST3/11/10, m. 16.

On 12 Aug. 1452, as a feoffee of Sir John Pennington*, Sir Nicholas settled an annual rent of five marks on Sir John’s and his own grandson, John, and Isabel, daughter of John Broughton*. He was alive as late as 1454 when he made another grant as a Pennington feoffee, but he died soon afterwards. Cumbria RO, Whitehaven, Pennington-Ramsden mss, 19/16; 32/18. After his death Sir Nicholas’s widow made provision for their large family. By a final concord levied in Michaelmas term 1458 she made a generous settlement in favour of her younger sons. The legal remainder, expectant on her own death, of over 2,500 acres, mostly pasture, in Penrith, Carleton and Castlerigg in Cumberland, and Bolton and Sleagill in Westmorland, was settled jointly on her four younger sons, John, Christopher, Robert and Marmaduke. Their interest was, however, only to be for their lives, with the remainder saved to her right heirs. CP25(1)/293/73/436. Later, in 1464, she contracted a modest marriage for her daughter, Janet, to whom she gave a portion of 80 marks. This was enough to secure the hand of one of the middle-ranking gentry of Cumberland, John, son and heir of Thomas Aglionby of Carlisle, and a jointure of ten marks p.a. Cumbria RO, Carlisle, Aglionby of Nunnery mss, D/AY1/142.