GARDENER, Thomas

Of unknown antecedents, Gardener was residing in Winchester by the early years of Henry V’s reign.3 D.J. Keene, Surv. Winchester (Winchester Studies, 2), ii. 1240. After acquiring a capital tenement and four cottages in Wongar Street from the town clerk, John Bye*, in 1417, it was there that he lived, at least until 1430 and perhaps as late as 1446.4 Ibid. ii. no. 410; Stowe 846, f. 138v. Besides this, he took a lease of two gardens nearby, and from 1420 he held jointly with Thomas Hebbe a tenement on the corner of Butler’s Lane.5 Keene, ii. nos. 398-9, 400A; Stowe 846, f. 144v. Making his living through trade, he entered a partnership with another Winchester merchant, Thomas Dunster*, to export grain from Southampton to Normandy, and import wine from Gascony. Gardener also arranged to have another import, woad, carted to Winchester from Southampton, for use in the process of finishing cloth.6 E122/184/3; Port Bk. 1427-30 (Soton Rec. Soc. 1913), 59; Port and Brokage Bks. 1448-9 (Soton. Rec. Ser. xxxvi), 204.

Before his only known election to Parliament Gardener had undertaken various responsible tasks for some of his fellow citizens. As an executor of the will of Agnes (d.1416), the widow of John Steor†, he helped finalize the sale of her property in Wongar Street, and in 1423, as the only surviving executor, he completed transactions regarding her holdings in Colebrook Street.7 Keene, ii. nos. 404-5, 408, 565; Stowe 846, ff. 137v, 138v, 147v. He was one of the pledges for payment of the fine of £5 levied on Thomas Bole, constable of Winchester, in the same year, after Bole had been arrested for dereliction of duty in service of the mayor, John Veel*.8 Black Bk. 119. Gardener served for four years as an alderman before being chosen as bailiff of the commons in the city. During his term of office, on 12 Jan. 1430, he and John Person were paid 40s. to ride to London to make inquiries about the judgement in the lawsuit between the former mayor, Richard Bolt*, and John Spynays,9 Hants RO, Winchester recs. W/E1/16. and election to Parliament followed just a few weeks after the end of his official year. The session lasted less than three months. In the next year the city council of 24 employed him as an auditor, and in June 1433 he came forward at the Winchester elections to stand surety for the attendance in the Commons of John Dutton*. He contributed 3s. 4d. towards the expenses of the city’s representatives of 1445-6, but was never returned again.10 C219/14/4; Winchester recs. W/E4/4.

Meanwhile, along with Robert Colpays*, the Winchester lawyer, in 1444 Gardener had been made a feoffee of annual rents of £4 from property situated outside the city, in Otterbourne, by grant of the former mayor John Wryther* and his wife,11 CP25(1)/207/33/11. who had apparently decided to return to Sussex from whence they had come. Subsequently, Colpays enfeoffed him of other substantial holdings, also in Otterbourne, which, in association with his co-feoffees, headed by Thomas Bekynton, bishop of Bath and Wells, he conveyed in 1446 to Winchester College, with the intention of making provision for the obits of the benefactor, Colpays, and his kin.12 Winchester Coll. muns. 14676-8; CPR, 1441-6, p. 444. Gardener may have been linked to the college in other ways, too, for the Thomas Gardener of Winchester who had been educated there from 1423 to 1427 was perhaps his son, although nothing more is heard of the boy.13 Winchester Scholars ed. Kirby, 47. Our MP is not recorded alive after February 1449.14 CCR, 1447-54, pp. 112, 231. His un-named widow was still living in Wongar Street many years later, in 1480-1, but her house fell vacant not long afterwards.15 Keene, ii. nos. 398-9.