SYWARD, William

Nothing certain is known of the MP’s antecedents but he is likely to have been closely related to William Syward, defendant in an action of novel disseisin at the assizes at Northampton in August 1413.3 JUST1/1524, rot. 43d. In common with other Northampton MPs in this period, he was a mercer. He also conformed to an established pattern in holding both borough office and sitting in Parliament relatively early in his career. Indeed, when elected bailiff in 1433 he must have been very young, and most of what is known of him post-dates his single term as mayor ten years later.4 Northampton Recs. ii. 550, 557. Not until the late 1440s does he begin to appear with any frequency in the records. By then he seems to have been a man of some modest importance, with more extensive commercial and social connexions than those of most of his fellow Northampton burgesses. In 1446 he claimed debts of over £50 against nine local husbandmen and tradesmen; and in 1448 he was himself attached with Henry Stone*, one of the leading townsmen, to answer the Crown for an unspecified contempt against the statute of victuallers.5 CP40/741, rot. 150; 742, rot. 70d; KB27/750, rex rot. 32.

Some of Syward’s trading profits may have been laid out in mortgages. On 5 Apr. 1456 John Raser, a spicer from Olney in Buckinghamshire, quitclaimed to him, Joan, his wife, and his sons, Thomas and William, a valuable tenement in Abington Street, Northampton; two days later Raser entered into a bond in £59 guaranteeing the Sywards secure possession for a term of 20 years.6 Northants. RO, Charity of St. Giles mss, nos. 39-41. Trade also brought him connexions outside his native town. On 10 Sept. 1458 John George, a haberdasher of Banbury in Oxfordshire, included him in a gift of his chattels alongside no less a man than Richard Neville, earl of Warwick, and in the following April he was named in a similar grant made by the London draper, Thomas Wattes.7 CCR, 1454-61, pp. 380-1; 1461-8, p. 64. Not all the litigation in which Syward was involved related to his financial interests. In Hilary term 1455 another former MP and bailiff, John Makesey*, sued him, his son Thomas, also a mercer, and as many as 20 others, including another leading townsman, William Hegge alias Etherton*, for ambushing and imprisoning him at Kingsthorpe, just outside the town.8 CP40/776, rot. 290d. There is no other evidence to give this alleged offence a context, but the number of defendants implies that it reflects a more serious offence than the generality of such actions.

Little else is known of the last years of Syward’s long career. In September 1463 he was elected mayor for the second time; in 1467 he offered mainprise on the election of John Ashburn† to represent the town in Parliament; and on 1 Apr. 1469 he was one of four former mayors who joined four ex-bailiffs in arbitrating a dispute between a local mercer and a dyer.9 Northampton Recs. ii. 550, 558; C219/17/1; C1/43/128. By the late 1460s, his sons were also coming to take a part in the public life of Northampton. Thomas acted as bailiff in 1465-6, and the younger William was serving as one of the town’s coroners early in 1469.10 Northampton Recs. ii. 558; Northants. RO, Northampton bor. recs. private ch. 51.

Syward made his will on 25 July 1473. He wanted to be buried in the chapel of Corpus Christi in the town’s church of All Saints. The largest of his many charitable bequests was as much as ten marks to the parish church of Wollaston, a few miles to the east of Northampton. Either this was the place of his birth or he had acquired property there. Several members of his family are mentioned, with the largest bequests reserved for his then only surviving son, William, and his daughter Alice, who were to have ten marks and £5 respectively. Another £5 was to be used to employ a chaplain to pray for his soul in the year after his death. His wife was named as one of his executors.11 PCC 10 Wattys (PROB11/6, ff. 76v-77). His will was not proved until 9 Oct. He was dead by the following 10 Sept., when his widow and son alienated the tenement in Abington Street mortgaged to them in 1456.12 Charity of St. Giles mss, no. 42. Joan did not long survive her husband. She made her own will on 18 Sept., probably within days of his death, and asked to be buried alongside him. Her geographical origins are suggested by her bequest of £5 to the church of Bromham in Bedfordshire, about 18 miles from Northampton, for the purchase of a missal. The grant of probate implies she died in 1475.13 PCC 20 Wattys.