MAFFEY (MASSEY), John, of New Romney, Kent.

Maffey’s presumed father and namesake paid maltolts at Romney between 1379 and 1382, and owned land nearby in St. Martin’s hundred.2E179/225/4, 7, 11; assmt. bk. 1, ff. 5, 7, 14. He himself probably had some kind of legal training before starting his career as common clerk of Rye. He remained active there as an attorney and a feoffee for the conveyance of property until the spring of 1403.3Cat. Rye Recs. 136/150, 155. Subsequently, however, he made Romney his permanent home: he paid maltolts between 1406 and 1418 and supplemented his income from the law by dealing in wine. Romney often employed him on its external business, as when, in 1406-7, he served on a deputation to Dover which was managing a lawsuit against Thomas Knight, and he also undertook a mission to London with John Roger II to procure the writs needed for the Cinque Ports’ exemption from parliamentary fifteenths. He accompanied William Clitheroe to Dover a year later, to arrange about finding ships for the King’s service, and the same two men visited Canterbury in 1410-11 to obtain the advice of Romney’s counsel over difficulties that had arisen in certain pleas brought in the city courts. Precisely how long he served as common clerk of Romney is not known, but it was as such that Hythe paid him 2s.6d. for entering the proceedings of the Brodhull held at Romney in July 1413 in the Cinque Ports’ register, and certainly while he was holding the office he was returned to his only known Parliament in 1414. As common clerk in 1415-16 he was paid wages of as much as £4 3s.4d.4Assmt. bk. 2, ff. 64-87.

He may have been the father of John Maffey (d.c.1447), of Iden.5E101/67/23, no. 15; Canterbury Cathedral, City and Diocesan RO, consist. ct. wills, Reg. 1, f. 66.