ANDREW, John I

A successful lawyer who advanced himself in the service of the powerful Stafford family, Andrew remained closely associated with his native Gloucestershire throughout his career. As to his antecedents, there is next to no evidence, but it is probable that he was related in some way to the well-connected Crown servant Robert Andrew*, who may perhaps have influenced the direction of his early career.11 The Commons 1386-1421, ii. 35-38. He may also have been related to Richard Andrewes, a tax collector in Glos. in 1432: CFR, xvi. 108-9. There is nothing known about his wife beyond her name and that she bore him a son, Hugh.12 Cath. deeds, D1609/10/19. Possibly, Robert helped Andrew in February 1424 to secure the office of receiver for the duchy of Lancaster at Ogmore in South Wales, a post he may have held until 1443. A year later, he received another duchy appointment in the shape of the office of feodary of lands in Herefordshire and Gloucestershire that had formerly belonged to Queen Katherine. He had already begun to practise as a lawyer by this time, although it is unclear whether he was the ‘Andrew’ admitted to Lincoln’s Inn in 1424.13 L. Inn Adm. i. 5. During the first half of the 1420s, he acted as an attorney and surety in the court of common pleas for other residents of Gloucester, and for the queen herself.14 CP40/643, rot. 313d; 654, rot. 396; 658, rot. 203d. Andrew’s connexion with the dowager queen loomed large in a lawsuit that he pursued in the same court on his own account two decades later. In this case, which came to pleading in Michaelmas term 1445, Andrew alleged that the defendant, a London draper named Thomas Thorndon, had illegally maintained a suit for a debt of £33 6s. 8d. brought (against the MP) by the royal chaplain and dean of St. Stephen’s, Westminster, William Walesby. In response, Thorndon asserted that Andrew had been indebted in that sum to Walesby and Queen Katherine (who had died in 1437) jointly and had given them a bond for that amount. As it happened, the queen and cleric had themselves owed £40 to Hugh Dene, to whom they had delivered Andrew’s bond in London, so that he might sue the MP over the £33 6s. 8d. in their name and recover most of the sum owed to him. Dene had died before he could do so, having appointed his widow Joan his sole executrix. Having subsequently married Thorndon, Joan had herself died, leaving Thorndon, who denied the charge of maintenance, to sue Andrew, and then to distribute the money recovered on charitable purposes for the good of Dene’s soul. Following these pleadings, Andrew and Thorndon agreed that a jury should consider the matter but it seems that the proposed trial, postponed until Trinity term 1446, never occurred.15 CP40/739, rot. 120.

It would appear that, like Robert Andrew, John forged a connexion with the Beauchamp family, for in late 1430 he was a mainpernor for a number of prominent retainers of Richard Beauchamp, earl of Warwick, who were granted the keeping of lands associated with the wardship of John Burgh III*.16 CFR, xvi. 21. It was ‘of Southam’, near Cheltenham, that he stood surety for these men, indicating that he must either have inherited or acquired holdings there. Elsewhere in the county, he owned property at Kempsford, where in early 1455 a band of men broke into his house and stole wool worth £12.17 KB27/776, rex rot. 36. Evidently, he had a stake in the local wool trade, most probably as a sheep-farmer. Andrew also acquired landed interests outside Gloucestershire, for in August 1443 Gloucester abbey leased its manor of Tregoff and lordship of Pennon in Glamorgan to him, his wife and their son for a term of 70 years. In return, the Andrews were required to pay the abbey a rent of 20 marks p.a. and to provide its cellarer and steward with board and lodging when they came to hold their courts there.18 Cath. deeds, D1609/10/19.

Whatever his links with the Beauchamps, Andrew certainly found employment with Anne, dowager countess of Stafford, who appointed him her attorney-general at some point before March 1431. He was the first recorded holder of this office, and among his principal tasks was to take charge of matters arising from the disputes with the Crown over the former de Bohun inheritance, which included estates in both Gloucestershire and Herefordshire. The post, which brought him an annuity of five marks p.a., came to involve the supervision of a team of legal advisors, many of whom, like Thomas Arblaster*, became permanent councillors of the countess and her son, Earl Humphrey.19 Rawcliffe, 159-60. Andrew’s work involved the co-ordination of litigation in the central courts, and he occasionally appeared there in person during the 1430s: in the autumn of 1435, for instance, he appeared on the countess’s behalf when she sued John Wixe of Mapledurham in the court of common pleas for a debt of £37 10s. 4d.20 CP40/699, rot. 327. Along with his annuity, Andrew was also granted a fee of £6 13s. 4d. from the issues of the Stafford lands in Stratton in Gloucestershire.21 SC11/816, m. 2; Rawcliffe, 219. Naturally, his high profile brought him into contact with members of the Bourgchier family. In February 1432, for instance, the keeping of the estates held by the late (Sir) Richard Hankford*, in right of his wife, the Fitzwaryn heiress, was granted to the countess along with her sons, Henry and Thomas Bourgchier, and a number of trusted associates and councillors, including Andrew. He was still involved in the administration of these lands ten years later, by which time the countess had secured the inheritance for another of her sons, William. He was of further service to the Bourgchiers when, in the spring of 1433, he relinquished the lease of the manor of Dymock in Gloucestershire, granted to him less than a year before, and then stood surety when the Crown granted the keeping of the manor to Henry.22 CFR, xvi. 83-84, 97, 148; E403/734, rot. 10; E364/77, rot. 13. The countess also exploited Andrew’s prominence in the West Country, particularly during her dealings with Llanthony priory in the early 1430s, when ‘Jankyn Andreux’, despite his other duties, acted as her personal emissary on several occasions.23 C115/76/6682, ff. 250v, 248v, 259v.

Andrew’s reputation as a lawyer and administrator seems to have spread well beyond the confines of the councils of the countess and her sons. Despite his employment by the Staffords and the Bourgchiers, he was also able to build up links with other important individuals during the 1430s and 1440s. For instance, on three occasions (in 1432, 1439 and 1442) he was one of the parliamentary proxies nominated by the abbot of Evesham, while in 1447 he acted in a similar capacity for the abbot of Winchcombe. He may also have provided legal services to Robert, Lord Willoughby, from whose Lincolnshire estates he received in the autumn of 1435 a fee of £6 13s. 4d.24 E163/7/31/2, no. 33.

Andrew was closely involved in the affairs of Gloucester throughout this period. Chosen as one of the four stewards of the borough in the autumn of 1432, he made the first of four appearances in Parliament for the town five years later. His standing there may well have assisted him following the murder of his mother Margaret and brother Hugh. It appears that he himself secured the indictment of Thomas Eventon of Gloucestershire for the crime, which occurred at some point before 1443. Eventon was subsequently imprisoned in Gloucester castle, but the tardiness of the judicial process, combined with the expense of keeping him locked up, eventually forced Andrew to petition Chancery requesting a commission of gaol delivery in consideration ‘as wel this horrible and myschevous dede as ye grete derth and scarste of vitailles that now is’.25 C1/44/260. Twelve years after his first appearance in Parliament, Andrew again secured election as one of the town’s MPs. An indication of his standing at this time can be found in a mid fifteenth-century rental for Gloucester, where he is described as an esquire and ‘legis peritus’, and which reveals that he had acquired a number of well-situated properties there over the years, including tenements in the prosperous Mercery and Butchery areas.26 Gloucester Rental 1455 ed. Cole, 26, 92, 96, 98, 100, 102, 106. In the autumn of 1450, Andrew’s fellow burgesses both returned him as an MP for Gloucester and elected him as one of the two bailiffs of the town. Three years later, however, he began proceedings at Westminster against the municipal authorities over his still unpaid wages for attending that assembly. He claimed £8 6s. for the 168 days (that is, 2s. per day) that the Parliament took up of his time.27 KB145/6/32, recorda. Although it would have included time spent travelling to and from Parliament, the total of 168 days might suggest that its second session extended into late April 1451, rather than closing in late March.28 A. Curry, ‘Introduction to 1450 Parl.’, PROME.

Like a number of other trusted Stafford councillors, Andrew had found immediate re-employment with Humphrey, earl of Stafford and later duke of Buckingham, following the death of Countess Anne in 1438. One of the consequences of the merger of the countess’s estates with those of her son was an increase in the duties undertaken by several Stafford officials, not least by the attorney-general. Soon after inheriting his mother’s estates, for instance, Earl Humphrey granted Andrew the posts of farmer of Stratton St. Margaret in Wiltshire and bailiff of the liberty of Hereford in Gloucestershire.29 Stafford fam. mss, D641/1/2/167, m. 8v; Rawcliffe, 219. As well as the administrative and legal tasks connected with the Stafford lands, Andrew was also required to take on additional responsibility for the legal and financial aspects of Duke Humphrey’s appointments as constable of Calais and warden of the Cinque ports.30 L.S. Woodger, ‘Hen. Bourgchier’ (Oxf. Univ. D.Phil. thesis, 1974), 291; Rawcliffe, 159-60; E101/54/12; SC6/1305/4, m. 5. Compensation for these extra duties came in the form of a much higher salary, since Andrew received an annuity of 10 marks from at least 1441. As a key member of the duke’s council, he was required to act as his feoffee and surety on several occasions, and he represented Buckingham on matters affecting the Stafford interests around the country. In 1445-6 he received a ducal commission to act as an itinerant justice in the Welsh marches, and in the latter year the duke sent him to the Cheshire assizes, where he was on hand at the conclusion of the lengthy dispute between Buckingham and (Sir) Thomas Stanley II* over the manor of Bosley.31 Rawcliffe, 158, 219, 235; CPR, 1446-52, p. 78; CFR, xviii. 115. Duke Humphrey was also keen to promote his interests in the House of Commons. While Andrew’s four appearances as one of the Members for Gloucester would doubtless have benefited Buckingham, his election to the second Parliament of 1449 for the Stafford mesne borough of Bletchingley in Surrey indicates a closer link between lord and retainer. The Parliament itself was a difficult one for Henry VI’s government, and culminated in the impeachment of the duke of Suffolk; as one of the King’s closest advisors, Buckingham would certainly have seen the advantages of having a trusted councillor among the representatives in the lower chamber.

Andrew remained Buckingham’s attorney-general until at least 1457, and it is probable that he continued to serve until the duke’s death in 1460. Apart from occasional appearances in the central courts on Buckingham’s behalf, however, there is little evidence of his activities after he left his final Parliament, and it is likely that he died in the early 1460s.32 SC6/1305/4, m. 5; CP40/781, rot. 340d; Stafford fam. mss, D641/1/6/3.