ARCHER, John I

After Archer became a baron of Hastings in or before the early 1440s, he took on a prominent role in the Port’s affairs. Indeed, his fellow Portsmen sent him to Brodhulls at New Romney as one of the delegates from Hastings on as many as 16 occasions between 1443 and 1464.3 Ibid. 17, 22, 23, 33, 36, 40-45, 47, 50. Election to Parliament may be seen as an extension of this role as a spokesman, representing the interests of his home town. Archer held office as bailiff of Hastings for two consecutive years, starting in the spring of 1461. On 6 May 1462, during his term of office, he purchased a pardon in which he was described as ‘formerly of Hastings, merchant alias yeoman’,4 C67/45, m. 23. but this is the only indication of how he made a living. At the Brodhull of 27 July that year, which he attended, it was agreed that ‘John Archerysvyll shalbe the first that shalbe redde in the next Brodhull’.5 White and Black Bks. 46. This has been taken to mean that his ‘vill’, that is, Hastings, should be given priority in view of its position as premier Port, since the practice of hearing the delegates from Hastings first is still accepted at Brodhulls. On the other hand, it is more likely that ‘bill’ was meant, and indeed at the Brodhull of 19 Apr. 1463, when Archer was once more present, it was decided that the bailiff of Hythe should arrest a debtor of his, Thomasina Walton, and detain her until she paid him £4.6 Ibid. 47. Archer deputized for his successor as bailiff of Hastings at the assembly of July 1464, but is not definitely recorded thereafter.

There is no evidence to connect the John Archer who served as a juror at a coroner’s inquest held at Robertsbridge in the rape of Hastings in 1472 with our MP.7 KB9/332/13. The namesake who attended Brodhulls as a deputy from Sandwich from 1475 onwards,8 White and Black Bks. 68. was probably John Archer† (the baron for that Port in three Parliaments of the 1480s), and whether he was related to the older man remains conjectural.