BALDWYN, John

Although he was to represent a Sussex borough in the Commons and to end his days as common serjeant of London, Baldwyn was not a native of either place. He belonged to a family which had been resident in Aylesbury from the early years of the century, if not before, and was probably one of the sons of a namesake, who in the 1450s came to be known as John Baldwyn ‘the elder’. The latter had attested five of the Buckinghamshire parliamentary elections held in their home town between 1420 and 1432, and his status among the more prominent men of the county is clear from his inclusion on the list of those required to take the oath against maintenance as administered there in 1434. Furthermore, he was closely acquainted with figures of consequence in the region, for he was named as a feoffee by William Whaplode*, the steward of the estates of Bishop Beaufort of Winchester.4 C219/12/4, 13/3, 4, 14/2, 3; CPR, 1429-36, p. 397; 1441-6, p. 392. The younger John, our MP, made his first appearance in the records in February 1450, when he and his brother William and another kinsman, Thomas Baldwyn (perhaps also a brother of theirs), were enfeoffed of the property known as ‘Otters Fee’ in Aylesbury, which was subsequently to come into the family’s possession.5 CPR, 1446-52, p. 311. Later that same year either he or his putative father joined Thomas Baldwyn in attesting the Buckinghamshire election, held at Aylesbury on 30 Sept. A few weeks afterwards, on 12 Dec., both Johns and Thomas Baldwyn were listed among those who, in the illustrious company of the chancellor, Cardinal Kemp, obtained a royal licence to found a guild dedicated to the Virgin Mary in the parish church of Aylesbury, which was permitted to acquire in mortmain lands to the value of £20. This substantial foundation was to gain a degree of control over town affairs in years to come.6 C219/16/1; CPR, 1446-52, p. 412; VCH Bucks. iii. 9. John Baldwyn ‘junior’ later appeared in the records as one of the recipients of the goods and chattels of a local barber,7 CCR, 1454-61, p. 298. but it is not always easy to chart his early career, in the course of which he completed his training as a lawyer.

Like two more of his fellow members of the legal profession, Thomas Molyneux* and Thomas Urswyk II* (who both came from Lancashire), Baldwyn was elected to Parliament for the west Sussex borough of Midhurst. None of these men had any connexion with the locality, so far as the surviving sources reveal, and how they came to be chosen in close succession in 1447, 1449 and 1453 remains a mystery. Nevertheless, it must be significant that all three belonged to Gray’s Inn, and that they knew each other well (indeed, Molyneux and Urswyk were related). It was perhaps while attending the Commons that Baldwyn first came to the attention of the government, for shortly after the dissolution in 1454 he was made a j.p. in his home shire, as a member of the quorum. This in turn led to his appointment as escheator of the neighbouring county of Northamptonshire later the same year. His reputation as a lawyer was growing fast. Like Urswyk he was among the apprentices-at-law retained by the duchy of Lancaster; and he received fees for the counsel he gave to duchy officials from 1455 to 1466.8 R. Somerville, Duchy, i. 454. Among the private clients who employed him in the same period was Joan, the wealthy widow of William Danvers*, for whom he acted from 1457 onwards as a feoffee of various of the manors which were destined to be donated by her to Magdalen College, Oxford. Acting under Joan’s instructions he also entered negotiations with the prior of Motsfont, Hampshire, regarding her offer to discharge the priory from an annual rent of £5 in return for a flat payment of 100 marks. This led, after her death in 1458, to Baldwyn being summoned to Chancery to provide evidence about the transaction.9 Magdalen Coll. Oxf., Stainswyke deeds, 65; C1/28/425-8. Also in the late 1450s he served as a feoffee of premises in the Strand, outside Temple Bar, and both the Mercers’ and Grocers’ Companies of London paid small sums of money to have his friendship and advice.10 London and Mdx. Feet of Fines, 200; N.L. Ramsay, ‘The English Legal Profession’ (Cambridge Univ. Ph.D. thesis, 1985), p. xlix.

Baldwyn’s putative father was still living in April 1458, when both Johns witnessed a conveyance at Aylesbury, but he is not recorded subsequently. There would not seem to be a political reason for the removal of our MP from the bench in Buckinghamshire in July 1459, as a few months later he was appointed as a j.p. in Oxford, where he served until the end of the reign. It is difficult to guess what, if any, significance should be attached to his appearance in May 1460 as a witness to a grant of certain manors in Essex and Buckinghamshire made by Thomas, Lord Richemount Grey, to Henry, duke of Exeter, and a number of lawyers headed by Judges Fortescue* and Prysote*, and although the Yorkist regime which came to power shortly afterwards had no use for him as a j.p., his continued service as legal counsel to the duchy of Lancaster implies that he was not regarded as a staunch opponent to the government of Edward IV.11 CCR, 1454-61, pp. 287, 483. The new reign did, however, mark a change of direction in Baldwyn’s career, for in 1463 he was elected common serjeant of London, a role which his colleague Urswyk (now the City’s recorder) had filled ten years earlier. The office, which he continued to hold until his death, led to his appointment in 1466 to hold inquiries about the property in the capital held by the Lancastrian (Sir) Robert Whittingham.12 It was probably his putative fa. who had been receiver in Bucks. for Whittingham’s fa. (Sir) Robert Whittingham I* in the 1440s: C1/16/703-9, 164/54.

Little is known about Baldwyn’s wife, save that she was probably the eldest of William Streteley’s three daughters, who by the autumn of 1468 had become his heirs-apparent. On 25 Oct. that year Streteley and his wife made a curious declaration, which they had enrolled on the close roll. They stated that their daughters (Edith Baldwyn, Anne, wife of Edward Lee, and Elizabeth, as yet unmarried) had been conceived in true wedlock, contrary to the assertion of ill-disposed persons that they were bastards.13 CCR, 1468-76, no. 129. The three women subsequently inherited their father’s manor of Creslow, which, in 1482, after Baldwyn’s death, they quitclaimed to the King.14 VCH Bucks. iii. 337; CP25(1)/22/126/14, 294/77/14.

Baldwyn had been last recorded acting as a feoffee of property in Buckinghamshire on behalf of the late Walter Brightwell. The latter had been a tenant-in-chief, holding his land of the honour of Wallingford, and in March 1469, after his death, it was alleged that the enfeoffment had been made by collusion to defraud the Crown of the wardship of his son and heir.15 CPR, 1467-77, p. 152. Baldwyn made his will on 2 June following, and probably died within ten days, for he was replaced as common serjeant of London on the 12th. He requested burial in the chapel of St. Francis in the Greyfriars, and left £2 to the friars for repairs to the church. As he had no surviving children, his lands and rents in Buckinghamshire were to pass to his brother William, provided that he would pay the testator’s widow Edith an annuity of 20 marks for her lifetime. The widow was also to retain other unspecified properties as her jointure. Edith, who was named with William as Baldwin’s executor,16 PCC 27 Godyn (PROB11/5, f. 214); London jnl. 7, f. 194v. The date of death given on the inscription on his tomb has been transcribed as 10 Apr. 1469, but, in view of the date of his will, this cannot be correct: Collectanea Topographia et Geneaologica v. 288. subsequently married Alexander Darell, probably the son of the prominent Wiltshire landowner William Darell*.17 CP25(1)/294/77/14. The precise location and value of Baldwyn’s landed possessions remain obscure, as no inquisitions post mortem survive either for him or for his brother, who outlived him by some ten years.18 CFR, xxi. no. 513. Their kinsman Richard Baldwyn, who died in 1485, held the manor of ‘Ottersfee’ and much property in Aylesbury including an inn called Le Crowne.19 CIPM Hen. VII, i. 115. He was succeeded by his brother John (c.1470-1545), who having followed our MP into the legal profession, rose to be c.j.c.p. under Henry VIII (in which capacity he presided at the trial of Anne Boleyn). This more famous John Baldwyn became lord of the manor of Aylesbury.20 VCH Bucks. iii. 3, 4, 12.