BEVERLEY, Thomas

The name of Beverley was a familiar one in the merchant community of York: the draper John Beverley (d.1394) had served as chamberlain in 1371-2 and as bailiff a year later, while a number of other members of the family, such as John (fl.1329) and Thomas (made free in 1389), had been mercers active in overseas trade.5 J. Kermode, ‘Merchants of York, Hull and Beverley’ (Sheffield Univ. Ph.D. thesis, 1990), app. 4. The precise relationship between these men and the MP of 1459 – if any – is unclear, but the latter had to purchase the freedom of the city in 1440, rather than being admitted by patrimony.6 Freemen of York (Surtees Soc. xcvi), 155. The impression that Beverley may have been something of a new man is borne out by his marriage to the daughter of another relative newcomer. The mercer Henry Market originally came from Germany, was granted letters of denization in 1430, and three years later was acting as steward of the Mercers’ Trinity Hall. No mention of Beverley was made in his will of 1443, but when his widow, Matilda, died four years later the administration of her estate was entrusted to her son-in-law.7 Kermode, app. 4; York registry wills, prob. reg. 2, f. 168.

Within a few years, Beverley joined the governing elite of the city. In February 1447 he was chosen as one of the chamberlains and, perhaps unusually, he appears to have been given membership of the council of 24 immediately at the end of his year in office. In October 1449 he attested his first parliamentary election, presumably in this capacity. At Michaelmas 1450 he was appointed as one of the sheriffs and it was as such that he was named to collect the parliamentary subsidy in the following year, rendering account at Westminster before the end of his shrieval term. Thereafter he returned to the ranks of the 24, once again attesting the parliamentary election in 1453 and regularly attending council meetings.8 C219/16/2. He was now of sufficient standing in the city to be admitted that year to the prestigious guild of Corpus Christi.9 Reg. Guild Corpus Christi, York (Surtees Soc. lvii), 52. By March 1459 Beverley had joined the ranks of the aldermen, and on 26 Nov. of that year he was elected, alongside the wool merchant Richard Lematon*, to the so-called ‘Parliament of Devils’, which met at Coventry and attainted the Yorkist lords. The citizens of York clearly prevaricated over their choice of representatives: the King opened Parliament on 20 Nov., some six days before the city even managed to hold its election, and it is likely that York’s two MPs managed to avoid at least part of the assembly’s uncomfortable business. It is possible that the ruling elite of York was grateful to Beverley, who was elected mayor the following February, but his official duties soon turned potentially problematic when he was named an ex officio member of a powerful commission headed by Henry Percy, earl of Northumberland, to investigate treasons and felonies in York and Kingston-upon-Hull. Within months, the tables turned as the Yorkist lords invaded from their exile at Calais and took control of the King and the government at the battle of Northampton. A fresh Parliament was summoned, and as mayor Beverley headed the list of witnesses to the city of York’s election return.10 C219/16/5, 6.

The 1460s saw Beverley continue to serve on the aldermanic bench and play a full role in the city’s public affairs. Moreover, in March 1461 his prominence as a trader saw him become master of the York Mercers’ Company, a post he held for the customary year. He now also joined the mercers’ guild of Holy Trinity, and as one of the senior members of his company he was responsible for meeting the costs of the annual Corpus Christi procession.11 York Mercers, 67, 71. It nevertheless seems that it took him some time to attain this commercial standing. At the beginning of the 1450s, he was not, apparently, a wealthy man, being assessed at only 60s. p.a. for the parliamentary subsidy.12 E179/217/56. In 1452-3 he imported miscellaneous goods and wine worth £4 through Kingston-upon-Hull, and in 1457 he joined with other York mercers in shipping cloth in The Kateryn of Hull.13 Customs Accts. Hull, 1453-90 (Yorks. Arch. Rec. Ser. cxliv), 12-13; York Mercers, 20, 60. As an exporter of wool, he joined the company of the Calais staple, and in October 1454 he was named among a group of York and Hull staplers who had lent money to the Crown, and together with John Thirsk* received a special licence to recover a debt of £32 11s. 6½d. by shipping wool free of customs.14 CPR, 1452-61, pp. 210-12. The value and diversity of both his imports and exports appears to have increased during the 1460s. In 1462-3 he imported goods worth £194 (including iron, Brabant cloth and almonds), while exporting lead worth £96. Two years later, he imported goods worth £146 (mainly iron), while exporting cloth and lead valued at £33 6s. 8d., and in 1466-7 his imports were of a similar level, while his shipments contained cloth and wool. In 1469-70 he exported 16 short cloths, some 13 sacks of wool and 1,020 fells, and he maintained this level of trade into the early 1470s: in 1471-2 he imported merchandise valued at £174, while exporting wool, cloth and lead valued at £93 6s. 8d.15 Customs Accts. Hull, 23, 25-26, 29, 43-44, 47, 51-54, 63, 66-70, 72-74, 78, 101-2, 104, 115-16, 125, 127, 130-4, 138, 142, 147-8, 152, 156-62, 164, 167-8, 170-1, 173-4, 179, 181-4. It has been estimated that by the end of the 1460s his annual turnover was in the region of £250, making him one of the wealthiest merchants in the north of England and placing him on a par with the great York merchants of the fourteenth century.16 J. Kermode, Med. Merchants, 265.

Of Beverley’s part in public life in the later years of his career little is known. He attended council meetings throughout the 1460s, and in February 1472 he apparently contested unsuccessfully the election of William Holbeck* to a third successive term as mayor. By February 1476, from when regular minutes of the council meetings survive, he had left the aldermanic bench.17 York City Chamberlains’ Acct. Rolls, 211; York Memoranda Bk. ii. 204; York House Bks. ed. Attreed, 4. He is not to be confused with his namesake, a fishmonger, who is recorded as serving on several local juries in the early 1470s: York Memoranda Bk. iii (Surtees Soc. clxxxvi), 170, 171, 174, 197. It may, however, have been he who rented a tenement from the wardens of the Fosse bridge between 1468 and 1476, and who appeared in the sheriffs’ court in November 1478 to bring a plea of debt against a local man.18 York Bridgemasters’ Accts. ed. Stell (York Arch. Trust, 2003), 86, 91, 94; York City Archs., sheriffs’ ct. bk. 1471-8, E25.

Beverley made his will on 11 Aug. 1480. He asked to be buried in the choir of the Virgin Mary in his parish church of All Saints Pavement. As well as providing for the costs of his funeral there, he gave £40 for a priest to sing for eight years for his soul, that of his late father-in-law and ‘all his other benefactors’. He gave 10s. to each of the mendicant orders in the city on condition that they would sing a trental of masses. He also made bequests to the Mercers’ hospital of Holy Trinity, the lepers’ house and the Maisondieu, and gave 20d. to a recluse at nearby Clementhorp. To his wife Beverley made a cash bequest of £5, while he gave ten marks to his daughter, Isabel, five marks to another daughter, Joan, and a further 20s. to his sister, Margaret. A number of other named individuals, probably servants and more distant kin, received smaller sums. Beverley settled his immovable property on his wife, with remainder to three of his surviving sons, Nicholas, John and Richard, and made an unusual bequest of 6s. 8d. towards the costs of the papal war against the Ottoman Turks. His executors were these three sons and the merchant and sometime mayor John Feriby (whose daughter, Anne, had married one of them, John). Probate was granted on 4 Oct. that year.19 York registry wills, prob. reg. 5, f. 184; CP40/883, rot. 385.

Alice Beverley outlived her husband by only a couple of years. She made her will on 8 Aug. 1482, asking to be buried beside her husband, and provided £35 for masses to be sung for her soul, as well as those of her husband and parents. Her other charitable requests mirrored those of Thomas. She made cash bequests to her sons, including a fourth, William, not mentioned in the will of her husband, as well as their wives and her godchildren. She entrusted the settlement of her affairs to her husband’s former executors. On 16 Sept. she added a codicil, rewarding a former servant and stipulating that her son-in-law, Feriby, was to have custody of the £35 she had put aside to pay for masses in her parish church. Probate was granted on the following 4 Dec.20 York registry wills, prob. reg. 5, ff. 28v-29.

Of Beverley’s sons, only one, John, rose to prominence in the city. A mercer, he became free by patrimony in 1478 (alongside his brother, Nicholas), and served as chamberlain in 1483-4 and sheriff from September 1485. He died, however, while in office the following July. Beverley’s eldest son, Thomas junior, had been made free in 1471 but died prematurely the following year.21 Ibid. prob. reg. 4, f. 176; Kermode, ‘Merchants of York, Hull and Beverley’, app. 4; Freemen of York, 200. The MP must be distinguished from a contemporary namesake, another York merchant, who was also known as ‘of Elsham, Lincs.’: C67/41, mm. 24, 30.