BRADLEY, John II

No trace has been found of a Wiltshire man of this name, although it is possible that the MP was a kinsman of Henry Bradley, the esquire who lived at Bradley in that county, and was active as an attorney in Wiltshire suits brought in the court of common pleas between 1423 and 1444.1 CP40/649-732; also occasionally in the King’s bench: KB27/656, 667. Henry served as a tax collector in Wiltshire in 1428, and was listed to take the generally prescribed oath against the maintenance of malefactors, as authorized by this same Parliament of 1433-4.2 CFR, xv. 15, 86, 124, 221; CPR, 1429-36, p. 371. It may even be the case that the MP’s first name was incorrectly given on the schedule listing those returned by the Wiltshire boroughs, and that it was Henry rather than John who was elected.

Alternatively, it may be speculated that the MP was a retainer of Humphrey, earl of Stafford, to whom the borough of Great Bedwyn pertained. An older John Bradley ‘of Stafford’ had served as receiver of estates belonging to Earl Humphrey’s family in the late fourteenth century and during Henry IV’s reign;3 C. Rawcliffe, The Staffords, 213, 215; CPR, 1401-5, p. 48. another of this name was bailiff of Stafford for at least three terms in the 1420s and 1430s;4 E159/199, recorda Mich. rot. 19d; 201, recorda Mich. rot. 25; 208, recorda Mich. rot. 5d; Staffs. RO, Stafford bor. recs. D938/205. and before 1450 a third John Bradley served in the garrison of Calais when the earl (by then duke of Buckingham), was captain there.5 E207/16/5.