HOCHON, John

Hochon acted as a feoffee for Nicholas Wotton I* of London with regard to Wotton’s acquisition of the manor of Boughton Malherbe, Kent, in Henry IV’s reign, and in January 1428, during his first Parliament, he joined Wotton, John Bamburgh* and others in acquiring an interest in extensive estates in Sittingbourne, Kent, and neighbouring parishes which had belonged to Alice Corby, the widow of Wotton’s putative father-in-law.3 CCR, 1413-19, pp. 72-73, 376-7; 1422-9, p. 388. Hochon’s connexion with Wotton and Bamburgh most probably came about through the administration of Rochester bridge, and it may be this connexion that explains his two returns to Parliament for Rochester. Nevertheless, he was a local man, and in May 1434 was listed among the leading citizens required to swear the generally administered oath not to maintain peace-breakers.4 CPR, 1429-36, p. 391.

Hochon’s employment in the affairs of Rochester bridge continued long after his first election. By October 1435, when he sat in his second Parliament, he was the junior of the two bridge-wardens. His duties involved travelling to Maidstone in the following April and to Canterbury in September to meet one of the bridge’s most important local patrons, Geoffrey Lowther*, the lieutenant-warden of the Cinque Ports, and to recover 110 marks which Richard Clitheroe† of New Romney had bequeathed to the bridge in his will some 15 years earlier.5 Rochester Bridge wardens’ accts. F 1/40. In July 1439 he served as a juror at an inquisition ad quod damnum with regard to alienations of land to the bridge.6 C143/448/19. At Michaelmas 1444 Hochon was chosen as bailiff of the city, but during the Hilary term of his official year he was ordered to appear in King’s bench accused of selling beer, ale and bread to the value of £40, contrary to the statute of Edward II’s reign which prohibited municipal officers from trading in victuals.7 KB27/731, rots. 4d, 103. In this case and in another later on,8 KB27/740, rot. 129. his occupation was given as ‘hackneyman’. He was not the first hackneyman to represent Rochester in Parliament (Reynold Shrewsbury† had done so in the early years of the century), but the choice of a tradesman with a relatively low social status as MP reflected the importance of the bridge and the carriage trade between London and Dover to the city’s prosperity. Yet Hochon’s other business interests and links with important Londoners and Kentishmen belied his description as mere ‘hackneyman’. Significantly, he also appears to have been a merchant of the Calais staple. At least one of his transactions in wool involved him in litigation. At an unknown date he entered into a trading partnership with another London merchant, Thomas Knovile, who went to Calais to sell a shipment of wool on their behalf, only to withhold a part of Hochon’s share of the proceeds of more than £440, or so Hochon alleged. He said that Knovile ‘untruly sclaunderd and noysed hym to diverse worthe and notable persones’, claiming that Hochon had unjustly detained their ‘boke of reknynge’. This incident may relate to the charges that Knovile was bound to appear before the King’s council to answer in March 1436, but the outcome of their quarrel is not known.9 E101/202/19; CCR, 1435-41, p. 55.

Hochon acquired a number of properties in Rochester and elsewhere along the banks of the Medway, some of them through marriage to a widow. By Michaelmas 1439 he was renting 135 acres of marsh from the wardens of Rochester bridge on their manor of Grain, and in Easter term 1445 he brought an action of trespass against a local man who forcibly entered his close at Selling and stole goods to the value of five marks.10 Rochester Bridge wardens’ accts. 1439-40, F 1/42; CP40/737, rots. 92, 94d. By that date he had also obtained land in Smeeth, near Ashford, but towards the end of 1447 he and another local man, Thomas Melle, conveyed it to John Scott†.11 J.R. Scott, Mems. Fam. of Scott, app. lvii, deed 34. Hochon’s only son, Robert, died in the following year, after naming his father as one of his executors.12 Centre for Kentish Studies, Maidstone, Rochester consist. ct. wills, 1440-53, DRb/PWr 1, f. 60v. In his own will, made on 11 Aug. 1467, the MP instructed his feoffees to deliver his lands in Rochester, Chatham and Boxley to his widow, Joan, to hold for her lifetime. When she died his property in Rochester was to descend to his daughter, Alice Wattes, while the other holdings were to revert to his stepsons, Thomas and William Barker. Hochon asked to be buried in the parish church of St. Nicholas in Rochester, and made small bequests for the fabric of the church and for that of St. Nicholas in nearby Strood. A trental for his soul and those of his parents and benefactors was to be sung in the Carmelite friary of Alyesford, Kent, perhaps an indication of his place of birth. Hochon left 20s. for the marriage of his stepdaughter, Joan Barker, and the same sum to his servant, Isabel Bouke, to provide for her until she married. He appointed his widow and Richard Redeman, a former bailiff of Rochester, as his executors.13 Ibid. 1453-61, DRb/PWr 2, ff. 389v-90v.