CHYKE, William

Although the pedigree of the Chyke family may not now be properly reconstructed, there is a strong possibility that this MP was descended from a namesake who had represented Wareham in five Parliaments between 1352 and 1373. His parents held property not far from the borough, at Kimmeridge and West Holme, and in 1421 they made a settlement ensuring that William would inherit it after their deaths.2 Ibid. 296-7. Besides this he acquired a remainder interest in a messuage and some 150 acres of land at ‘Westport’,3 Ibid. 373. and lawsuits he brought in the court of common pleas show that he also had arable land at East Tyneham,4 CP40/788, rot. 43. and at ‘Estmore’, ‘Sakmore’ and ‘Portmanmore’ where a barber and husbandman from Wareham were allegedly able to harvest crops worth £10.5 CP40/817, rot. 256; 825, rot. 182d. He added to his holdings at Kimmeridge by leasing lands and tenements from Joan, widow of John Clavell, agreeing in 1465 to pay her 26s. 8d. p.a. and to Robert Fry a further £4 p.a.6 J. Hutchins, Dorset, i. 564. The full extent of Chyke’s property in Wareham itself is uncertain, but the fact that he witnessed deeds there and was described in a royal pardon as ‘of Wareham, gentleman’,7 Dorset Nat. Hist. and Antiq. Field Club. Procs. lxv. 105; C67/40, m. 25. indicates that he lived there at least some of the time and was probably well acquainted with the burgesses.

Although a man named William Chyke traded in coal and other merchandise through the port of Weymouth (a cargo of his was unlawfully taken from a balinger called Le George of Weymouth at Mounts Bay in Cornwall in 1442),8 CPR, 1441-6, p. 109. the description of our MP as a ‘gentleman’ suggests that he was a lawyer rather than a merchant. Friendship with others who sat for Wareham in Parliament led him to witness a deed for his neighbour William Clavyle* regarding land at Egliston in 1445,9 Dorset Hist. Centre, Smedmore (Clavell) mss, 60. and a few years later he attended the county court to stand surety for the two men elected to represent the borough in the Parliament of February 1449.10 C219/15/6. Why he purchased a royal pardon on 6 July 1452 is not known, although many men from the region did so as judicial proceedings began against the followers of the earl of Devon and Sir Edward Brooke*, Lord Cobham, who had marched to Dartford in support of the duke of York’s army.11 C67/40, m. 25. It should be remembered that York was Wareham’s feudal lord.

Later in the 1450s Chyke became closely associated with the prominent Dorset lawyer John Newburgh II*, who lived not far away from him at East Lulworth. Thus, in 1459 he was party to transactions regarding the manor of Turners Puddle, which belonged to the Turbervilles but came, allegedly by subterfuge, to Newburgh.12 Dorset Feet of Fines, 386-7. Newburgh’s influence in the locality should not be underestimated, and credence may be given to the speculation that he played a decisive role at the Dorset elections held on 22 Sept. 1460. On that occasion he himself was returned for the county and at least five of his intimates were elected to represent boroughs: Chyke for Wareham, John Calowe* for Bridport, Sampson Brown* for Melcombe Regis, Christopher Wood* for Shaftesbury, and Thomas Hussey II* for Poole.13 C219/16/6. Even so, a wider political purpose (that of lending support to the Yorkist regime following the Crown’s defeat at Northampton), cannot be readily deduced from an examination of Newburgh’s career. While up at Parliament, during its second session in Hilary term 1461, Chyke continued his suit in the common pleas, begun three years earlier, against a husbandman from Povington, for taking crops worth £5 from his land at Tyneham.14 CP40/788, rot. 43; 800, rot. 166d. Throughout the 1460s he continued to assist Newburgh as a feoffee of property in Dorset.15 Dorset Feet of Fines, 400-1, 402, 404. Membership of the Commons had not brought him to the attention of the government; nor did the change of monarch in 1461 lead to his appointment to ad hoc commissions of local administration. Furthermore, although he was listed as a potential juror at sessions of oyer and terminer held in Dorchester in May 1462 he was not pricked in the event.16 KB9/21/18.

Chyke was present at the shire court on 25 May 1467 to attest the indenture of return recording the election for Dorset of William Newburgh†, John’s son and heir.17 C219/17/1. Following the Readeption of Henry VI and the arrival in England of Margaret of Anjou and Prince Edward in the spring of 1471, William Newburgh rode to support their forces, only to be executed on the battlefield at Tewkesbury by the victorious Edward IV. Whether or not Chyke rode with him, he saw fit to take out a pardon from the restored King, which, dated 1 Jan. 1472, described him as ‘of Wareham, gentleman, alias late of Kimmeridge in Purbeck’.18 C67/48, m. 28. On behalf of the Newburghs he was involved in transactions regarding the hundred of Bere and manors including Bere Regis in April 1476, following the deaths of two of the feoffees, and he acknowledged the deed on 9 Aug. at Wareham. Then, in May 1478 he was among the Newburgh trustees who made a settlement of manors in Somerset on John Newburgh’s grandson and his wife.19 CCR, 1476-85, no. 140; CIPM Hen. VII, i. 38. Still alive in Trinity term that year,20 CP40/867, rot. 511d. he is not recorded thereafter.