JANE, William

Few details of William Jane’s career prior to his election to the Bury Parliament of 1447 have come to light, but it is probable that he was a kinsman of Stephen Jane* who was returned to the same assembly as a Member for Launceston. If so, it is possible that he, like Stephen, was connected with the Courtenays of Boconnoc, who had recently succeeded to a portion of the estates of the ancient Carminowe family and who, in (Sir) Hugh Courtenay*, supplied one of Cornwall’s knights of the shire on that occasion. Certainly, ties of both lordship and kinship played a part in the Cornish elections of 1447: William Jane’s parliamentary colleague, John Nanskelly II*, was not only a relative of his, but also the son of Courtenay’s fellow shire knight, John Nanskelly I*. Moreover, both the Nanskellys and Janes owned property in the vicinity of Truro, in the case of the latter on the Roseland peninsula.4 Cornw. Feet of Fines, ii (Devon and Cornw. Rec. Soc., 1950), 919.

The extent of William’s own landholdings (none of them demonstrably in the Truro area) is unclear, but in 1451 his property was assessed at no more than 40s. p.a. for taxation purposes.5 E179/87/92. It may have been he, rather than a namesake, who by the late 1460s had settled at Liskeard and was trading in cloth.6 Cornw. RO, Liskeard bor. recs., B/Lis/92. In his business dealings, Jane occasionally employed somewhat dubious practices. Thus, in 1470 he concluded an agreement with one Stephen Sadeler that he would take 23 ‘dozens’ of cloth across the Channel to Brittany and purchase a safe-conduct at his own expense, paying Sadeler for the merchandise as soon as he himself had found a purchaser. Rather than undertaking the dangerous voyage, Jane soon found a willing buyer in a Breton merchant in the port of Fowey, but failed to hand over Sadeler’s share of the profits. When Sadeler sued him for the debt in the duchy court at Liskeard, Jane successfully delayed proceedings by various questionable pleadings and threats against his opponent, forcing him to seek redress from the council of the young prince of Wales.7 SC8/345/E1355.

Within a few years of these events, Jane took up more permanent residence at Launceston, and rose to such prominence in the town as to be elected one of the stewards on two occasions in the 1470s, and eventually to serve as mayor. Indeed, the townsmen came to rely on his experience to such an extent that he was one of two men charged with standing surety for the borough’s loyalty in the aftermath of the Cornish rising of 1497.8 E101/516/27, m. 3. By this time Jane must have been an old man, but he was clearly in good health, for as late as 1502 he leased property in ‘Estlysyon’ for a term of 20 years, and lived on for another six or seven years thereafter. At his death he left a daughter, Thomasina, and two sons, both called John, the elder of whom became his executor.9 C1/529/8, 9.