KINGSTON, William

Few details of the career of Kingston, one of the less notable men to represent Tavistock in Parliament in Henry VI’s reign, have come to light, but he was evidently a local man. Although his parentage is unknown, he was probably related to Robert Kingston, who witnessed property deeds in the town in the late 1430s. His return to the Bury Parliament of February 1447 aside, William is first heard of in a similar capacity in December of the same year.1 Tavistock Parish Recs. ed. Worth, 76-77. Kingston’s failure to appear regularly among the witnesses to his neighbours’ property settlements, or to be empanelled on local juries with any degree of frequency, is indicative of his relatively low standing. Even after serving in two Parliaments, he was styled a mere yeoman, and he is not known ever to have held office either locally or under the Crown.2 CP40/766, rot. 57. It is probable that he owed his two returns to Parliament to the unwillingness of any of his more prominent neighbours to undertake the journey to the meeting place of the Commons, either on account of the choice of venue or of the strained political situation: both in 1447 and 1450 the burgesses of Tavistock elected local men of little note, whereas their representatives in the two intervening Parliaments were figures of rather greater substance. As Kingston appears to have died before 1460, the Exeter yeoman of this name who in 1462 was sued by the Devon esquire John Batyn for a debt of £20 must have been a namesake.3 HP Biogs. ed. Wedgwood and Holt, 517; CP40/805, rot. 34d. Another man of the same name active in Tavistock in the 1520s was probably a descendant or other kinsman of the MP.4 Tavistock Parish Recs. 83.