INGRAM, John

Of obscure origin,6 On chronological grounds, we may discount identification with the namesake who was a tax collector in Wilts. in 1416-17 and took the oath against maintenance of law-breakers in that county in 1434. That John was among the guardians of the young John Combe* nominated by Thomas Montagu, earl of Salisbury, from 1416, and later a feoffee for Nicholas Wotton II* of land in Oxon. in 1427: Hants RO, Jervoise of Herriard mss, 44M69/C/528; CPR, 1429-36, p. 371; CAD, vi. C4374. Ingram was established in Buckinghamshire by the 1440s, and made his home at Aylesbury. He may have been the John Ingham (sic) who was enfeoffed by Sir John Cressy* of manors in Bedfordshire and elsewhere in the summer of 1435, prior to Cressy’s departure overseas on military service,7 CPR, 1429-36, p. 463. but if so this must have been an early commitment in his career. Having trained in the law, and probably joined an inn in the parish of St. Andrew, Holborn, without Old Temple Bar (where he sometimes resided),8 KB27/818, rots. 11d, 54, 108. in the 1440s and 1450s he was regularly employed as an attorney in the courts at Westminster by litigants from Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire.9 Baker, i. 928. Successive sheriffs of the joint bailiwick engaged him to receive writs on their behalf in the court of common pleas, and he is known to have served at least three terms as an under sheriff in the two counties. In 1450 the chief justice of the common bench, (Sir) John Prysote*, saw fit to appoint him clerk of the essoins in his court, in a grant considered by Ingram to entitle him to hold the office for life.10 CP40/829, rot. 139.

At home in Aylesbury Ingram became active as a feoffee and close associate of the local families of Revenyng and Baldwyn, who numbered among them the Gray’s Inn lawyer, John Baldwyn*.11 CPR, 1446-52, p. 506; Hampton mss, 705:349/12946/494956, 494991, 495194. The parliamentary elections for Buckinghamshire usually took place in the same town, and Ingram attested the indentures sealed at the county court there in 1449, 1450 and 1453, on one occasion endorsing the election as a knight of the shire of Thomas Singleton*, whom he twice served as under sheriff. Yet he was also well known to others who represented the county in different Parliaments of Henry VI’s reign, notably the brothers John Hampden II* and (Sir) Edmund Hampden* and their kinsman of Great Kimble, John I*. All three Hampdens were party to a deed of September 1452 concerning a messuage and its appurtenances in Aylesbury, in which Ingram and his wife Isabel had an interest.12 Hampton mss, 705:349/12946/494902-3.

Ingram’s legal practice often took him away from Buckinghamshire to the capital. Styled ‘gentleman’ he was among the recipients of a ‘gift’ of goods and chattels made in May 1453 by Bernard de Mage, a man of Gascon origin domiciled in London,13 CCR, 1447-54, p. 432. and in the following year, or early in 1455, he styled himself ‘of London’ in a bill he sent to the chancellor, the earl of Salisbury. In this bill he and an associate, Stephen Ibot, complained about the actions of an esquire named Roger Dreycotes, to whom they had been bound in an obligation of £40 on behalf of Harry Staunton, a monk claiming to be prior of Wenlock. Ingram contended that it had been agreed that if they paid Dreycotes £20 which the monk owed him the latter would discharge them using the abbot’s seal, but the duplicitous Dreycotes kept the bond to enforce payment of other debts, and had the petitioners arrested. Ingram sent in his bill within a week of his arrest,14 C1/24/265. and it may well be that his difficult circumstances prompted him to seek election to the Parliament summoned to meet shortly afterwards, on 9 July 1455. The writ of summons followed the Yorkist victory at the battle of St. Albans, but politics may have had nothing to do with Ingram’s candidacy; perhaps he was simply seeking the privilege of freedom from arrest accorded to Members of the Commons.

Ingram had no recorded connexion with Bridport, the Dorset borough which returned him; indeed, he was one of an increasing number of outsiders and lawyers elected by that borough in our period, and his current position as under sheriff of Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire further demonstrates that he was not resident in the constituency. His office as clerk of the essoins required him to be at Westminster on a regular basis, but the proximity of the law courts to the meeting place of the Commons meant that he could attend the House as occasion demanded. In September 1455, during the recess between the first two parliamentary sessions, Ingram was once more the recipient of a gift of goods and chattels, this time belonging to a London goldsmith called Domenic Euan. Walter Ingram, another ‘gentleman’ and presumably a relation of his, witnessed the transaction.15 CCR, 1454-61, p. 104. Our MP acted in a similar fashion in June 1457, as the recipient of the moveable possessions of a London tailor, but in the following spring he took on the trusteeship of lands in Aylesbury and elsewhere in Buckinghamshire. This was again in association with Sir Edmund Hampden.16 CCR, 1454-61, pp. 224, 287. Also in 1458 Ingram received from James Butler, earl of Wiltshire, another of the queen’s intimates, a quitclaim of a garden in Aylesbury, but nothing is known of the background to this transaction: Hampton mss, 705:349/12946/494963. The latter was strongly identified with the Lancastrian court as a servant of the queen and the prince of Wales, and Ingram seemingly followed his lead in the civil war years. On 28 Aug. 1460, just a few weeks after the Yorkists triumphed at Northampton, a commission was issued by the new regime ordering the arrest of John and Walter Ingram, among others, to answer charges of spreading false rumours in breach of the statutes. John hastened to clear his name, and five days later secured a pardon of all treasons, rebellions and insurrections committed before 6 Aug., and of any consequent outlawries.17 CPR, 1452-61, pp. 611, 624, 651. Chief Justice Prysote died early in the following year, and it may be for this reason (rather than the accession of Edward IV) that Ingram then lost his post as clerk of the essoins. He is next recorded on 7 Aug. 1462, when he and Walter acknowledged a quitclaim to John Scolehouse, a waxchandler from Norwich, of all actions and demands against him, but the background to this particular dispute is not revealed.18 Cal. P. and M. London, 1458-82, p. 22.

Continuing to practice in the law, at one point, in 1465, Ingram became embroiled in a suit brought under the statute of maintenance by a fellow lawyer, Thomas Calwodlegh* of Exeter.19 KB27/818, rots. 11d, 54, 108. He attested the Buckinghamshire elections once again, in 1467, although this time the county court was held at Chipping Wycombe rather than Aylesbury. The following year he attempted at the Middlesex assizes to reclaim his former office in the court of common pleas, but apparently proved unsuccessful.20 CP40/829, rot. 139. Ingram’s whereabouts during the Readeption are not known, yet the fact that he subsequently took out pardons from the restored Edward IV in June 1472 and again two years later (the second one being enrolled on the patent roll), need not lead to the conclusion that the Yorkist regime had found cause to mistrust him – his appointments to commissions of gaol delivery (even as a member of the quorum) contradict this supposition. In the first pardon he was described not only as of Aylesbury and London, but also as formerly of North Marston, Buckinghamshire.21 C67/49, m. 28; CPR, 1467-77, p. 447. Presumably he had acquired property in that parish, but may have passed it on to his putative son.

Ingram had once sought to invest in land in Surrey, but without much success. In the mid 1470s he petitioned the chancellor regarding a messuage called ‘Boveley’ and land in Wonersh which he sold to John Preston in return for the sum of £7 3s. 4d. and an annual rent of 3s. 4d., but Preston failed to honour the commitment.22 C1/54/222. Another petition was sent to Chancery about the same time in the name of Ingram’s grandson and ward, Thomas Hulmet or Helmet. At the time of the betrothal of Helmet’s parents, Ingram’s daughter Katherine and John Helmet, the latter had enfeoffed Sir Thomas Montgomery†, Richard Croft† and others including Ingram himself of his lands in Buckinghamshire (at Penn, Wycombe and Taplow), intending to settle them on himself and his new wife in jointure, with remainder to their issue, but after the couple’s premature deaths one of the feoffees refused to relinquish his interest.23 C1/51/159-60; C4/2/35.

Whether this grandson was Ingram’s heir-apparent, or whether he had produced sons is not known for certain, although it seems likely that Katherine Helmet was not his only child, especially as he was called John Ingram ‘the elder’ from the late 1460s,24 Hampton mss, 705:349/12946/495182, 495194, 495199. and his younger namesake (perhaps his son) was associated with him in Aylesbury affairs. It becomes difficult to distinguish between the two Johns, but our MP was active in the interest of John Golyn† of Sandford-on-Thames into the 1480s.25 Egerton 1938, ff. 94v, 95. He also continued to be linked with persons of consequence: he had named the chief justice of common pleas, Sir Thomas Bryan, and John Grey†, Lord Grey’s son, among the trustees of his property in Aylesbury in 1479.26 Hampton mss, 705:349/12946/495178. In April 1483 he and his wife Agnes conveyed certain lands and tenements in the town and at Walton nearby to John Ingram ‘of North Marston’ and Richard Gourney, and these two conveyed the same to Golyn and others a year later.27 Ibid. 495200, 495229. It would seem, therefore, that it was the younger John who chose to be buried in the nave of the church at North Marston, where a monumental brass commemorates John Ingram, sometime bailiff of that vill.28 VCH Bucks. iv. 79 and RCHM, N. Bucks. 225 give the date on the brass as 14[59], but Mon. Brasses ed. Mill Stephenson, 45, suggests 1499.