PARKER, John IV

Nothing is known of Parker’s origins, although he established himself in Winchester in the early years of the century by acquiring a house in Tanner Street from his first wife’s mother, Amy. However, the latter was subsequently murdered by her husband, a weaver named John Smyth, and the property was temporarily confiscated by the bailiffs of the city before being returned to Parker and his wife in 1405. Parker probably enlarged the property, which he inhabited for several years. By 1422 he also held a tenement in Buck Street, next to the bridge over the stream, and in return for the payment of 1d. as tarrage was allowed to extend the corner of the building onto the highway. Later, in the early 1440s, he took a 90-year lease at an annual rent of 20d. of a plot adjacent to this tenement, on which by 1447 he had erected another house and created a garden. In addition, he held property in High Street.4 D.J. Keene, Surv. Winchester (Winchester Studies, 2), ii. nos. 153, 472, 497, 500, 502A; Black Bk. Winchester ed. Bird, 52.

Such modest prosperity as this implies depended on Parker’s trade as a fuller. In 1406 he broke city regulations by weaving cloth outside the liberty, and the imposititon of punitive fines prompted him five years later to join Richard Bolt* and seven other fullers in petitioning the authorities to change the current ordinances, which by forbidding citizens to carry on their industry outside the walls was causing considerable hardship. Yet the mayor and council, concerned about losing revenue needed to fund the fee farm, angrily dismissed (contradixerunt) the bill, and affirmed the ordinances regarding weaving and fulling.5 Keene, ii. 1315; Black Bk. 27-28. Little is known about Parker’s trade in cloth, although in the 1440s he exported this product overseas through Southampton, and he also dealt in oil which was carted from that port to Winchester.6 E122/140/62; Brokage Bk. 1439-40 (Soton. Rec. Soc. 1941), 30.

Having become involved in the civic administration of Winchester in about 1416, when he served as an alderman, in 1419 Parker was assigned the task of collecting poundage.7 Winchester recs. W/E1/14, no. 6. Ten years later he acted as a chamberlain, but on 10 Jan. 1431, shortly after the end of his term of office, he was convicted in the mayor’s court of unspecified offences against the liberties of the city, and fined as much as £10.8 Black Bk. 72. Whatever his misdemeanors, they did not prevent him being elected as bailiff of the commons the following Michaelmas, and as such in March 1432 he and the superior bailiff, James Solas*, responded to the sheriff’s precept to hold elections for Parliament.9 C219/14/3. Parker’s exemplary service to the city thereafter was formally recognized on 11 Aug. 1441, when he was exonerated from all local offices in the city save at his will, with the exception of those of mayor and MP, and it was also granted by the mayor that he be quit for life from paying parliamentary taxes, contributions towards the expenses of the city’s representatives, murage and all other levies.10 Black Bk. 78. He was returned to the Parliament summoned to assemble on the following 25 Jan. No doubt because of his exemption from taxation, he was not included on the list of those required to contribute towards the expenses of the MPs of 1445-6. It is possible that he was the John Parker described as a ‘yeoman of Winchester’ named among the recipients of the goods and chattels of Alan Cotton, a tailor from Southwark, in June 1454, but if so he must by then have been an old man.11 CCR, 1454-61, p. 71. Parker was survived by his second wife, Alice, who was still living in 1464.12 Winchester recs. W/E4/5.