SEGRYME, Ralph

A mercer of unknown origin, Segryme resided in the parish of St. John Maddermarket.8 Cozens-Hardy and Kent, 26. It is not known if he was connected to John Segryme of Haverhill, Suff., who was active at the beginning of the 15th cent., and Thomas Segryme, a merchant and fishmonger of London in the first half of Henry VI’s reign: CPR, 1436-41, p. 152; DKR, xlviii. 254; CCR, 1435-41, pp. 118, 270. He became one of the most prominent Norwich burgesses of the mid fifteenth century, styled in his later years as ‘venerabilus vir’ by his fellow citizens.9 NCR 16d, f. 23.

Customs accounts show that he traded through the port of Great Yarmouth in the early 1450s, exporting woollen cloth and importing a variety of commodities, including felt hats, canvas and paper.10 E122/151/69-73.

The position of treasurer of the city was Segryme’s first known office after he became a freeman of Norwich in 1426-7,11 Norwich city recs., ‘Old Free bk.’, NCR 17c, f. 46v. although it is very likely that he also served as a common councillor early in his career. When he began his term as treasurer, the city’s liberties were in the hands of the King, who had confiscated them in the wake of the disputed mayoral election of 1437. Following the election, Thomas Wetherby*, leader of one of the factions at Norwich, and his allies had alleged that a riotous mob had prevented them from coming to the guildhall on election day. They also claimed to have suffered assaults at the hands of some of the rioters, of whom Segryme was one, but it is impossible to ascertain the truth of such partisan allegations.12 KB9/229/1/106.

Although evidently engaged in local politics by the later 1430s, Segryme did not begin to play a leading role in civic affairs until the succeeding decade. In January 1441 he and other citizens were tasked with informing the duke of Norfolk, who had come to Norwich seeking a loan for the King, that the city was so ‘desolate of everything’ that it was unable to raise a notable sum.13 NCR 16d, f. 14v. In the following year he and Thomas Aleyn were elected sheriffs and in January 1443, several months into their shrievalty, there was an outbreak of unrest (afterwards known as ‘Gladman’s Insurrection’) directed against Norwich priory. In the wake of these disturbances, the government dispatched a commission of oyer and terminer to investigate. The commissioners took indictments naming the mayor, William Henstead*, the two sheriffs and other leading citizens as promoters of the trouble. The indicted citizens were also charged with having assaulted, imprisoned and ill-treated a fellow citizen, Thomas Ingham*, and several notable figures who were in Norwich at the time, among them Sir John Clifton and John Timperley I*.14 KB27/730, rex rot. 30; KB9/84/1/10.

The King punished the city by confiscating its liberties for a second time and appointing Clifton its governor. Henstead, Segryme and Aleyn were removed from office but it is unlikely that they fell into complete disgrace, since the two former sheriffs were members of a delegation which Clifton sent to the King at Windsor in the following month.15 Norwich city recs., chamberlains’ accts. 1384-1448, NCR 18a, f. 223v. Their membership of the delegation supports the argument that ‘Gladman’s Insurrection’ was a formalized protest, rather than a serious riot (see P. Maddern, ‘Legitimation of Power: Riot and Authority in 15th-Cent. Norwich’, Parergon, n.s. viA, 65-84. Furthermore, Segryme was appointed a j.p. in 1446, more than a year before the liberties were restored. When the city regained its rights and privileges at the end of 1447, the former mayor and sheriffs recovered their offices, meaning that Segryme finally completed his interrupted term as sheriff at Michaelmas 1448.16 Blomefield, iii. 164; Cozens-Hardy and Kent, 26; Norf. Official Lists, 101.

A few months later, Segryme was elected to his only Parliament. This sat until July 1449, and shortly after its dissolution the Crown commissioned Segryme and Robert Toppe*, with whom he had sat in the Commons, to distribute a tax allowance in Norwich. He subsequently served on at least five other royal commissions, including one of oyer and terminer charged with investigating allegations of trespass, oppression, maintenance and other abuses in Norwich. This was established in the autumn of 1450, a few months after the King’s chief minister, the duke of Suffolk, fell from power. The indictments it took blamed the city’s recent difficulties on a corrupt alliance between the prior of Norwich and some of Suffolk’s retainers in East Anglia, who were accused of having oppressed the citizens.17 R.L. Storey, End of House of Lancaster, 218; KB9/272/1-5.

Owing to gaps in the records, it is not clear exactly when Segryme became an alderman, but probably it was after he had finally completed his term as sheriff and before his election as mayor. He was an alderman for Conisford ward,18 NCR 16d, ff. 17, 18, 21, 23v, 27. even though his home parish of St. John Maddermarket lay within that of Wymer, but it was not uncommon for an alderman to represent a ward in which he did not reside. His term as mayor was significant, since it saw the King grant Norwich a new charter and witnessed an important agreement between the corporation and the city’s guild of St. George. Dated 17 Mar. 1452, the charter formally pardoned the citizens for ‘Gladman’s Insurrection’ and declared that they were to enjoy all their former customs and privileges, although crucially it failed to define the city’s jurisdictional boundaries, controversy over which had lain at the root of the trouble.19 Recs. Norwich ed. Hudson and Tingey, i. pp. xcvii-xcviii. Drawn up ten days after the charter, the agreement between the corporation and guild was mediated by the city’s recorder, William Yelverton*, and regulated the relationship between the two institutions. In accordance with this arrangement, subsequently known as ‘Yelverton’s Mediation’, Segryme and successive mayors served a term as the guild’s alderman after completing their mayoralties.20 Recs. Gild St. George, 12-13.

In April 1453, while Segryme was alderman of the guild, Margaret of Anjou visited Norwich (perhaps while on her way to the shrine at Walsingham to give thanks for her pregnancy), and he and other leading citizens lent the city money (in his case seven marks), so that it could prepare a suitable reception for her.21 NCR 16d, f. 18v; NCR 17c, f. 18v. Later that year, and again in 1454, he took part in negotiations with the prior of Norwich, with whom the citizens were embroiled in yet another dispute.22 NCR 16d, ff. 19v, 21. Also in 1454, he and Thomas Ellis† met Master John Wigenhale, one of the executors of Thomas Brown, the former bishop of Norwich, to seek the £40 which Brown had left the city in his will.23 Blomefield, iii. 159. In the same period Segryme was occupied with his responsibilities as an executor of another alderman, John Wilby, declaring in January 1454 that he intended to build a separate prison for the women prisoners in Norwich out of the resources of the testator’s estate.24 Norwich consist. ct., Reg. Wylbey, ff. 5-6v; NCR 16d, f. 21.

By the mid 1450s Segryme was feeling the effects of old age. In March 1455, after forgiving the city a debt of £20, he was excused from holding any civic office because of his physical infirmity. Evidently this exemption did not apply to his position as alderman, customarily an office for life, since he was re-elected as such later that month. He was dead by the following year, when John Burt was elected as an alderman in his place.25 NCR 16d, ff. 23, 27. Segryme could have died at any time between his re-election and Burt’s election in Mar. 1456, since elections for the aldermen of each ward were held only once a year. Segryme was buried in the parish church of St. John Maddermarket, to which he gave a rood screen, two panels of which, bearing his initials, are now preserved in the Victoria and Albert Museum.26 Cozens-Hardy and Kent, 26; N. Pevsner, Buildings of Eng.: Norf. i. 241. His will has not survived, but the city’s records show that his executors included John Gilbert and Richard Brown II*,27 Norwich city recs., ct. roll, 1461-83, NCR 1/19; C67/41, m. 3. that he left his widow, Agnes, 800 marks and a life interest in his messuage in St. John Maddermarket, and that he set aside £10 towards cleaning the river Wensum.28 NCR 1/19; NCR 16d, ff. 29, 30v. He was also one of the founders of St. Barbara’s chapel in the guildhall, established for the benefit of the prisoners in the guildhall prison as well as the welfare of his and his co-founders’ souls.29 Cozens-Hardy and Kent, 26; Blomefield, iv. 232-3. Aside from the messuage, there is no evidence for Segryme’s real property, save that it was valued at £5 p.a. for the purposes of a royal tax in 1451.30 R. Virgoe, ‘Norwich taxation list of 1451’, Norf. Archaeology, xl. 150. In the late 1430s he had been a feoffee of a moiety of Netherhall, a manor in Cavendish, Suffolk, but he himself is not known to have held any property in that county.31 CPR, 1436-41, p. 152; W.A. Copinger, Suff. Manors, i. 66. His personal estate was clearly substantial, since his executors were able to pay his widow her 800 marks in full, and to offer the city 200 marks for the repair of its walls.32 NCR 1/19; NCR 16d, ff. 31v-32.

Some 16 years after Segryme’s death, the civic authorities agreed to give the hospital of St. Giles £200, drawn from the residue of his estate and that of his by then deceased executor, Richard Brown. In return for the gift, the hospital agreed to support a perpetual chaplain in St. Barbara’s, the chapel Segryme had helped to found.33 NCR 1/19; NCR 16d, ff. 31v-32; C. Rawcliffe, Medicine for the Soul, 156. The MP’s widow survived until 1474. She was buried beside her husband in St. John Maddermarket, where a brass depicting the couple still exists.34 Pevsner, 241. In her will of the previous year she directed that a chantry priest in St. John’s should sing for the souls of herself and Segryme for three years. Her will does not mention any sons, although it does refer to her daughter, Margaret, who had married William Skipwith†, and to Segryme’s sister, Emma.35 Reg. Gelour, ff. 81v-82v. Katherine Segryme, who became prioress of the nunnery at Carrow in the late 15th century, was probably another of the MP’s relatives.36 VCH Norf. ii. 354. Katherine features in the wills (made in 1465 and 1466 respectively) of John Gilbert and Alice, Richard Brown’s widow: Norwich consist. ct., Reg. Cobald, ff. 68-69; NCR 1/19. Thomas Segryme and the priest, Robert Segryme, also feature in Alice’s will.