STRELLEY, John

Strelley, who is not to be confused with three namesakes and cousins of Woodborough and Strelley in Nottinhamshire and Hazlebadge in Derbyshire,3 Their careers are not difficult to disentangle save in one particular. It is possible that it was our MP who was escheator of Notts. and Derbys. in 1463-4, although it is far more likely that his cousin, the son and heir of Sir Robert Strelley, occupied the post. owed his place in landed society to the marriage in about 1411 of his father, a younger son of the wealthy knight, Sir Nicholas Strelley† of Strelley, to the heiress-presumptive of a minor Exchequer official. He was still in his boyhood when his father died, and was probably brought up by his mother and her second husband, John Hickling, who, largely as a result of the lands he held in her right, took an active role in local administration in the late 1430s. Fortunately for the financial interests of our MP, his mother and stepfather died within a few years while he was still a young man: Hickling was dead by May 1444 and Joan by February 1448.4 S.J. Payling, Political Society in Lancastrian Eng. 70, 141; CCR, 1441-7, p. 172; CFR, xviii. 74. Both named him among their executors: CP40/779, rot. 154d; 817, rot. 207d. He was involved in litigation as Hickling’s executor until at least as late as 1470: CP40/835, rot. 183. Their deaths brought him manors in Linby, where there was also a royal manor, and Oxton (settled on his parents in tail general by Sir Nicholas), the one in the heart of the forest of Sherwood and the other on its outskirts, together with property in Nottingham and in Derbyshire at Derby and Ashover.5 Payling, 70, 175n.; E13/130, rot. 24; Notts. Archs., Nottingham recs., ct. rolls CA 1339, rot. 2; Feudal Aids, i. 277, 290; CP40/806, rot. 196d; 808, rot. 288d. His mother’s inheritance also appears to have included a London brewhouse, called le Cokke super le Hoop, in the parish of St. Giles without Cipplegate, probably acquired by Thomas Hunte when he was resident in London as an Exchequer official. Neither of his manors was particularly valuable; none the less, in the tax returns of 1450 Strelley was assessed on a respectable annual income of 40 marks.6 E179/159/84.

The young Strelley may have served in the retinue of Sir John Cressy* which went to France with Richard, duke of York, in the summer of 1441, and then, in the spring of 1443, in the garrison at Alençon under Sir Richard Wydeville.7 E101/53/33, m. 2; Add. Ch. 12210. If this was our MP, military service brought him the opposite of prosperity. In June 1446 he sued out a general pardon and during the next few years he often found himself in trouble. Two years later, in June 1448, he required a pardon for his outlawry at the suit of the London skinner and moneylender, Christopher Warter, over a debt of almost £18; and it may have been financial difficulties that prompted him to alienate his London brewhouse in the following November.8 C67/39 m. 44; CPR, 1446-52, p. 100; Corp. London RO, hr 177/13. Difficulties of another sort soon followed. In July 1451 the Crown issued a commission, on the complaint of Strelley’s neighbours, to investigate his alleged obstruction of a highway in the forest of Sherwood. This seemingly rather minor matter was to be a source of annoyance to him for much of his career. On the following 26 Aug. he was indicted before these commissioners for blocking the highroad from Hucknall Torkard to Blidworth at Papplewick with a great ditch and hedge. It was in the context of this indictment that, on 24 Nov., he sued out an exemplification of an inquisition taken before the verderers of Sherwood forest as long before as 1316, to the effect that a dyke had long existed at Papplewick to protect crops from the ravages of the deer of the forest. But this did not resolve the issue: a further commission of inquiry was issued in May 1454 and another indictment was laid against him in the following autumn.9 CPR, 1446-52, pp. 477, 506-7; 1452-61, p.175; KB9/265/170-1; 275/119-20. Process long continued on these indictments, and in 1476 and 1482 Strelley entered detailed defences only for the matter to be adjourned: KB27/859, rex rot. 10; 883, rex rot. 17. To add to his troubles he was outlawed in London in June 1455 for failure to answer a London tailor, John Laurence, for debt. Although he was able to reverse this on a technically, in the following February he was faced with the further inconvenience of personally appearing in the court of common pleas to find surety of the peace to Warter as another of his creditors.10 CP40/779, rot. 532d; CP40/780, rot. 407d.

Strelley was involved in a more serious incident in the summer of 1457. The dispute between the Yorkshire family of Plumpton and our MP’s neighbours, the Pierreponts of Holme Pierrepont, led to two murders in July, the one of Henry Pierrepont, and the other of John Green, steward and brother-in-law of Sir William Plumpton*. Strelley was later one of those appealed by Green’s brother for the latter murder, but there is no evidence to show why he should have been involved. That involvement may, however, have prompted him to sue out the general pardon in July 1458.11 Payling, 200-1; KB27/802, rot. 5d; C67/42, m. 18.

Although nearly all that is known of Strelley in the 1440s and 1450s concerns his legal problems, he did play a part in local politics. He attested the shire election of October 1449 and acted as a mainpernor for the attendance of one of those returned, Henry Boson*, an esquire of the royal household. In 1453 he witnessed an important deed which marked the settlement of the long-running dispute between another esquire of the Household, William Middleton of Girton (Nottinghamshire), the husband of his sister, Joan, and John Sacheverell* over lands in Stanton in the Peak in Derbyshire. After attesting his second parliamentary election, of 1455, he was himself returned to the next Parliament, which met at Coventry in November 1459.12 C219/15/7; 16/3; CCR, 1447-54, p. 481; S.M. Wright, Derbys. Gentry (Derbys. Rec. Soc. viii), 124.

By neither wealth nor prominence in local government was Strelley well qualified to represent his county, and it is clear that his election to this Parliament owed everything to the particular political circumstances of the autumn of that year. The defeat of the Yorkist lords at Ludford Bridge had prepared the way for a reassertion of Lancastrian lordship; and what is known of Strelley’s connexions at this date places him firmly in the Lancastrian camp. Most relevant here is the evidence connecting him with Henry VI’s half-brother, the earl of Pembroke, to whom the King had granted the royal manor of Mansfield with its satellite manors in Clipstone and Linby. In Trinity term 1457 Pembroke sued an action of account against Strelley, and it is a reasonable inference that that our MP had been acting as the earl’s receiver in this property. To be added to this probable association are Strelley’s various family connexions with members of Henry VI’s household. His cousin, Sir Robert Strelley*, and his sister’s husband, William Middleton, had both been in receipt of Household robes at one time or another. Further, he himself had benefited, albeit in a small way, from the King’s patronage: on 7 Nov 1456 the keeping of small parcels of forfeited land in Kirkby Woodhouse and nearby Awsworth had been committed to him for 12 years at an annual rent of 44s.13 C219/16/5; CP40/786, rot. 298d; CFR, xix. 181-2. There can, in short, be little doubt that he was elected in 1459 as a supporter of the house of Lancaster.

Strelley was again involved in parliamentary affairs in the very different political circumstances of the following autumn. On 6 Oct. 1460 he was one of many who voted in the disputed Nottinghamshire election. His votes there were not determined by family loyalty, for although his cousin, Sir Robert, was one of the successful candidates, he supported the opposing ‘ticket’ of William Babington* and Richard Sutton‡. It may be significant that he was later to be closely associated with William’s son, John, and that in March 1459 he had witnessed a grant by William to the Babington chantry at Flawford.14 Payling, 161-5; C219/16/6; Harl. 174, f. 13. Whether Strelley played any other part in the dramatic events of 1459-61 is not known, but if his Membership of the 1459 Parliament marked him out as a Lancastrian partisan, there is no unequivocal evidence that he suffered for those loyalties in the wake of Edward IV’s accession.

The last quarter of Strelley’s long life is poorly documented. What is known conforms to the pattern of his earlier career. He continued to be beset by difficulties. It is possible that these arose, in part, because he was distrusted as a Lancastrian, yet it is more likely that he failed to prosper, as he had largely failed to do so before 1461, because he was inadept at managing his own affairs. On 12 July 1462 he was again outlawed on a suit of debt brought by Warter, although he was able to secure revocation on a technicality, albeit not until February 1467.15 CP40/807, rot. 142. In the meantime, in either 1463 or 1464, he was involved in an affray in Nottingham in opposition to Henry Pierrepont†, the son of the man he had supported in 1457; in November 1466 he was summoned, on pain of £200, to appear before the duchy of Lancaster council at Westminster to answer for unspecified offences; and in the following Hilary term he was attached to reply to the King’s young brother, George, duke of Clarence, who had succeeded the earl of Pembroke as lord of Mansfield, for hunting in his free warren at Sutton near Mansfield.16 Nottingham mayor’s bk. CA 3955, p. 18; DL37/35/42; CP40/822, rot. 229d.

There is nothing to suggest Strelley played any part in the Readeption, unlike his cousin, Sir Robert, who fought for the earl of Warwick at the battle of Barnet in April 1471. He did, however, take the precaution of suing out a general pardon in the following November, which he then pleaded in bar to proceedings against him for not taking up knighthood under the 1465 distraint. Later he was again in trouble. In October 1472 he was again outlawed for debt in Middlesex and he did not secure the relevant pardon until May 1475. In April of the latter year he was summoned to appear in the Exchequer to answer the King for depasturing grass in the royal manor of Clayworth in north Nottinghamshire, although the matter was not pursued further.17 E159/249, recorda Mich. rot. 33; 250, recorda Trin. rot. 7; 252, recorda Easter rot. 8; CPR, 1467-77, p. 498.

Nearly all else that is known of the later part of Strelley’s career derives from two Chancery petitions dating from between 1475 and 1485. The first arose out of the marriage long before of his sister Joan to William, younger son of the Northumbrian knight, Sir John Middleton*. According to a petition presented by William’s brother, Richard, Sir John, who died as long before as 1441, had conveyed his outlying manors of Gratton in Derbyshire and Wansley in Nottinghamshire to Strelley and others to the intention that they would stand seised to the use of the successive life interests of his mother, Elizabeth, himself and his wife, before making estate to William and his heirs male. Richard now complained that our MP, as the last surviving feoffee, had failed to make this estate in which he was the next beneficiary after William.18 C1/54/184; Hist. Northumb. xiii. 326. The date of William’s death is not known, but it was before June 1477, the date of his widow’s will. The other petition was in very similar terms and related to an even older feoffment: John, son of John Wilford*, claimed that Strelley, seised of property in Nottingham to his use, refused to convey the legal estate to him. Oddly, Strelley found himself as defendant as a result of a feoffment made by the plaintiff’s grandfather to, among others, his own maternal grandfather, Thomas Hunte. Allegedly Hunte had outlived his co-feoffees and our MP had entered the disputed lands as heir. Since Hunte had died about 50 years before, the suit is a curious one.19 C1/56/247.

Strelley died an old man in 1487, but no inquisition was held until 20 Apr. 1508, when, in response to a writ of intrusions, a jury presented that he had died seised of the manors of Linby, held in chief by knight service, and Sutton cum Lound with lands in Oxton, Calverton and Kirkby-in-Ashfield, together worth as much as £36.20 The jurors gave his date of death as 4 Mar. 1487, but this is probably an error as a writ to inquire into his lands was issued on the previous 7 Feb.: CIPM Hen. VII, iii. 475, 569; Notts. IPM (Thoroton Soc. iii), 55-56; CFR, xix. 115. The inquisition taken in April 1538 after the death of his son, Sir Nicholas, suggests that these findings were more favourable to the interests of the Crown than was justified: according to the later jurors, at John’s death the manor of Sutton cum Lound was in the hands of two of his most powerful neighbours, Henry, Lord Grey of Codnor, and Sir John Babington, as feoffees for the implementation of his will. This would explain why the earlier jurors returned that Babington had taken the issues of the manor from John’s death.21 The jurors of 1538 described the manor as that of Mattersey and Lound iuxta Scrooby: Notts. IPM, 236.

The jurors of 1508 also returned that Strelley’s widow Elizabeth had, without royal licence, married James, younger son of Sir John Savage (d.1496) of Clifton, Cheshire, brother of Thomas Savage, who became archbishop of York in 1501. As tenant of Linby and the member of a family high in the favour of Henry VII, James played a far more active role in Nottinghamshire affairs than our MP had done, serving as sheriff in 1491-2 and then as a j.p. Indeed, before his marriage to our MP’s widow, he had been appointed, for service to the new King during the Bosworth campaign, keeper of the Crown’s park at Bestwood.22 Materials for Hist. Hen. VII ed. Campbell, i. 10. His place in royal favour explains both his marriage to Strelley’s widow and the long delayed response of the Crown to the escheator’s failure to hold an inquisition on John’s death, a failure that effectively deprived the King of the wardship and marriage of our MP’s son, Nicholas, who, at least according to the jurors of 1508, was only 12 at his father’s death. This implies that Nicholas’s mother, Elizabeth Meryng, may not have been our MP’s first wife, as does her longevity.23 CPR, 1485-94, p. 10. The heraldic evidence suggests that she and Savage were responsible for the building of the north porch of Linby church, and, on architectural grounds, the church’s tower and what remains of the old manor-house there have been attributed to them, although it may be that these building projects were at least begun in the time of our MP.24 Trans. Thoroton Soc. xxiii. 5. It is probable that the alabaster monument removed from Linby church and buried in the churchyard in the late 19th cent. was that of our MP: Derbys. Arch. and Nat. Hist. Soc. Jnl. xiv. 85.

Elizabeth survived into the reign of Henry VIII and her longevity may explain why the relationship between the Meryngs and the Strelleys of Linby long remained close. In his will of 1506, her brother, Alexander Meryng of Newark, bequeathed to her son, Nicholas, a silver cup, and nearly 30 years later Nicholas more than repaid the compliment by instructing his executors to find a priest to sing for his uncle’s soul in the church of Newark and to pay £40 to his children.25 Test. Ebor. iv (Surtees Soc. liii), 181n; Notts. IPM, 235. Much less close was the relationship between the Strelleys of Linby and the senior branch of the family they sprang from. Although our MP was named as a remainderman in family settlements made in 1426 and 1443, there is little else to tie the two branches of the family together. Later evidence is suggestive of conflict rather than co-operation. Robert sat on the commission which took an indictment against John in 1451, and John is known to have voted against his cousin in the election of 1460.26 CAD, iii. C3355, 3415; KB27/265/171.