GOLAFRE, John

More can be added to the earlier biography.2 The Commons 1386-1421, iii. 199-202.

It is not recorded at what stage in his career Golafre received from Edward, duke of York, an annuity charged on the ducal estates in Wiltshire, although he was still receiving it at the time of York’s death at Agincourt in 1415.3 CIPM, xx. 403. He may have owed this preferment to his kinship to the Duchess Philippa (his cousin’s widow), or else to services done for the duke at the time of the Parliament of 1397-8, when he first entered the Commons. Besides his other fees and annuities, he also had one of five marks from Henry V’s queen, Katherine de Valois, which was still being paid in 1436.4 E163/7/31/2, no. 32. During Henry VI’s reign he often showed himself willing to make loans to the Crown, proffering 100 marks in 1429 and again in 1430, the sum of £40 on three occasions in the 1430s, and £20 in 1441.5 E401/723, m. 18; 725, m. 2; 732, m. 22; 743, m. 13; 763, m. 3; 771, m. 22.

In January 1444, two years after Golafre’s death, feoffees of his ancestral manors of Sarsden and Fyfield were ordered by the Crown to transfer possession to his kinswoman, Mary, wife of John Spechesley, who was deemed to be the true heir, but litigation over the inheritance was destined to continue for many years.6 CP40/733, rot. 105d. Mary was a descendant of John’s uncle Roger. John’s heir had initially been found to be Agnes, wife of William Browning I*, a grand-daughter of his aunt Juliana and her husband Robert Wyghtham: C139/112/74. She had since died without issue: C1/16/713-14.