MALLORY (MALORY), John (1610-56), of Studley Royal, Ripon, Yorks.

The foundations of Mallory’s brief parliamentary career were laid in 1636 with the death of his elder brother William, who, as heir to the estate and a son-in-law of Sir Guy Palmes*, would have been the more likely candidate for election had he lived. Mallory’s tastes, it seems, ran more to soldiering than to politics, and on 2 Apr. 1639 he obtained a commission from the 21st or 14th earl of Arundel, commander of the king’s army in the first bishops’ war, as a cornet in charge of a troop of horse under Henry Lord Clifford† (who succeeded as 5th earl of Cumberland in 1642).21W. Yorks. Archives (Leeds), WYL150 (former Vyner ms 5803). The Mallorys had close ties with the Clifford family; indeed, Mallory’s uncle, Francis Mallory, had served in the household of the 4th earl of Cumberland.22Spence, Skipton Castle, 23. He failed to sign the first two petitions to the king from Yorkshire’s ‘disaffected’ gentry during the summer of 1640, complaining about the military burdens upon the county, and by late August he had assumed field command of his father’s militia regiment, which the king ordered him to muster at Ripon, ‘being now resolved in our own royal person forthwith to march towards the frontiers’.23Add. 36913, f. 45; W. Yorks. Archives (Leeds), WYL150 (former Vyner mss 5804, Add. Z/2938/1). But although he was given the rank of colonel, there is no firm evidence that he was commissioned as such in place of his father. With the second bishops’ war clearly lost by mid-September, he joined his father and several other loyalist gentlemen in signing the third Yorkshire petition, which repeated the demand made by a group of dissident English peers that Charles summon a new Parliament.24Cumb. RO (Kendal), Strickland Ms vol. 1608-1700, N38 Car. I. He also signed the Yorkshire county indenture on 5 October, returning two of the summer’s leading petitioners, the 2nd Baron Fairfax (Sir Ferdinando Fairfax*) and Henry Belasyse, to the Long Parliament.25C219/43/3/89. Four days later, on 9 October, Mallory was himself returned for Ripon along with his father, who had represented the borough in almost every Parliament since 1614.26C219/43/3/120.

Mallory spent very little time in the Long Parliament before abandoning his seat and joining the king’s party, which he appears to have done by December 1641. He received no committee appointments in the Commons and participated very little in debate. He is first mentioned in the Commons Journals on 12 December 1640, when, upon the motion of Sir Guy Palmes, the House granted Mallory leave on personal grounds and because he was ‘employed about his majesty’s affairs’ (possibly a reference to Mallory’s duties as an officer in the king’s army).27CJ ii. 49b. On 16 December, he was issued with a royal warrant of safe conduct, requesting free passage and all assistance to him on his journey back to Ripon ‘concerning his urgent business’ – the nature of which is not clear.28W. Yorks. Archives (Leeds), WYL150 (former Vyner ms 5805). He probably remained in Yorkshire during the winter of 1640-1 and was certainly there in late April.29Fairfax Corresp. ed Johnson, ii. 207. On 7 May, the ‘committee of seven’ – set up on 5 May 1641 to investigate the army plots – recommended him to accompany (Sir) Henry Cholmley* on his mission into Yorkshire ‘for satisfying the army and to discover the [army] plot’ (7 May).30CJ ii. 138. That Mallory was trusted with such a delicate task is perhaps further evidence that the ‘Mr Mallory’ who voted against the earl of Strafford’s attainder on 21 April 1641 was William Malory, not John.31Infra, ‘William Malory’. Indeed, it is possible that Mallory remained absent from the House for much of 1641, which would explain why he was never listed among those Commons-men who took the Protestation after its introduction early in May. When his father was granted leave of absence on 31 July, he was asked to send John back down to Westminster ‘for the service of the House’.32CJ ii. 231b.

Mallory may have accompanied the king to Scotland during the second half of 1641, for at some point that autumn he sent the master of the royal armoury – and future royalist grandee – William Legge a detailed account of Charles’s political maneuverings in Edinburgh.33Staffs. RO, D(W)1778/I/i/32; Beinecke, Osborn fb190, ff. 29-32. One of the Mallorys, either William or John, spoke against the militia bill that Sir Arthur Hesilrige presented to the Commons on 7 December, urging that it be burnt in Westminster [Old] Palace Yard and demanding that Hesilrige be made to answer for his presumption. John Mallory was apparently the more hotheaded of the two men, and his outspokenness on this occasion would perhaps help to explain his knighthood on 23 December.34D’Ewes (C), 246-7. But whatever the circumstances surrounding this reward, it was an expensive one, for the dubbing ceremony alone cost Mallory £60.35W. Yorks. Archives (Leeds), WYL150 (former Vyner ms Add. Z/2938/1).

If Mallory had indeed attended the Commons late in 1641, it is likely that he had returned to Yorkshire by 7 February 1642, when he and his brother-in-law, the future royalist Richard Aldburghe*, stood surety for a debt belonging to Sir Robert Stryckland*, another future royalist.36W. Yorks. Archives (Leeds), WYL150 (former Vyner mss, parcel 456). According to Thomas Stockdale*, Mallory returned to Studley on 23 February, ‘but whether he be employed by the House on some special service, or come about his own private occasions, I do not yet hear’. Writing to Ferdinando Lord Fairfax in March, Stockdale reported that Mallory, Stryckland, Sir John Goodricke† and other royalist-inclined gentlemen had been ‘diverse days making merry’ at the country seat of Sir Richard Hutton†, near Knaresborough.37Fairfax Corresp. ed Johnson, ii. 376, 384. Mallory’s acceptance of a royal commission in May 1642 to raise a regiment in the West Riding caused less consternation at Westminster than did the defection of his more influential father.38Infra, ‘William Malory’; W. Yorks. Archives (Leeds), WYL150 (former Vyner ms 5806). Sir John was declared absent without leave at the call of the House on 16 June, and although he was appointed to the Yorkshire commission of array in June, it was not until 6 September – the day on which his father was disabled from sitting by the Commons – that the House resolved to summon him to Westminster.39CJ ii. 626, 754b; PJ iii. 481. By this time, Mallory had raised his regiment, causing ‘money to be furnished to his soldiers by the constables’.40A Full Relation of All the Late Proceedings of His Majesties Army in the County of Yorke (1642), sig. A3v (E.112.40).

In the event, Mallory was not disabled from sitting until 16 January 1643, and this delay may indicate that there were men at Westminster who still thought that he might be brought over to the parliamentarian fold.41CJ ii. 929a. As late as September 1642, he had not been wholly given up for lost by Parliament’s supporters in Yorkshire. On 16 September, Lord Fairfax, Mallory’s ‘affectionate cousin’ (as he styled himself), wrote to him from Denton, in what appears to have been an effort to entice him into the parliamentarian camp

I have relation from many hands the good respect the Parliament gives you and esteem you have in the country [i.e. county], and do very heartily wish your growth in both. This enclosed [a parliamentary order?] I received on Sunday last and then writ to desire your company here that I might have intimated the same and acquainted you with what we then received or intended in pursuance of commands. We purpose a meeting at York on Thursday next and...to assemble at Leeds on Wednesday, at either of which, if you please to be, we shall be glad of your company.42W. Yorks. Archives (Leeds), WYL150 (former Vyner ms 5808).

These meetings were part of the negotiations that led to the Yorkshire ‘treaty of pacification’, signed late in September, which represented a last-ditch – and, ultimately, abortive – attempt by a group of leading West Riding gentry to keep the county neutral. It is very unlikely that Mallory was involved in these talks; and probably the only reason that Fairfax had approached him in the first place was because of the Mallorys’ links with the earl of Cumberland, who was the leading figure on the royalist side of the table.43Add. 75354, f. 13; A. Woolrych, ‘Yorkshire’s treaty of neutrality’, HT vi. 696-704.

Mallory was among the group of prominent Yorkshire royalists that invited the commander of the king’s northern army, the earl of Newcastle, into the county in the autumn of 1642 in order to secure it against Sir John Hotham* and his confederates.44CJ ii. 853a; Newcastle Mems. ed. Firth, 189, 190. In January 1643, his regiment joined the garrison at Skipton Castle, of which he was made governor by the earl of Cumberland. In the three years that followed, he proved himself an able commander, launching several attacks on parliamentarian positions in the West Riding and in Lancashire.45Spence, Skipton Castle, 23, 36-48, 67-9; Ripon Millenary ed. W. Harrison, ii. app. p. xiv. His abilities were recognised by the earl of Newcastle, who confirmed him as governor in December 1643 following Cumberland’s death.46W. Yorks. Archives (Leeds), WYL150 (former Vyner ms 5811); Spence, Skipton Castle, 54. But the harsh living conditions at Skipton took their toll of his health, and when his governorship was once again confirmed by George Lord Digby*, in October 1645, Sir Thomas Strickland† and several other officers were commissioned to assist him in governing the garrison in the event of his becoming ill.47W. Yorks. Archives (Leeds), WYL150 (former Vyner mss 5814, 5815); Spence, Skipton Castle, 89. Two months later, after a short siege, Skipton Castle surrendered and he retired to Studley to recuperate.48Spence, Skipton Castle, 93-100.

In March 1646, shortly after his father’s death, Mallory petitioned the Committee for Compounding, claiming that he had intended to petition immediately after the surrender of Skipton Castle, but that he had been sick and unable to travel.49SP23/193, p. 624; CCC 1008. The sequestrators estimated that he owned lands worth about £460 a year in possession and £200 a year in reversion (his mother’s jointure) – which was probably an under-valuation – and had debts of £3,600.50SP23/6, p. 66; SP23/193, p. 624; CCC 1008; Yorks. Royalist Composition Pprs. ed. Clay, 135. At his death in 1656, his estate would be valued at £1,200 a year in possession, with a further £350 a year in reversion, although heavily encumbered with debt.51W. Yorks. Archives (Leeds), WYL150 (former Vyner ms 5633). His fine was set initially at a half of his estate (£3,323), but this was later reduced to a third (£2,219).52SP23/3, f. 325; SP23/6, p. 66; CCC 1008. In order to pay this fine and his wartime debts, he was forced to break the entail on his estate in 1646, thereby allowing him to raise capital by mortgaging and selling off his property.53C10/477/4; W. Yorks. Archives (Leeds), WYL150 (former Vyner mss, parcel 458). In one such sale, Mallory conveyed some of his lands to the Yorkshire parliamentarian Brian Stapylton* and the royalist lawyer Solomon Swale† to be sold by them for the payment of a debt of £4,000.54W. Yorks. Archives (Leeds), WYL150 (former Vyner ms 5909). Mallory paid his composition fine in June 1650 and his estate was discharged from sequestration.55SP23/8, p. 106; CCC 1008.

Despite having fought for the king, Mallory appears to have remained on good terms with the Fairfaxes of Denton. At some point after the war, he wrote to Lord Fairfax, thanking him for having been ‘a means for the preservation of that small store which is left to me’.56Bodl. Fairfax 34, f. 38. At the same time, he apparently retained the trust and friendship of many royalists in the area, in particular, it seems, Sir Robert Stryckland and Richard Aldburghe. Unlike these two gentlemen, however, he was not active for the king during the second civil war.57Supra, ‘Richard Aldburghe’; infra, ‘Robert Stryckland’. According to one of Secretary John Thurloe’s* agents, Mallory was implicated in the Yorkshire royalist rising of 1655, ‘but being sick, could not be at the rendezvous’.58CSP Dom. 1655, p. 213.

Mallory died intestate on 23 January 1656 and was buried in Ripon Minster the following day (24 January).59Memorials Fountains Abbey ed. Walbran, 332. He left debts of over £10,000, having borrowed almost half that sum (£4,500) in 1653 and mortgaged Studley for £6,000 in 1654.60C10/477/4; LC4/203, f. 250; W. Yorks. Archives (Leeds), WYL150 (former Vyner mss 5633, 5915, parcel 455, item 2). With Mallory’s death in 1656, and that of his only son William in 1667, the family’s estate passed to Sir John’s son-in-law, George Aislabie, whose own son, John Aislabie†, became chancellor of the exchequer in 1718.61C10/477/4; HP Commons 1715-1754, ‘John Aislabie’.