MASON, John (d. 1656), of St Peter’s Lane, Nottingham.

Mason is one of the most obscure Nottinghamshire MPs of this period and should not be confused with the parliamentarian officer and sectary of the same name.15Firth and Davies, Regimental Hist. ii. 502. Nothing is known about his background or upbringing, and although described by Lucy Hutchinson – the wife of Colonel John Hutchinson* – as an attorney, there is no record that he attended either university or the inns of court.16Hutchinson Mems. ed. Sutherland, 115. He was a resident of Cuckstool Row, in St Peter’s, Nottingham, by 1624 and bought up several messuages in and around the parish over the next two decades.17Notts. RO, CA 3414, p. 21; CA 3415, p. 17; CA 3416, p. 19; DD/VC/30/3, 5; M/15997; M/23973, f. 6. His only recorded involvement in public affairs before 1642 was as a signatory to the indenture returning Sir Thomas Hutchinson and Robert Sutton as MPs for Nottinghamshire to the Short Parliament in March 1640.18C219/42/1/167.

Mason was one of the wealthiest inhabitants of Nottingham and, as such, was active in municipal affairs during the civil war.19Nottingham Borough Recs. v. 218. In December 1642, he supported a motion that the parliamentarian gentlemen of the town and county join with the townsmen for the defence of Nottingham, and a year later he was appointed to a municipal committee for liaising with the parliamentary county committee.20Notts. RO, CA 3417, p. 1; Nottingham Borough Recs. v. 222. In January 1644, after the royalists had attempted to capture Nottingham, he was commissioned by Hutchinson (the town’s parliamentarian governor) as a captain of a municipal company of foot. Lucy Hutchinson, who disliked Mason for his opposition to her husband’s authority, described him as

a great cavalier, but a reserved, silent man, who, for an austere knit of his brow and a grave, severe countenance, had the reputation of a wise man, but was known to be disaffected to the Parliament, though cunning enough not to do anything that might expose him to sequestration.21Hutchinson Mems. ed. Sutherland, 115.

There is certainly evidence that Mason was on close terms with at least one Nottingham royalist – his ‘friend and cousin’ Gilbert Boune*.22Supra, ‘Gilbert Boune’; SP23/82, pp. 425, 441; PROB11/310, f. 252. Nevertheless, Lucy Hutchinson acknowledged that Mason and his men fought bravely against the cavaliers.23Hutchinson Mems. ed. Sutherland, 115. Moreover, such accusations of disaffection are difficult to reconcile with his record as an active member and officer of the Nottinghamshire county and sequestrations committees.24Add. 40630, f. 227; SP23/195, 885, 887, 905; SP28/213, unfol.; SP28/240, unfol.; SP28/241; Bodl. Nalson IV, ff. 275, 300.

What Lucy Hutchinson took for disaffection on Mason’s part was probably him putting what he saw as the town’s best interests before those of the parliamentarian garrison. The first occasion of his falling out with Colonel Hutchinson was in about March 1644, when he and his men refused to obey the governor’s orders unless he agreed to strengthen the town’s defences with ordnance from the castle.25Hutchinson Mems. ed. Sutherland, 124. In defying Hutchinson’s authority, Mason became embroiled in a factional struggle that divided the Nottingham committeemen, leading townsmen and local parliamentarian officers.26P.R. Seddon, ‘Col. Hutchinson and the disputes between the Notts. parliamentarians, 1643-5’, Trans. Thoroton Soc. xcviii. 71-9. At the root of this feud was disagreement as to the extent of Hutchinson’s powers in relation to the garrison and attendant military units and therefore to the defence of Nottingham itself. Heading the faction that sought to vest military authority in the committee rather than the governor, were Mason, James Chadwicke*, Gilbert Millington* and Charles White*. In the governor’s camp were Gervase Pigot*, Colonel Francis Thornhagh* and – on the rare occasions he visited Nottingham – Henry Ireton*. Religious tensions among the Nottingham godly may well have exacerbated this conflict. Lucy Hutchinson accused Mason, Chadwicke, White and their confederates of ‘having engaged the persecuting priests [orthodox puritan ministers] and all their idolaters [against Colonel Hutchinson] upon the insinuation of the governor’s favour to separatists’.27Hutchinson Mems. ed. Sutherland, 131, 132, 143, 146, 148, 149. Mason’s quarrel with Hutchinson does not seem to have prejudiced him in the eyes of the corporation, which in September 1645 voted nem. con. to grant him his freedom at no charge.28Nottingham Borough Recs. v. 236. In March 1646, he was a signatory to the indenture returning Hutchinson and Pigot as recruiters for Nottinghamshire to the Long Parliament.29C219/43/2/78.

Mason remained active in local government after the regicide both as a committeeman and solicitor for sequestrations.30CSP Dom. 1651, p. 242; CCC 150. Although he seems to have played little part in municipal affairs after the civil war, the leading townsmen voted overwhelmingly on 11 July 1654 to elect him and his civil-war political associate James Chadwicke to represent the town in the first protectoral Parliament, and they were duly returned the following day (12 July), with Mason taking the junior place.31Supra, ‘Nottingham’; Notts. RO, CA 3427, p. 36; Nottingham Borough Recs. v. 282-3. Mason received just one appointment in this Parliament – to a committee set up on 4 December 1654 for making the office of sheriff less burdensome to its occupants.32CJ vii. 394b.

Mason died in the summer of 1656 and was buried in St Mary’s, Nottingham on 29 June.33St Mary, Nottingham par. reg. In his will, he left the bulk of his estate to his heir and namesake (with whom he is sometimes confused) and made bequests in excess of £450.34PROB11/273, f. 30; Wood, Notts. 133. His instruction that his youngest daughter be placed with a ‘seamstress or some other calling’ suggests that he had insufficient means or standing to marry his children into county gentry families. The men he appointed as supervisors of his will included his ‘very much honoured and kind friend Colonel John Hutchinson’ – their quarrel having evidently been forgotten – and his ‘dear and loving friend’, the Nottinghamshire lawyer William Cartwright*. Mason was the first and last of his line to sit in Parliament.