£1,000
Rare Books, Manuscripts, Maps & Photographs | 589
Auction: 19 February 2020 at 10:00 GMT
John Storiton of Preston and others, a release of the manors of Iller, Bere, Pitteney & Werne [?Aller, Beer, Pitney & Wearne] in Somerset, and the manors of Melbury, Osemond, Blakelonde, Lydlinch, Caundle, Haddon and many other manors and advowsons in Dorset, Oxfordshire and Bedfordshire, witnesses: Robert Hill, John Cokayne, John Preston, William Babyngton & John Martyn, manuscript on vellum, in Latin, in brown ink in a cursive charter script, 41 lines, 16th/17th century docket on verso, creased and slightly stained at edges, remains of red wax seal, [Phillips M.S. 35623], 357 x 251, "Regio henrici quinti", 14th August 1422.
Note: Documents from the Reign of King Henry V are extremely scarce.
Sir Thomas Beauchamp of Somerset, a relative of the earls of Warwick, seems to have been a somewhat turbulent character. In 1413 he was committed to the Tower of London by order of Henry V, being released on 8 February 1414 only after several prominent London citizens including "RIchard Whytington" stood surety "under a pain of 1000 marks" for his future behaviour. Beauchamp was an esquire of Edward, second Duke of York (?1373-1415) and was left an annuity of 10 marks from his inheritance in the custom Port of London and keeper of the great part at Fasterne at his death. In 1419 he and several others forcibly seized seven acres of meadow in Chaffcombe [Somerset] from John Denebaude who was in the king's household in a long standing feud that dated back to at least 1410 but was cleared of wrongdoing by a commission of enquiry. In 1421 he was served a commission of array for the west country because of the threat of an invasion by the Kings of Castile and Aragon. Thomas Beauchamp was appointed carver to Henry VI from 1430 to 1432 and in 1430 was one of the eight household knights to accompany the king to France for his coronation in Paris. Two witnesses are of note in this document, being Sir William Babington (d. 1455), chief baron of the Exchequer (1419-23) and John Cokayn, justice of an assize in Lincolnshire, Warwickshire etc.
Provenance: Phillips MS 350623 (docket on verso) with pencilled note Soth[eby's], [lot] 421, 30 June 1936; Bloomsbury Book Auctions, 18 March 2004, lot 1