Baynam family in
fifteenth century Gloucestershire:
a brief account of life and suspect
documents
Niall C.E.J. O’Brien
Introduction
In the first two decades of the fifteenth century Robert Baynam was
landlord of a modest estate at Mitcheldean, also known as Great Dean (Dean
Magna) and Little Dean near the Forest of Dean in Gloucestershire. The manor of
Mitcheldean had come into the Baynam family by 1334 when Ralph ap Eynon, later
changed to Baynam, had married Joan, eldest daughter of William of Dean. Ralph
Baynam died by 1366 and his widow kept the manor and gave a £10 rent to her
son, Thomas Baynam. The latter died in 1376 when the rent was confirmed to his
widow, another Joan. By 1384 Joan of Dean was still alive and her daughter
Margaret, wife of William of the Hall, was said to be her heir but by 1395 her
share of the manor passed to her grandson, John Baynam, a minor.[1]
Robert Baynam
By 1418 John Baynam was deceased and the new landlord of Mitcheldean was
his son, Robert Baynam. As a landlord who lived among his tenants Robert Baynam
had the time to attend personally to his tenants even with other distractions.
Other medieval landlords with property scattered across one or more counties
sometimes struggled to give good estate management. In June 1422, as Robert
Baynam celebrated the birth of his son, Thomas Baynam, he found time for estate
business.
Estate business or suspect
officials
On the day of the birth Robert Baynam sold to Richard Garon a white
horse with a black foot for 5 marks and on the same day Robert Baynam gave a
lease of 21years to Richard Kemyll of a bovate of land at Mitcheldean at a rent
of 6s 6d per year. On the same day of 1st June Robert Baynam hired
William Willys to build him a new grange in a tenement at Mitcheldean.[2] Of
course these transactions were not just ordinary estate business. Instead they
had an important long term influence as twenty-one years later the two Richards
and William would remember the special day when called to give evidence for the
proof of age of baby Baynam.
Yet as exacting as reading this estate business is, we must be suspect
that this estate business ever happened as the near exact events happened in
another proof of age in 1441 in Shropshire.[3] Since
the beginning of the twentieth century scholars have looked upon the proof of
age documents with a very suspicious eye and a sad realisation that many of the
proofs may contain factitious information. It would seem that the escheator had
a template of events that the jurors could use to help their memory or that the
inquisition of proof of age, taken on the day, was lost before it got to the Chancery
office. In the Baynam case there was six months between the issuing of the writ
to take the inquisition and the supposed date of same.[4]
The Baynam estate beyond the
suspect documents
Aside from the suspect chancery documents the economy of Mitcheldean in
the early fifteenth century was a mixture of farming, wool production and iron
making with furnaces and nail makers. The wool industry had many skilled
workers like weavers, fullers and shearmen. The produce of the area was carried
out to market by road and two nearby navigable rivers. Although Mitcheldean had
a Monday market and a three day fair the trade was local in nature.[5]
Robert Baynam beyond the estate
Beyond estate business Robert Baynam was involved in the social life of
the gentry class in Gloucestershire and had relations with some of the more
important people in the county’s political scene. In about March 1436 Robert
Baynam was a party to the agreement of Guy Whittington (M.P. for
Gloucestershire, 1420-1432) with the prior of Llanthony whereby Whittington
entrusted the prior with £106 13s 4d to be kept safe until suitable land could be
found for purchase settlement on his own eldest son, Robert Whittington.[6]
On 12th September 1436 Robert Baynam died leaving a son
called Thomas as his heir. Robert’s property in Gloucestershire was examined by
twelve jurors at Newent on 22nd October 1436. The inquisition post
mortem that they drew up listed property in Mitcheldean and Little Dean.[7] The
area of Mitcheldean and Little Dean formed part of the manor of Dean, with
Abenhall, in the Domesday Survey and lay near the great Forest of Dean. It was
owned by three thanes in 1066 and by 1086 William Fitz Norman was the owner.[8]
Robert Baynam held two thirds of the manor of Mitcheldean (the other
third was the dower lands of his mother) along with an annual rent of 26s 8d at
Little Dean from the free tenants there. All this was held of the king as of
his castle of St. Briavels for a quarter knight’s fee and the service of paying
11s to the castle at Michaelmas only. Within Mitcheldean Robert Baynam had 40
acres of arable land worth 4d per acre; 12 acres of meadow worth 2s each along
with 16 acres of pasture worth 12d per acre. There was at that time 100 acres
of fallow land worth 1d per acre along with 200 acres of waste land which was worth
nothing. Robert received rents worth £6 5s 9d payable at Christmas and
Midsummer in equal parts. The pleas and perquisites of court were worth 2s per
year beyond the steward’s fees and expenses.[9]
Mitcheldean church
Thomas Baynam, minority
Thomas Baynam, son and heir of Robert Baynam, was only 14 years, 5
months and 2 days old when his father died.[10]
Thus the estate was taken into the king’s hand. In November 1436 Guy
Whittington (a former associated of Robert Baynam) took out an Exchequer lease
of the property at Mitcheldean and Little Dean during the minority of Thomas
Baynam, Robert’s son and heir.[11] On
12th February 1438 William Browning was appointed to have the
marriage of Thomas Baynam. For this grant Browning paid 100 marks to the
Exchequer.[12] Also in
1438 the crown presented the rector to Mitcheldean church as the Baynam family
held the advowson, although the Greyndour family who held part of Mitcheldean
manor claimed a share of the presentation. For the parishioners of Mitcheldean
it possibly mattered little as in 1442 the rector got leave to be absent from
the parish for three years.[13]
Proof of age of Thomas Baynam and
the suspect memory
On 13th July 1443 a writ was issued to hold a proof of age
inquisition for Thomas Baynam who claimed to be twenty-one years old on 1st
June 1443. Yet it took a few months before the inquisition was held and on 21st
January 1444 at Gloucester twelve people came to support the idea that Thomas
Baynam was of age.
The jurors then gave their reasons for knowing that Thomas Baynam was of
age. William Pricke (aged 52) carried Thomas Baynam in his arms to and from
Mitcheldean church. In the church Sir John Estcourt (aged 55, possibly John
Estcourt of Shipton Moyne who succeeded there by 1438), saw Rev. Richard
Wethyr, parish rector, lift Thomas from the font. Meanwhile Guy Dobyns (aged 49)
went all the way to Longnor in Shropshire to fetch Joan Karles and bring her to
Mitcheldean to lift Thomas Baynam from the font but apparently he was late
coming back if the cleric had to do the job. But his evidence appears suspect
as the journey to Longnor was used previously in a 1441 Shropshire proof and
the distance involved between Mitcheldean and Longnor (about 65 miles) would be
too much to cover going and coming on the same day. In 1441 it was John Poynour
(49) who went to Longnor for Joan Karles so she could go to Pontesbury church
to raise baby Henry Grey from the font.[14] While
this was going on Walter Bayly (aged 73) remembered the day as he carried
chrism to the font for the baptism. Also in Mitcheldean church on 1st
June 1422 was Sir Thomas Rous (aged 70) to see his daughter Katherine married
John Yong.[15]
Other jurors like Thomas Hoke (aged 70) said he knew because his son
Edward was born on the same day at Mitcheldean while John Mody (aged 62)
remembered that day in 1422 as he was espoused to Alice Payn. Elsewhere two
other jurors remembered the day because of accidents. John Venne (aged 62) was
gravely wounded in the shin by an arrow shot by Richard Bonynton (it was a
holiday and people were expect to practice archery) while John Halle (aged 55) fell
from a black horse at Mitcheldean and broke his arm.[16]
Yet after the delight of reading all these events occurring in
Mitcheldean in 1422 we must look with sadness upon them when all these events
happened in Shropshire in 1441 with just different names used. Historians are
so dependent upon surviving documents and then when those documents prove false
it becomes a real question of what documents speak the truth. If we didn’t have
the 1441 Shropshire proof of age then the Baynam proof of age would be accepted
a face value. In college we are taught to ask what the purpose of the creation
of a document was as we interpret the information contained within. For the Baynam
family and the medieval Chancery clerks the proof of age was created simply to
get Thomas Baynam out of his minority situation and to gain possession of his
father’s estate. For us of the twenty-first century reading the lives of
ordinary medieval people is of interest but that is not what the document was
created for. It was made for a purpose and succeeded in its job.
Dating evidence to prove or
disprove
If the recall of memory appears to be just the work of a chancery clerk
who lost the original inquisition taken at Gloucester could the dating evidence
help to prove or disprove the evidence. The jurors said that Thomas Baynam was
born at Mitcheldean on the feast of St Nichomedis (1st June 1422) and
was baptised on the same day in the local church.[17]
The inquisition post mortem of Thomas’s father, Robert Baynam, was taken on 22nd
October 1436 at which time it was said that Thomas Baynam was 14 years, 5
months and 3 days old – a very precise age.[18]
Other inquisitions post mortem taken before and after Robert Baynam only report
the age of the heir as 5 years and more, 14 years and more, 29 years and more,
and 40 years and more.[19] If
we subtract the precise age of Thomas in 1436 we get a date of birth of 19th
May 1422, some thirteen days before the jury of 1444 said i.e. 1st
June 1422. It is very possible that Thomas’s baptism was recorded in a church
missal or some other book to give such a precise date. Maybe by 1444 the book
was damaged and the exact date was therefore not available to the Gloucester
jurors or the Chancery clerks and so they went for an approximate date.
Yet doubts over the Baynam proof are perhaps only modern in origin. It
appears that the escheator and King Henry VI accepted all the ‘evidence’ given
as true though with possible questions as it was another six months before
Thomas Baynam was declare fully to be of age and in July 1444 was given seisin
of his father’s estate.[20]
Thomas Baynam’s half century of
life
After succeeding to his estate in 1444 Thomas Baynam went onwards to
develop the estate and for time to become involved in the administration of
Gloucestershire. On 30th September 1450 Thomas Baynam, while serving
as escheator Gloucestershire, conducted an inquisition into the manor of
Teynton in which it was found to be held in chief to the king. The manor was
claimed by Edmund Ferrers as heir male to his deceased brother William Ferrers.
Edmund subsequently petitioned the king to enter the manor without paying the
entry fine. Henry VI granted entry without fine on account of Edmund’s poverty.[21]
On 9th January 1456 Thomas Baynam was witness to a deed of
feoffment by John Joce of land in various locations, including within the
Forest of Dean, to five other men. From this feoffment Joce was establishing an
endowment for a chantry in Llanthony priory after his death which occurred
sometime before February 1466.[22]
In 1471 Thomas Baynam became a justice of the peace for Gloucestershire
and he enjoyed this honour until his death in 1500.[23]
In 1476 Thomas Baynam was made sheriff of the county.[24]
In 1478 Thomas Baynam became warden of the Forest of Dean and constable of St.
Briavel’s castle and position he held until 1483.[25]
With these honours and responsibilities Thomas Baynam also found time
for marriage. His bride was Margaret, daughter of Sir John Hody, M.P. for
Shrewsbury (1421-27), Dorset (1431) and Somerset (1433-37).[26]
This marriage produced a son, Alexander Baynam who succeeded his father at
Mitcheldean in 1500. Meanwhile by 1471 Thomas Baynam got married a second time
with Alice Walwyn as his new wife.[27]
Alice Walwyn was an heiress of the Greyndour family and thus the marriage
united the two parts of Mitcheldean manor into the control of the Baynam
family.[28]
Over the years Thomas Baynam expanded his property portfolio from his
initial very modest size estate at Mitcheldean. He ultimately became lord of
Abenhall; Clearwell in Newland; Hathaways in Ruardean and Aston Ingham. He also
acquired Putley and Bykerton in Herefordshire.[29] Thomas
Baynam also inherited the manors of Clearwell, Noxton and Nasse (held of the
abbot of Flaxley) from his second wife Alice Walwyn as heir of the Greyndour
family.[30] Using
his acquired income Baynam invested in property elsewhere. Thus he became
mortgagee to seven manors in Somerset .[31]
Having seen the coming and going of the War of the Roses with the end of
the Plantagenet dynasty and the birth of the Tudor monarchy Thomas Baynam died
in 1500 after a long and eventful life.[32] The
Baynam family continued to hold Mitchelsdean and the other estates. In the
military survey of Gloucestershire in 1522 Sir Alexander Baynam was lord of the
manor of Mitchelsdean (worth £20) while George Baynam was lord of Abdenhall
(worth £15).[33]
End of the road
In the reign of another dynasty king, James I, a descendant of Thomas
Baynam, also called Thomas Baynam, left only daughters as his heirs. One of these
daughters, Cecily, married William Throgmorton of Tortworth and thus Clearwell
passed to the Throgmorton family.[34]
Meanwhile the manor of Mitcheldean continued in the Baynam family until 1619
when Alexander Baynam sold it to Nicholas Roberts of London and Stanton
Harcourt.[35]
Conclusion
At the beginning of the fifteenth century Robert Baynam inherited a
modest estate from his father, John Baynam, which was mostly acquired by
marriage in the 1340s. Robert Baynam kept the estate in its modest size for his
underage son to inherit while out traveling in Gloucestershire gentry society.
After the suspect start to his tenure with a dodgy proof of age, the son,
Thomas Baynam expanded the estate by purchase and marriage while at the same
time fulfilling official duties in the government of the shire. Thomas Baynam
managed to negotiate his way through the Wars of the Roses without too much
damage and emerge in the full light of the new Tudor age. Thus the Baynam
family survived the fifteenth century and grew in standing.
Bibliography
Calendar of Close Rolls, Henry
VI, 1441-1447
Calendar of Patent Rolls, Henry
VI, 1436-1441
Calendar of Patent Rolls, Henry
VI, 1446-1452
Collins, A., The Baronettage of England: Being an
Historical and Genealogical Account of Baronets from their first Institution in
the reign of King James I, Volume 1 (London, 1720)
Holford, M.L.
(ed.), Calendar of Inquisitions Post
Mortem, volume XXVI, 21 to 25 Henry VI, 1442-1447 (Boydell Press &
National Archives, 2009)
Noble, C. (ed.),
Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem,
volume XXV, 16 to 20 Henry VI, 1437-1442 (Boydell Press & National
Archives, 2009)
Holford, M.L.,
Mileson, S.A., Noble, C.V. & Parkin, K. (eds.), Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem, volume XXIV, 1432-1437 (Boydell
Press & National Archives, 2010)
Hoyle, R.W.
(ed.), The military survey of
Gloucestershire, 1522 (Gloucester Record Series, Vol. 6, 1993)
Parkin, K. (ed.),
Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem,
volume XXII, 1 to 5 Henry VI, 1422-1427 (Boydell Press & National
Archives, 2009)
Rhodes, J. (ed.), A calendar of
the Registers of the Priory of Llanthony by Gloucester 1457-1466, 1501-1525 (Bristol
& Gloucestershire Archaeological Society, 2002)
Taylor, C., An analysis of the Domesday Survey of
Gloucestershire (Bristol, 1889)
==========
End of post
==========
[2] Holford, M.L. (ed.), Calendar
of Inquisitions Post Mortem, volume XXVI, 21 to 25 Henry VI, 1442-1447 (Boydell
Press & National Archives, 2009), no. 145
[3] Noble, C. (ed.), Calendar of
Inquisitions Post Mortem, volume XXV, 16 to 20 Henry VI, 1437-1442 (Boydell
Press & National Archives, 2009), no. 612
[4] Parkin, K. (ed.), Calendar of
Inquisitions Post Mortem, volume XXII, 1 to 5 Henry VI, 1422-1427 (Boydell
Press & National Archives, 2009), pp. 33, 34, 35
[6] http://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1386-1421/member/whittington-guy-1440
accessed on 10th September 2017
[7] Holford, M.L., Mileson, S.A., Noble, C.V. & Parkin, K. (eds.), Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem, volume
XXIV, 1432-1437 (Boydell Press & National Archives, 2010), no. 598
[8] Taylor, C., An analysis of
the Domesday Survey of Gloucestershire (Bristol, 1889), pp. 25, 204, 317
[11] http://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1386-1421/member/whittington-guy-1440
accessed on 10th September 2017
[19] Holford & others (eds.), Calendar
of Inquisitions Post Mortem, volume XXIV, 1432-1437, nos. 590, 591, 599,
604
[21] Calendar of Patent Rolls, Henry VI, 1446-1452, pp. 413-4 at www.uiowa.edu/patentrolls accessed on 24th May 2013
[22] Rhodes, J. (ed.), A calendar of the Registers of the Priory of
Llanthony by Gloucester 1457-1466, 1501-1525 (Bristol &
Gloucestershire Archaeological Society, 2002), nos. 91-2
[23] Rhodes (ed.), A calendar of the Registers of the Priory of
Llanthony by Gloucester
[24] Rhodes (ed.), A calendar of the Registers of the Priory of
Llanthony by Gloucester
[25] Rhodes (ed.), A calendar of the Registers of the Priory of
Llanthony by Gloucester
[29] Rhodes (ed.), A calendar of the Registers of the Priory of
Llanthony by Gloucester
[30] http://www.british-history.ac.uk/inquis-post-mortem/series2-vol1/pp41-60
accessed on 10th September 2017
[31] Rhodes (ed.), A calendar of the Registers of the Priory of
Llanthony by Gloucester
[32] Rhodes (ed.), A calendar of the Registers of the Priory of
Llanthony by Gloucester
[33] Hoyle, R.W. (ed.), The
military survey of Gloucestershire, 1522 (Gloucester Record Series, Vol. 6,
1993), p. 73
[34] Collins, A., The Baronettage
of England: Being an Historical and Genealogical Account of Baronets from their
first Institution in the reign of King James I, Volume 1 (London, 1720), p.
296
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