BEDFORD, John I, of Lewes, Suss.

Published in The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1386-1421, ed. J.S. Roskell, L. Clark, C. Rawcliffe., 1993
Available from Boydell and Brewer

Constituency

Dates

1391

Family and Education

m. by 1389, Maud.

Offices Held

Biography

In 1378 Bedford exported wool from Sussex, to a recorded amount of 120 sacks, 542 fells, mostly in the Margaret of Shoreham, of which Richard Bernard* was master. His wife Maud had a reversionary interest in a messuage and ten acres of land at Hamsey, just outside Lewes, destined to fall to her on the death of Isabel, wife of Thomas Cheseman, but this interest the Bedfords conveyed to Thomas White III* by a transaction completed in 1391. Bedford witnessed deeds at Lewes in the 1380s and 1390s, and towards the end of the same period he acted as a feoffee of the property there belonging to Stephen Holt* (d.1398). Holt’s son William later alleged in Chancery that Bedford had failed to fulfil the conditions of the trust. Bedford is last recorded in November 1401, when, at the assizes held at East Grinstead, he was acquitted on the charge of having disseised Simon Benefeld* of premises in Cliffe and South Mailing, near Lewes.

E122/33/1; CP25(1)240/78/1; C1/3/69; Add. Chs. 30554-5, 30558-9; JUST 1/1512 m. 48.

Ref Volumes: 1386-1421

Author: A. P.M. Wright

Notes