Family and Education

bro. of Nicholas Chippenham* and prob. s. of Thomas I*. m. 1s. 1da.

Offices Held

Supervisor of a royal grant of murage, Hereford May 1426-9, July 1429-32.

Bailiff, Hereford Oct. 1430-1; mayor 1436-7, 1443-4.1

Biography

From 1406 Henry Chippenham, a grocer by trade, regularly witnessed deeds in Hereford. He also frequently attested parliamentary election indentures for the city, doing so on no fewer than 20 occasions between 1407 and 1450. In the meantime, in 1417, he provided sureties for the appearance in Parliament of John Wilton; and, in 1429 and 1435, he attended the elections of the knights of the shire held at the county court in Hereford castle.2 In June 1415 his kinsman by marriage, John Vale esquire, formerly receiver at Calais for Henry V when prince of Wales, made him an executor of his will, but he declined to act when probate was granted in May 1416. That same year he became a feoffee of property in Hereford. He was high on a list of 12 citizens of Hereford who combined to lend £40 to the Exchequer in May 1421, during Henry V’s visit from Normandy. In May 1426 he was one of three men whom the Crown authorized to supervise the expenditure of a three years’ grant of murage, and he was reappointed in July 1429 with similar responsibilities. It was during this period that he held office for one annual term as a bailiff of the city. In May 1434 his name was on the list of those local notables who were to the general oath that they would not assist persons breaking the peace. A few years later Richard Green, who had earlier been appointed by Chippenham as a trustee of his property in the city, filed a petition in Chancery alleging that Chippenham had himself been enfeoffed of certain lands and tenements there by one John Kemp, with the intention that he should convey these to Green, but that he had refused to fulfil the agreement. After twice serving as mayor of Hereford, on 29 Jan. 1445 Chippenham took out a royal licence exempting him from this or any other office accountable to the Crown.3

Chippenham had owned property in Hereford since before 1416, when he settled part of his holdings upon feoffees. The 1431 inquiry as to those eligible to contribute to a royal aid revealed that he was then in possession of premises in the city worth £5 annually. In May 1443 his feoffees relinquished their trusteeship, and in the autumn of the following year Chippenham conveyed all of his Herefordshire holdings, now consisting of the manor of Litley near Hereford, land there and at Hampton Bishop, no fewer than 40 messuages in Hereford itself and a large meadow called ‘Ossewoldesey’, to another group of feoffees. One effect of this was that when an inquest was held following his death on 12 Sept. 1451 he was said to have owned no property whatsoever, which may well have been the purpose of the undertaking. Henry’s heir, Thomas, who was aged over 30 at the time of his father’s death, is not to be confused with Thomas Chippenham II*, nor with the Hereford MP of the same name of 1495.4

Ref Volumes: 1386-1421

Author: L. S. Woodger

Notes

• 1. Hereford City Lib. MT/X/2; J. Duncumb, Herefs. i. 365; C219/15/1; Cal. Hereford Cathedral Muns. (NLW 1955), no. 711.
• 2. CCR, 1405-9, p. 504; Hereford Cathedral Muns. nos. 78, 84, 86, 107, 168, 177, 394; Hereford City Lib. MT/V/5, 7, 13, VI/6, XIII/2; C219/10/4, 12/2-5, 13/2-5, 14/1-5, 15/1, 2, 4, 6, 7, 16/1.
• 3. Reg. Chichele, ii. 83, 85-86; Reg. Mascall (Canterbury and York Soc. xxi), 190; Hereford City Lib. MT/V/3, 4; PPC, ii. 281; CPR, 1429-36, p. 377; 1441-6, p. 348; C1/9/295.
• 4. Hereford Cathedral Muns. nos. 53, 709; Feudal Aids, ii. 422; C139/161/4. Henry’s da. Katherine (d. 1504) m. (1) Robert Mattesdon; (2) — Bromwyche: CIPM Hen. VII, ii. 753.