Family and Education

b. Easter 1373, s. and h. of Peter Rede (d.1388/9) of Dover by his w. Joan. m. Margaret, 3s.

Offices Held

Dep. mayor, Dover Mar. 1400; mayor Sept. 1402-3; jurat 1411-12.1

Cinque Ports’ bailiff at Yarmouth Sept.-Nov. 1401, 1409.2

Biography

Rede’s father, a prominent figure in Dover where he served as mayor in 1354-5 and 1357-8, as royal bailiff from 1361 to 1377, and as lieutenant of Dover castle in 1380 and again in 1383-4,3 died while he was still a minor. The youth may have been placed under the guardianship of Sir William Barry, whom his mother then married. In March 1394 John Palmer, town clerk of Dover, rendered an account to him of half his father’s goods (including some plate, but also much household stuff described as ‘vetus et debilis’) which his mother had entrusted to Palmer to his use. Rede gave him his quittance, but it was not until 19 June that a group of townspeople, including his old nurse, testified that he had come of age the previous Easter. Rede subsequently held land in the east Kent hundreds of Bewsborough and Cornilo, on which as a Portsman he claimed exemption from taxation. He had also inherited some property his father had acquired in Rye, but this he sold in 1397, preferring to live in Dover where, between 1400 and 1412, he was occasionally involved in lawsuits.4

In May 1411 Rede was party to undertakings in £200 to the prince of Wales, then warden of the Cinque Ports, as arbiter in certain disputes among the townsmen of Dover. He died before September 1414, when the Exchequer attempted to enforce payment as the bonds had not been cancelled. In 1418 his widow, Margaret, appeared before the mayor of Dover to make a formal declaration that Rede’s sons, Thomas, John and Peter, had all reached maturity.5

Ref Volumes: 1386-1421

Author: A. P.M. Wright

Notes

• 1. Egerton 2088, f. 117; 2091, ff. 17, 18, 23; Dover Chs. ed. Statham, 142-4.
• 2. Romney assmt. bk. 2, ff. 55, 70.
• 3. Dover Chs. 64; SC1/43/74-75; E368/158, Hil. rot. 2; Egerton 2091, ff. 43, 80.
• 4. Cat. Rye Recs. ed. Dell, 136/135, 149; Egerton 2088, ff. 115-16, 119-65; E179/225/27, 237/57.
• 5. E159/190, Trin. rot. 7; Egerton 2088, f. 190.