Family and Education

b. c.1539, s. of Miles Cholmley. educ. L. Inn 1564, called 1574. m. 1565, Margaret, da. of John Hound of Calais, 4s. 6da.1

Offices Held

Escheator, Kent and Mdx. 1579-80; clerk of Queen’s bench 1579; j.p. Mdx. 1584.2

Biography

Cholmley, of Worcestershire origins, was distantly related to, and the ‘servant and clerk’ of Sir Roger Cholmley, whose will he drew up on 30 Apr. 1565. He received the judge’s law books and the manor of Renters and other property in Hendon, which remained in his family for over two centuries. He resided at Highgate, where he was one of the first governors of the free school founded by Sir Roger. His ‘worshipful friend’ John Russell I of Worcestershire was Sir Roger Cholmley’s grandson, and Cholmley himself acted on behalf of the young 3rd Earl of Bedford and the Countess of Warwick in a lawsuit of 1587. The Russell influence probably accounts for his returns to Parliament. Cholmley left no trace on the records of either Parliament. He died 31 Oct. 1587, and was buried at St. Martin’s, Ludgate. In his will, made 12 Sept. 1586, he left his lands at Harringay, Highgate, Kentish Town and St. Pancras to his wife with remainder to his eldest son John, the executors of the will. To the latter he bequeathed most of his other property, including a house in the Old Bailey and the rectory of Adlingfleet in Yorkshire, on the understanding that he would give a bond of £4,000 to pay an annuity of £150 to his mother. A small annuity and land in Somerset, Kent or Surrey went to each of his younger sons and £400 apiece to his unmarried daughters. A small annuity went to Highgate School, and he remembered the poor both of Highgate and St. John’s, Worcester.3

Ref Volumes: 1558-1603

Author: Patricia Hyde

Notes

• 1. Stow, Survey of London, ed. Strype, i. 176; Mdx. Peds. (Harl. Soc. lxv), 140; Vis. Cambs. (Harl. Soc. xli), 95; Lond. Mar. Lic. (Harl. Soc. xxv), 30.
• 2. PRO Index 16774; CPR, 1563-6, pp. 207-8.
• 3. Stow, iii. 176; Mdx. Peds. 140; Vis. Worcs. (Harl. Soc. xxvii), 156; PCC 24 Morrison, 64 Lewyn, 17 Rutland; E. T. Evans, Hist. Hendon, 64; Highgate Sch. Reg. (5th ed.), ed. Tucker, p. xiv; D. Lysons, Environs of London, iii. 6; CSP Dom. 1581-90, p. 382; C142/219/88.