PAYRE

Kendal Castle

wikipedia - Tom Richardson - August 2003

Storye book - 18:00, 1 July 2009

Kendal Castle by Sue.jpg - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:
18:07, 1 July 2009  Storye book

Beautiful Britain Kendall Castle Early Photograph Print | Old-print.com Limited:

"Kendal Castle is situated on a mound-like hill, known as a drumlin, to
the east of the town of Kendal, Cumbria, in northern England.

It was probably built in the late 12th century as the home of the Barons
of Kendal. The best known family to live there were the Parrs,
including Katherine, the 6th wife of Henry VIII.

The building has been a ruin since Tudor times but imposing
stonework remains are still present. The site is freely accessible to
the public. It is managed by the South Lakeland District Council."

Kendal Castle - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kendal_Castle
Wednesday, July 01, 2009

"Kendal Castle was in existence by 1184 when it passed by Marriage
to Gilbert Fitz Reinfred, and it was he who constructed it in stone. After
that the castle had several owners: 1215 taken by the Crown; given
back to William de Lancaster, son of Gilbert; 1246, Peter de Brus;
1272, the Ros family; 1383, the Parr family; 1553 the Crown again,
then back to the Parrs in 1559; 1571 back to the Crown. By this time it
was falling down. Not until 1813 was any work carried out to prevent
further collapse"

The Morris Clan:
http://www.themorrisclan.com/GENEALOGY/FAMILY%20STUDIES/PARR%
20FAMILY%20STUDY.html
Wednesday, December 09, 2009


"Sir William Parr (1434 – c. 1483) was English courtier and soldier. He
was the eldest son of Sir Thomas Parr (1405–1464) and his wife Alice
(who was the daughter of Sir Thomas Tunstall of Thurland,
Lancashire).
The Parr family originally came from Parr, Lancashire. Sir William's
great-grandfather, Sir William de Parre (died 1405), son of Sir John de
Parre, lord of Parr; married, in 1383, Elizabeth, daughter of John de
Ros, and granddaughter and heiress of Sir Thomas de Ros, baron of
Kendal; through his marriage he acquired Kendal Castle and one-
fourth part of the barony of Kendal, which continued in the family till
after the death of William Parr, Marquis of Northampton, when the
Marquis's widow surrendered it to Queen Elizabeth I.

It was known as 'The Marquis Fee.' This branch of the family resided at
Kendal.

His paternal grandparents were John Parr (c. 1383–1409) and
Agness Crophull, widow of Walter Devereux. From her previous
marriage she was mother to a younger Walter Devereux and paternal
grandmother to Walter Devereux, Lord Chancellor of Ireland.

Sir Thomas Parr, the courtier's father, was sub-vice comes for
Westmorland from 1428 to 1437, and was sheriff from 1461 to 1475.
He was assaulted in going to Parliament in 1446, the case being
noticed in Parliament and took an active part in the wars of the Roses
on the Yorkist side; he was attainted in 1459, with the other leading
Yorkists (iborn v.348-50). Doubtless his attainder was reversed in
1461, as he died in 1464.

Sir Thomas left three sons and six daughters; the daughters all
married members of prominent northern families. Of the sons, the
second, Sir John Parr, also a Yorkist, was rewarded by being made
sheriff of Westmoreland for life in 1462; he married a daughter of Sir
John Yonge, Lord Mayor of the City of London, and must have lived
until after 1473, as in that year he was one of those exempted from the
resumption act (iborn vi.81). The third son, Thomas, was killed at
Barnet in 1471.
[edit] Life

William was made a knight of the Garter by Edward IV of England and
was exempted from the Resumption Act of 1464. He was on the side
of the Nevilles at Banbury in 1469, was sent by George Plantagenet,
1st Duke of Clarence and Richard Neville, 16th Earl of Warwick to
Edward in March 1470, just before the battle of Lose-Coat-Fields, and
was entrusted by Edward with his answer.

When Edward IV returned from exile in 1471 Parr met him at
Nottingham, and was rewarded with the comptrollership of the
household, which he held till Edward's death. He swore to recognise
Edward, Prince of Wales, as heir to the throne in 1472 (iborn vi. 234),
and was exempted from the resumption act of 1473 (iborn vi.81).

Parr sat as knight of the shire for Westmoreland in 1467 and 1473,
and was sheriff of Cumberland from 1473 to 1483. He was sent to the
Kingdom of Scotland to arrange about the breaches of the truce
probably in 1479. He was exempted from the act of apparel in 1482,
was chief commissioner for exercising the office of constable of
England in 1483, and took part in the funeral of Edward IV.

It seems probable that he died about this time (cf. Beltz, Memorials of
the Garter, pp. 210, lxxii, clxvii), and that the William Parr present at the
meeting of Henry VII of England and Philip I of Castile at Windsor, in
1506, was his second son.
[edit] Wives and children

Sir William married, first, Joan Trusbut (died 1473), widow of Thomas
Colt of Roydon, Essex; her issue, if any, did not survive Parr. Secondly,
Elizabeth, daughter of Henry, lord FitzHugh, who survived him and
remarried Nicholas, lord Vaux of Harrowden; by her Parr left a
daughter Anne, who married Sir Thomas Cheney of Irthlingborough,
Northamptonshire, and three sons.

The eldest son, Sir Thomas Parr, was knighted and was sheriff of
Northamptonshire in 1509; he was master of the wards and
comptroller to Henry VIII. He was rich, owing to his succeeding, in
1512, to half the estates of his cousin, Lord Fitz-Hugh, and also to his
marriage with Maud, daughter and coheiress of Sir Thomas Green of
Boughton and Greens Norton in Northamptonshire. He died on 12
November 1518, and was buried in Blackfriars Church, London. His
widow died on 1 September 1532, and was buried beside him. Of
their children, William Parr (afterwards Marquess of Northampton),
and Catherine, queen of Henry VIII, are separately noticed; while a
daughter, Anne, married William Herbert, first earl of Pembroke of the
tenth creation.

The second son of Sir William Parr was William, who was knighted on
25 December 1513, was sheriff of Northamptonshire in 1518 and
1522, and after his niece's Catherine's promotion became her
chamberlain. On 23 December 1543 he was created Baron Parr of
Horton, Northamptonshire. He died on 10 September 1547, and was
buried at Horton (for his tomb, see Bridges, Northamptonshire, i. 370).
By Mary, daughter of Sir William Salisbury, he left four daughters. A
third son of Sir William Parr, named John, married Constance,
daughter of Sir Henry Vere of Addington, Surrey."
Source
* Dictionary of National Biography - from an article published in 1895

William Parr, 1st Baron Parr of Kendal - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:
Wednesday, December 02, 2009
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sir_William_Parr_of_Kendal

"Sir Thomas Parr (c. 1483 – 11 November 1517) was an English
nobleman from Kendal in Westmorland (now Cumbria). He is best
known as the father of Queen Catherine Parr.

He was the son of Sir William Parr of Kendal and Elizabeth Fitzhugh.
He was descended from King Edward III of England. He married Maud
Green (6 April 1495 – 20 August 1529), daughter of Sir Thomas Green
in 1508.
He was knighted and was sheriff of Northamptonshire in 1509; he
was master of the wards and comptroller to Henry VIII. He was buried
in Blackfriars Church, London. His widow was buried beside him"

Sir Thomas Parr - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sir_Thomas_Parr
Wednesday, December 02, 2009

"# F10. Sir William de PARR. (PARRE). Knight (Marquess) of Parr &
Kendal. Born (about 1320)(about 1350-S21) at Kendal Castle, Wes.,
England; son of Sir John PARR [F9] and Matilda LEYBURNE. The next
in possession of the moitey of Parr, after Richard de PARR [F100]. He
apparently held an eighth part of the vill about 1370, but in the
Inquisition of Thomas de Lathom, on the division of the waste in 1377,
this eighth part is not recognized at all. This is probably because he
was convicted of murder in Lancashire, having killed Robert Haghe in
1369. In 1371 he secured a pardon for his crime in order to join the
retinue of John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, and to fight for the duke
on the continent. So well did he serve his master that he was allowed
to marry Elizabeth, heiress of He married Elizabeth (ROS)(de ROOS-
S20)(ROSS-S19), daughter of John de Ros, and granddaughter and
heiress of Sir Thomas de Ros, baron of Kendal, (sometime between
1380 and 1382-S?)(in1383-S20). The de Roos family of Kendal was a
junior branch of the de Rooses of Hamlake. Through his marriage he
acquired Kendal Castle and one-fourth part of the barony of Kendal,
which continued in the family till after the death of William Parr,
Marquis of Northampton, when the Marquis's widow surrendered it to
Queen Elizabeth I. It was known as 'The Marquis Fee.' This branch of
the family resided at Kendal. Sir William Parr had served as soldier,
treaty negotiator, ambassador and king's councillor, first to the duke of
Lancaster and then to his son, Henry IV. His marriage enabled Parr to
move from a small patrimony in Lancashire to his wife's extensive
inheritance in Westmorland and found the fortunes of the Parr family of
Kendal.
From S21: THE object of this study is to trace the causes of the rise
and fall in family fortunes as exemplified by that of the Parrs of Kendal
Castle through a period of great political upheaval and transition.
Three main factors affected the social and economic status of families
at this time. The first, that of patronage, demonstrates how closely the
Parr fortunes were affected by those of the patron on whose vessel
they were privileged to embark upon the perilous political seas of the
14TH and 15TH centuries. Marriage alliances, too, were of supreme
importance, carrying the family to its zenith when Katherine Parr
became the consort of Henry VIII, and to tis nadir through the failure of
William, her brother, to leave legitimate heirs. The third factor was the
ability of the head of the house to avail himself of those opportunities
for advancement offered in his day and age, and to avoid the dangers
inherent in the unstable political situation, learning when necessary
on both sides of the stairs to get up, as the earl of Pembroke, husband
of Ann Parr, unblushingly confessed to doing. William de Parr, founder
of the Westmorland branch of that name, pursued a military career
which, in the 14TH century was as good a road as that of the Church
or Law for an enterprising man to follow in search of success.
Accounts of his origin are confused and obscure. He was born about
1350, and one authority states he was the son of Sir John de Parr of
Parr in the parish of Prescot, Lancashire, his mother being Matilda,
daughter of Sir Richard Leyburne.3 An inquisition of 1385 on the
possession of Thomas de Lathom states he was seised of "the
homage and service of Sir John de Parr, of Robert, son of Henry de
Parr and of William, who held their tenements in Parr by knight's
service and by rendering 6s. 3d. yearly. Also of the service of Robert,
son of Alan Parr, who held of him tenements in socage by rendering
yearly 3s. 9d."4 William who held an eighth part of the vill [sic] of Parr,
seems to have inherited it from Richard, son of another Richard who
died about 1350. William was in possession about 1370.5 A crime
opens his recorded career. With a Roger Haukese6 he was accused
of killing Robert Haghe or Hawe some time before 1 March 1369.7 But
Sir Walter Huet, veteran of the Hundred Years' War, and one of the
heroes of Froissart, came to Parr's aid. The renewal of hostilities with
France in 1369, and the commissioning of John of Gaunt to take out a
strong force to Gascony, gaining for Parróas well as for
othersóthrough Huet's petitions in May 1370, a pardon "for good
service to be rendered by William de Par in the company of the said
Walter in parts beyond the sea, to William of the King's suit for the
death of Roger Hawe, alias Haghe . . . whereof he is indicted or
appealed of any consequent outlawry."8 From 1 April to 1 June,
however, Huet and his men were kept in London "awaiting payment of
their wages and the pleasure of the Lord King and his Council."9
Small wonder that many recruits grew tired and decamped, among
them "two chivalers and twenty one men (named) who were to have
gone beyond seas in the company of Walter Huet but have not gone,
as the said Walter has certified."10 These had their pardons revoked.
By some mischance, as it transpired later, Parr seems to have been
included by those in authority among these deserters. Huet's
contingent, as part of Gaunt's great fleet, sailed from Plymouth to
Gascony,11 Their arrival in Bordeaux was sadly damped by news of
the fall of Limoges. It is unlikely that William was at the seige and sack
of the city, for Froissart, who always appears to include Huet's name
whenever he took part in an engagement, does not mention him as
being at Limoges, but states that Huet and his company had been
sent to strengthen and hold the frontiers of Poitou, where he
commanded a contingent in the attack on the fortress of Moncontours;
12 here therefore, presumable, Parr first saw action in France. Six
months or so later, when Lancaster returned to England, William
accompanied him. By this time he was so far advanced in the duke's
favour that he could beg him to petition the king, his father, on his
behalf, for it appears that, in spite of the pardon Huet had gained for
Parr in May 1370, he was still accounted an outlaw and it was
necessary to prove that he had taken part in the Gascon campaign.
Accordingly, in 1371, Lancaster himself petitioned Edward III that
William might be pardoned, certifying and making known to the king
that "he (William) was occupied in the war and service of our lord and
father aforesaid in our company and that of the said Sir Walter from the
time of our passage towards the said parts of Guienne until our return
to England."13 So that, instead of re-entering England as a fugitive
from justice, Parr returned under the patronage and protection of the
great Lancaster himself, for although no bond of contract between the
duke and him was survived, yet some short while later William was
established as one of the regular members of the Lancastrain retinue.
14 The disastrous course of the French war soon drew Gaunt back
into the front line and with him, presumably, went William since he, in
company with many others, received the sum of £4. 11s. 4d. from the
Lancastrian exchequer before March 1372 in part payment of £9. 11s.
4d. due to him as wages and fees of war.15 Edward III had
determined to save Thouars, which was being sorely pressed. Orders
for ships to be collected in the harbours of Portsmouth and Sandwich
had been sent out on 6 and 7 February 1372,16 but the fleet did not
sail until the end of August when fierce gales prevented it from making
headway. Meanwhile Thouars was lost, and Gaunt and his army
returned ignominiously home. Parr now seems to have returned to his
Lancastrian manor, for in November 1372 Gaunt sent an order from
Hertford to his "parker de Tokstat et Crokstat . . . to deliver to William
Par a buck from one of the said parks."17 By the spring of 1373
William received from the duke letters of protection to go on the king's
service on the next voyage in Gaunt's company;18 he was presumably,
therefore, among the bands of fighting men who passed through the
towns and villages of the West Country on their way to Plymouth to join
Lancaster. By 4 August the great march from Calais towards the south
of France had begun, as disastrous a campaign for invader as ever
was waged. To Parr it brought what must surely have been a personal
tragedy. At Ouchy, Sir Walter Huet and his men were passing the night.
Huet had already gone to his lodging to rest and taken off his armour.
"Then, suddenly, one hundred and twenty French men-at-arms . . .
commanded by Jean de Vienne, surprised at dawn the outposts of the
English army and Walter Huet, one of the most illustrious veterans of
the army was killed while tryingówhen only half armedóto repulse a
completely unexpected attack . . . the English, deeply affected by the
loss of one of their most valiant knights then began the march towards
Rheims."19 Yet before that gruelling march in mid-winter was ended,
Parr and his comrades may well have envied Huet his earlier death,
for out of 15,000 picked men, all originally mounted, only 8,000, and
half of these unmounted, passed finally through the gates of Bordeaux.
20 Parr returned home with his patron. From Hertford where Gaunt
retired to shun publicity and the animosity with which he was now
widely regarded, he directed his clerk of the Great Wardrobe to make a
settlement with his "well loved esquire, William de Par," who had not
been paid the five marks of his annuity for the term of St. Michael 1373,
nor the other five marks for the following Easter term owed to him by
the duchy of Lancaster.21 During his retirement the direction of the
duke's ambition changed. As husband of the heiress of Castile, Gaunt
determined to claim and conquer this country with which Parr was to
be connected at intervals until practically the end of his life. Gaunt's
first task was to make peace with France and from the evidence it
seems that Parr accompanied his patron to Bruges to parley for the
truce which was arranged on 27 June, for on 24 July, immediately on
his return to England, the duke sent to his chief forester at Needwood
orders to deliver to William another fat buck from the chace;22 an
acceptable reward for services rendered, presumably, in Bruges.
From 1375 to June 1378 there is a gap in our evidence regarding Parr,
but in the spring of 1378 Lancaster was given command of a naval
force to put an end to French aggression, and on 1 June Parr was
granted a letter of attorney because he was going to Brittany with the
duke.23 Unfortunately the attack on St. Malo was a fiasco, largely
owing to Arundel's incompetence,24 and once again Parr returned to
England under the shadow of his patron's failure. Nevertheless, Parr's
personal influence continues to increase through the years as is
shown by the fact that at least four felons appealed to him to gain them
pardons for their crimes.25 As one of Gaunt's personal attendants, it
seems likely that parr would accompany him to Scotland in 1380 to
treat with the Scots, for warrants were sent out from Leicester on 26
August to the receivers of Lancaster and York to call out the knights
and esquires of the duke's retinue to meet him at Newcastle upon
Tyne, arrayed for war.26 But it was around the year 1382 that Parr took
his second great step forward along the road of advancement. He was
probably now in his early thirties, and his service with Lancaster had
brought him not only experience in war but enhanced social prestige:
he must also have benefited immeasurably from his contact with the
brilliant courts of Bordeaux and the art filled treasurehouse of the
Savoy Palace in London, to which the duke's presence attracted many
of the leading figures in the political and cultural life of Europe; here
Parr continued his vicarious lessons in diplomacy, talked,
presumably, with Chaucer and Froissart, listened to the songs and
music of Gaunt's well-paid minstrels and absorbed willy-nilly some at
least of the European culture of the 14TH century. Nevertheless, Parr
was still only a paid mercenary, possessed of an insignificant estate
worth but a mere 15d. per annum in rent. 27 his social standing and
influence dependent in the main on his retention of his great patron's
favour. Then he married,28 and at once, through his wife the way was
opened for his future acquisition of independence and security, of a
Norman stronghold in the northósmall, it is true, but yet a castle with
wide acresóof manors, mills and rents with the added social prestige
which went with their possession. His bride was Elizabeth de Ros,
daughter of John de Ros (died 1358)29 and heiress to her
grandfather, Sir Thomas de Ros of Kendal Castle, Westmorland. She
was 17 years and upwards in 1382.30 Elizabeth was a royal Scottish
descent, since her ancestor Robert, Lord Roos of Helmsley had
married Isabel, illegitimate daughter of William of Lion of Scotland.31
Robert de Ros of Werk, a younger grandson of Robert and Isabel,
married Margaret de Brus, heiress to Kendal Castle.32 Sir Thomas de
Ros was the grandson of this marriage. Parr's marriage was possibly
arranged through Peter de Ros, the bride's uncle who had become
one of Gaunt's retainers in 1382.33 In any case, Parr must have been
well known to Sir Thomasóa firebrand of a man and a typical
Bordereróas Ros had served in the earl of Arundel's retinue under
Lancaster, in 1378.34 A son, named John, was born to William and
Elizabeth during or before 1382.35 There is no evidence to show
whether William took part in Lancaster's campaign against the Scots
in 1384 or in King Richard's expedition during the summer of the
following year, but by 1386 Parr was being drawn into the orbit of his
patron's ambition, centering on Castile, for we find that, on 12 January:
"William de Par, going on the King's service to Portugal, appoints
Hugh de Ines and Richard de Assheton as his attornies." So, once
more, in the spring of 1386, Parr rode along the London-Plymouth
highway in attendance upon the duke and his Spanish "Queen." His
view of the future must have been satisfactory for, in the event of his
patron winning the throne of Castile, the rewards given to his closest
followers were likely to be kingly. Then followed the delay in Devon
while ships were being collected, the relief of Brest, the surrender of
Corunna and St. James de Compostella, capital of Galicia, where Parr
presumably witnessed the arrival of the Castilian embassy with a
secret offer of marriage for Lancaster's daughter Katherine with the
heir of Castile. That he survived the disastrous campaign which
followed, when English knights, esquires and archers died off in
hundreds from plague and dysentry, speaks well for the strength of his
constitution. It was probably to raise another army for the duke that
Parr returned to England in the summer of 1387. By the end of 1388
William had gained the confidence of King Richard II himself and was
acting as his agent in trying to secure the early return of Gaunt from
Aquitaine to redress the balance of power which the Lords Appellant
had weighted so heavily against the king. It was through Parr's
management of the affairs entrusted to him at this juncture that
Lancaster seems to have become convinced of his abilities. Richard
had already made one attempt to send envoys to Aquitaine, but this
had been frustrated, possibly by Arundel, who held the post of High
Admiral. Now using Parr as his agent, the king sent to Richard earl of
Arundel, the King's admiral or his lieutenant, the mayors and bailiffs of
Plymouth and Dartmouth, and the keepers of the passages in the
ports of Fowey and Barnstaple, strict order as they love the king and
his honour, and would escape his wrath, with all speed to provide
from the king's money another ship and barge furnished with seamen
and gear and deliver them to William Parre for the voyage of certain
envoys whom the king purposes to send to John Duke of Lancaster, to
declare business which concerns the king and his commonweal [sic],
that by their default the business remain not undone which the king
would impute to their neglect; as lately, by the advice and assent of the
Council, a great ship and barge were arrested and suddenly departed
for foreign parts at the will of the owners and possessors for their
advantage, without advising the king, as his highness is informed.
Dated Windsor, 4 December 1388.37 Nearly a year passed before the
duke landed at Plymouth. The day following, 20 November, he granted
by letters patent "to William de Par, his bachelor, on his surrender of
earlier letters patentógranting him 50 marks a year for life from the
issues of the duchy of Lancasteró£50 a year therefrom.:38 The
bestowal of this grant and the fact that Parr was now a knight bachelor
obviously betokens the performance of some outstanding service on
his part. Possibly he accompanied the freightship sent out by the king
in 1389 to bring back his uncle Gaunt from Aquitaine.39 Parr may then
have given his patron first hand information regarding the political
situation in England, urging upon him the desirability of leaving affairs
which, as its governor, had kept the duke in the French province, to
deal with the serious state of emergency in England which Parr must
have known would continue as long as Gloucester's lust for power
remained unchecked, and the divided state of the Council continued to
threaten the stability and peace of the realm. The next seven years
which marked for England and Lancaster a period and prosperity, also
brought further honours and wealth to Parr. In 1390 Sir Thomas de
RosóLady Elizabeth Parr's grandfatheróended his long and turbulent
life40 and on 23 January 1391 Sir William and his wife were granted
"full seisin of all the lands which Thomas held of the king in chief in
fee tail . . . on the day of his death, as the king has taken homage and
fealty due from William by reason of his having issue by Elizabeth."41
Parr did not, however, retire to his northern fortress in Westmorland,
for Lancaster went to Amiens to negotiate a truce with Charles of
France, taking a magnificent retinue of 1,000 horsemen. Stately
processions, royal banquets and tournaments followed fast upon
each other, and the grant made by the duke to Sir William and his wife
of an estate in Cornwall, "of the land and lordship of Ayran in the
parish of St. Medart, Ruyan, forfeited by the lord of Budos, 26 October
1392", 42 points to a desire on the part of the duke to contribute
towards the heavy expenses incurred by Parr as his knight bachelor
during the recent diplomatic mission. But a higher honour was
pending. The duke decided to make sure of the experience in
diplomacy which at least two members of his suite had gained during
their years of service with him in foreign courts. Sir William Parr with
Sir Walter Blount and Henry Bowet, archdeacon of Lincoln were
appointed in April 1393 to negotiate a renewal of the truce with King
Enrique of Castile,43 which had been arranged originally by John of
Gaunt with king Jo„o. Hard on his return to England Sir William was
commissioned in 1394 to attend Lancaster to Aquitaine, this time as
duke of the province. In the stately and luxurious court established in
Bordeaux Parr evidently carried out the duties assigned to him to the
duke's satisfaction for on 18 July 1394 he was appointedófrom
BordeauxóJustice of the Forests of the duchy of Lancaster for life. But
this colourful interlude in the south ended with Lancaster's return to
England in the autumn of 1395. Though Parr was to see them again,
Lancaster was unknowingly looking his last on the fruitful vineyards
and cornfields of France. After tarrying in Brittany to conclude a treaty
with its changeable duke on 25 November, the Lancastrian party
proceeded to England where Parr must have been met, soon after his
arrival with news of the illness, or possibly the death of his wife, for
she died presumably early in the New Year, since Parr was in Kendal
in May,45 the first recorded report of his presence there. Before
October 1396 he had remarried.46 His second wife was not, as might
have been expected of superior wealth or social status to Elizabeth.
She was Margaret, widow of Sir Laurence de Dutton, a Cheshire
knight who had died before 30 January 1392/3.47 The new marriage
was made in such haste that the necessary licence from the king was
not obtained. In consequence Lady Margaret had to "make fine in £12.
4s. 4d. for marriage to William de Par, knight, without licence."48 This
was the exact amount of her yearly dower from lands formerly held of
the king by the deceased Sir Laurence and valued at £36. 13s. 4d.
yearly.49 One of Sir William's first recorded tasks in the north was to
import corn from Ireland for the needs of his tenants and household at
a time when, it seems, the domestic crop had failed.50 Little is known
of the domestic economy of the north west at this time, but a document
of 18 Hen. V throws a thin ray of light upon the district, informing us
that Cumberland and Lancashire had been accustomed "long since"
to obtain much of their grain and bread from Richmond market in
Yorkshire: "Many merchants from the adjacent parts of Cumberland,
Westmorland, and Lancashire were wont [sic] to resort there with
merchandise, grain, victuals and other goods every Saturday in the
year, as well as carriers of grain and bread belonging to the adjacent
parts of Cumberland, Westmorland and Lancashire and the
neighbourhood of Lonsdale,m Craven, Dent and Sedbergh in which
no great quantity of corn was then grown, for which reason the
inhabitants of those parts made their chief provision of grain in
Richmond market . . . The people of the adjoining counties of
Cumberand [sic], Westmorland and Lancashire have thrown into
cultivation large tracts of moors and wastes by means of which
carriers of grain, using to resort to Richmond from these parts of
Lonsdale and Sedbergh, have long since withdrawn from the said
market."51 Was Sir William, inspired by recollections of the cornfields
of France, one of those who threw "into cultivation large tracts of moors
and wastes" in Westmorland? The fact that he began to play in active
part in the county as a commissioner introduces us to two feuds which
had a more than local interest. On 1 March 1397 he was appointed to
serve on a commission of the peace and of oyer and terminer in
Westmorland.52 As the delinquents named were still at large in
November 1398 a stronger commission was appointedóRalph, earl of
Westmorland,* Henry Percy, earl of Northumberland,* his son, Henry
Percy,* Richard Redman of Levens, William de Culwen, Thomas
Colvyll, a Yorkshire knight,* Thomas Tunstall of Thurland Castle,*
Thomas Musgrave and the sheriffs of Yorkshire and Westmorland,
with John Elyngham the king's sergeant at arms, Richard de Croft,*
and John Hudleston, with ordersó "on information of dissensions
between John de Preston, and John, son of Thomas de Middleton,
John de Blande, Adam Touke, William and Roger de Blande and
Thomas Spicer of unlawful assemblies in those counties and the lying
in wait of the last named to kill the said John de Preston and his
friends, causing homicides, insurrections, riotsóto arrest the persons
last named and bring them before the king in council, arresting also
others to be found of their following."53 Now since 1377, the Blandes
and Middletons had been involved from time to time in disturbances of
the peace in Yorkshire aimed particularly against Gaunt's officers and
property or that of his retainers.54 They were joined later by the
Bekwyths55 and the trouble came to a head in February 1393 when
Sir Robert de Rokley, Gaunt's forester of the Chace of Knaresborough
slew several of the Bekwyths,56 who retaliated by murdering Thomas
de Blande, one of their own confederates whom they accused of
betraying them to their enemies,57 John de Preston and his friends,
whom the Middletons and Blandes with their confederates were lying
in wait to kill in 1397 and 1398 was a justice of the King's Bench58
and a landowner in Westmorland having inherited the manor of
Preston Patrick near Kendal.59 During the disturbances in Yorkshire
he had served on commissions of a strongly Lancastrian character in
Westmorland and Yorkshire at least fifteen times since November
1376.60 It seems clear, therefore, from this evidence, that the enmity
of the Middletons and Blandes was directed against Preston in his
judicial capacity, the justice's "friends" being most probably, his fellow
commissioners. The second feud with which Parr had to deal appears
from the names of some of the protagonists to have a certain
connection with the first. In November 1398 he and John Elyngham
were appointed "on information of divers dissensions between
Edmund Redman, Richard Doket, John and Thomas de Lancaster
and others, on the one side, and the Roger de Wyndesore, William,
Thomas and John de Bethom, Roland, John and Richard Threlkeld
and Christopher Forster on the other . . . to arrest all persons named
and their followers . . ."61 The primary cause of these divisions seems
to have been a family dispute over the will and property of Sir William
de Wyndesore of Heversham, Westmorland, husband of the court
beauty, Alice Perrers, mistress of Edward III. Wyndesore had died in
1385 and his three sisters, Margery Duket, Christiana Morieux and
Isabel de Wyndesore were found by inquisition to be his heirs.62 Sir
William had, however, during his lifetime disposed of some of his
property to his nephew John de Wyndesore,63 leaving the bulk of it by
will to him and his brothers.64 Of the disputants mentioned in Parr's
commission of 1398, Richard Duket was Margery's son,65 Thomas
and John de Lancaster, if my deductions from the evidence are
correct, were illegitimate sons of Christopher de Lancaster by Isabel
de Wyndesore,66 while Edmund Redman was a relative by marriage
of the Dukets.67 On the opposing side, Roger Wyndesore was John's
brother and one of the beneficiaries of his uncle's will which does not
mention any of Sir William's three sisters or their descendants. The
Bethoms and Christopher Forster were adherents of the Lancastrian
party,68 and John de Preston of the Wyndesores,69 which provides
evidence for a connection in the personnel at least between this feud
and the first, especially as Christopher Forster was one of those who
supported Sir Robert de Rokley, Gaunt's officer, in his feud against the
Bekwyths;70 the Threlkelds, Bethoms and John de Preston also
shared a common emnity against the abbot of Shap.71 Unfortunately
we are given no certain evidence regarding the final outcome of these
disturbances. The likelihood is that they were swallowed upófor a time
at leastóin the great feud of 1399 which ended by Bolingbroke
mounting his cousin Richard's throne as Henry IV. Before that
happened Gaunt died on 3 February 1399 and Parr, one of the
executors of his will, experienced at first hand King Richard's
unscrupulous actions regarding the Lancastrian inheritance. Within a
month of Gaunt's death the king had changed Henry of Lancaster's
temporary sentence of exile into one for life and seized his vast
inheritance, ordering the executors to carry out Gaunt's will as speadily
[sic] as possible, but to keep the stock formerly owned by the duke in
places appointed by the king and his minsters.72 On Gaunt's death,
Richard took Parr into his service, confirming to him "because retained
to stay with the king only" the £50 a year for life which the duke had
granted to him for the issues of the duchy.73 Exactly what part was
played by Parr in the tragic events which ended in Richard's deposition
is not known. The usurping king showed himself more than generous
to most of those who had aided him to gain the throne, but Sir William
only received a confirmation of the grant of the lordship of Ayran made
to him by Gaunt seven years previously,74 Taking into consideration
the long and faithful service given to the new kings' father, the
meagreness of his reward perhaps suggests that Parr had been slow
in deciding to support Henry. But Parr's wide military experience made
him invaluable in the north where, in spite of the preliminaries of a
truce having been arranged with Scotland at the end of November
1399, Henry had to complain of "very great and horrible outrages
perpetrated in England by certain Scots"75 who burned Wark Castle.
Parr, under Northumberland and Westmorland, called out the local
forces,76 but the trouble blew over when the Scottish government
offered profuse apologies.77 In 1400 Henry recognized Parr's
diplomatic ability by sending him with John Trevor, bishop of St. Asaph
to announce his accession in Spain78 where the young Enrique of
Castile and his consort, Katherine of Lancaster were now reigning.
Parr was rewarded after his return in 1402ó "to the king's knight,
William Par, a stag and hind in season each year for life, within the
forest of Inglewode."79 Sir William's last recorded services were the
collection of the tenth and fifteenth in Westmorland in December
1402,80 and his appointment with the earl of Westmorland to a
commission of array in September 1403.81 If one may deduce from
this that Parr was serving with Westmorland when the earl prevented
the forces of the rebel Northumberland from joining those of his son
Hotspur at Chester, then we are left with no doubts of Parr's
wholehearted allegiance to Henry IV, once he was established on the
throne. Before 9 October of the following year Parr was dead.82 His
son John was now aged 22 and over, 83 and, until a short time before
his father's death had not married. Perhaps Sir William had hoped for
further sons by his second wife, for John's early death at the age of 26
or 27,84 and the fact that his name is practically absent from the
records, suggests a delicacy of constitutions. A premonition of his own
death may have impelled Sir William to arrange a match between his
heir and Agnes Devereux, widow of Sir Walter Devereux of
Herefordshire, who died in 1403.85 Sir William had not the
consolation of knowing about the birth of his grandson Thomas. He
may have died tormented by the fear that the line he had worked so
strenuously to establish in prosperity might die out. In fact, Thomas
was to prove the most prolific of all the Westmorland Parrs, and many
of Sir William's descendants were to inherit his fine qualities of
courage in war, versatility and adaptability in peace, as well as those
of foresight and industry, which, with a certain ruthlessness often
inherent in ambitious natures, enabled his descendants to add to the
family wealth, prestige and possessions. These, as left by Sir William
and judged comparatively were not great. Much of his income, granted
for life, died with him, so that only the fourth part of the manor of Kirkby
in Kendale, his in the right of his first wife and worth £40 yearly,86 with
one-eighth part of his vill [sic] of Parr, his own inheritance, for which he
paid 15d. yearly to his overlord,87 were inherited by John. But the
importance of Sir William's efforts lay in the fact that he had
established his family firmly in the ranks of the independent, landed
middle class which was to play such an important part in the
development of 15TH and 16TH-century England. On his foundation,
using his meansóthose of natural ability, the favour of powerful
patrons and brilliant marriage alliancesóParr's grandson and great
grandson were to heighten the family edifice, until its upper storeys
reached that rarer air warmed by the sun of royalty itself. They were
also to find that the tempests of changing fortune buffeted a taller
building more dangerously.
He died (in 1404-S20)(on 4 OCT 1405). For some particulars
concerning him see Dep. Keeper's Rep. xl, App. 524; Rep. xxxvi, App.
374; Pal. of Lanc. Chan. Misc. bdle. 1, file 2, n. 66. See also
Topographer, iii, 352ñ60. CHILDREN: John PARR [F11]. {S5,S6,F15,
S19,S20,S21}.

# F11. Sir John PARR. Born (about 1355-S5)(before Oct 1382-S21)
(about 1383-S8) of Kendal; son of Sir William PARR [F10] and
Elizabeth de ROS. He married (3-S8) Agnes CROPHULL (Crophill-
S8), daughter of Sir Thomas CROPHILL and Sibyl de la BERE--widow
of Sir Walter Devereux. [If Agnes was his third wife, who were one and
two? Agnes was of Salisbury, Wiltshire, England. He died (about 1408-
S20)(after 1408)(about 4 August 1408-S8). CHILDREN: Thomas
PARRE [F12]. {S5, S8,S20,S21}.

F12. Sir Thomas PARRE. (PARR-S12). Born (about 1380-S5)(1405-S6,
S23)(1407-S8)(in 1407-S20), of Kendal, Lancashire, England; son of
Sir John PARR [F11] and Agnes Crophull. He married Alice
TUNSTALL, daughter of Sir Thomas Tunstall and Eleanor Harrington,
of Thurland Castle, Lancashire, England. Alice was born in 1415.
Upon his father's death in 1408, Thomas's wardship was granted to
his mother, Agnes, Sir Thomas Beauford and Sir Thomas Brounflete.3
Some time in the following nine years, Agnes Parr married John
Merbury.4 On 9 July 1413, probably about the same time as the
marriage, she surrendered the wardship of her son and his lands to
Sir Thomas Tunstall of Thurland Castle, Lancs.5 William Torvar and
James Harrington for 200 marks (£133. 6s. 8d.).6 Parr lived at
Thurland Castle during his minority and Tunstall married him to his
daughter, Alice. The Tunstalls were ardent Lancastrians throughout
the fifteenth century, but this had little lasting influence on Parr, whose
Westmorland estates bordered those of the Nevilles, earls of
Westmorland. When he reached his majority and assumed his
Kendal inheritance, a mutually supportive relationship arose between
the politically aggressive Nevilles and the aggressively ambitious Parr.
Parr's value to the Nevilles depended on his own importance as a
local magnate and his future advancement on his ability to furnish aid
and support to a patron when needed.
Power in Kendal was based on possession of the lands of the original
barony of Kendal, which had been twice divided. The Richmond Fee
represented one-half of the original barony, the Lumley and Marquis
Fees each a quarter. In the fifteenth century, the lands of the Richmond
Fee were normally held by absentee landlords, being granted from
royal relative to royal relative. The Lumley Fee, too, went through
division and transfer, at one point belonging to Parr's enemies, the
Bellingham family. The holders of the Lumley lands, however, had
merely local significance; only the Parr lands, or as they were later
known, the Marquis Fee, were held continuously until 1571 by one
family and progressively augumented [sic] through Clifford and Neville
patronage, and after 1461, by royal favouritism. The first Sir William did
little to extend his wife's de Roos holdings,7 preferring to act as an
absentee landlord, but Thomas Parr had both the time and the need to
consolidate and extend them. Much of the estate was held in dower by
three relicts of the Parrs until 1436 when his mother Agnes Parr, the
last dowager, died. She had signed her dower portion over to her son
in 1429 in exchange for a yearly forty-mark allowance.8 At her death,
Parr took the oath of fealty and received full seisin of the dower third of
his estate for a fine of two marks.9 Finally, at the age of twenty-eight, in
law as well as in fact, Parr could enjoy his full income, amounting
possibly to £80-£100 yearly. The estate totalled at least 5083 acres of
land, 700 of them arable, and 57 messuages and presumably
Thomas also held the small Lancashire estate which was the first Sir
William Parr's patrimony. This included lands in Parr and Sutton and a
toft in Wigan,10 a parcel held of the Earl of Derby by knight's service,
and a yearly rent of 15d. "being thus identified with the quarter of a
moiety held by the above-named William in 1370 . . .". Parr, himself,
made only one known purchase: a plot called "le Groute by le Howes"
11 from one Baldwin Scheppesshed, which he bought to extend his
holdings in Helsington. To counter the recession of income from land,
subsisting throughout the greater part of the fifteenth century, Parr
turned from outright land purchase to royal leaseholds as a means of
increasing both his income and his local political control. Basically
there were three of these leaseholds, all of them portions of the
Richmond Fee held by Henry V's brother, John, Duke of Bedford, at his
death in 1435. In May 1438, Parr was given the keeping of two-thirds of
Bedford's lands (the ultimate third went to his widow, Jacquetta) in the
Westmorland townships or hamlets of Crosthwaite, Hutton, Strickland
Ketel, Frosethwaite and Helsington, the keeping of the fishery on the
river Kent, and, in Lancashire, all of Bedford's lands in Whittington. The
grant was for ten years, at a yearly farm of £25. 12s. 10d. with a
maintenance clause.12 During that time, should anyone else be found
willing to offer more, the farm would go to the highest bidder. In
February 1439 this grant was reconfirmed, with the addition "that Sir
Thomas Parr shall sufficiently build anew, repair and maintain at his
own charge one-half part of the Hoton [Hutton] water mill which the
King is bound to do and then yield it to the King . . .".13 It is pertinent
that in this area the decline in the revenues enjoyed by landlords,
especially in Cumberland, was attributable partly to the decline of
income from mills.14 Parr enjoyed the income from these lands for
only five of the ten years of the original lease. In 1443 all Richmond
Fee lands formerly held by Bedford, the Duchess' dower, were granted
to the king's favourite, John, duke of Somerset and Earl of Kendal. The
income from Richmond Fee lands was roughly three times that of
Parr's estates,15 so he cannot have been too pleased at being forced
by the king to relinquish them half way through his lease. In March
1445, another though lesser plum from the lands of Bedford fell into
his hands: the keeping of two-thirds of the market tolls, the profits of
local fairs, and the profits of "le wyndles et lepes de le weyle, with le
bothes, shoppes and scamelles and with the bakery, le bankes and le
court house of Kirkby in Kendal".16 This was a twelve-year farm at
60s. a year, but with a clause that should anyone offer more for the
farm during that time Parr would lose the lease. Along with it went a
twelve-year grant, at 20s. a year, of the keeping of the herbage ". . . of
certain meadows and land called Wyryholme alias Holmewery, county
Cumberland, with all appurtenances . . .". Six years later, in July 1451,
the king raised the rent from £3 to £4 and added a 3s. 4d. per year
charge against the income, probably some sort of pension. He also
extended the lease for a further twelve years, but it was a gratuitous
gesture for twenty months later Henry VI granted the market tolls lease
to the Earl of Richmond. Parr, left with a nominal 20s. a year herbage
lease, farmed it to his son, William, for sixteen years at the same 20s.
rate, presumably with the king's permission, as the original twelve-
year lease was due to expire in March 1457. Parr also secured two
other local sources of income. These were the tithes of Holme and
Mintsfoot which were demised to him at farm in 1431 for 10s. The farm
of the Mintsfoot tithe, but not of Holme, was renewed to Parr in 1435,
along with ". . . a place of which the name is lost (which) lay fallow in
1431",17 for which he paid 5s. One final transaction, which may
indicate another royal grant of farm, occurred in May 1428, when Parr
and Ralph Blennerhasset of Suffolk (probably a scion of the
Cumberland Blennerhassets) committed, by mainprise, to John
Broughton, esquire, the keeping of five messuages, five bovates of
land and ten acres of meadow in the township of Skelton, a burgage in
Carlisle and a quit rent of 13s. 4d. a year from another burgage in
Carlisle.18 This transaction may have been the subletting of a grant at
farm as it was later cancelled by Henry VI, who farmed it directly to
Broughton at a flat rate of 26s. 8d. a year. The final grant made to Parr
by the Crown was made by Edward IV on 29 July 1461. This was the
wardship and marriage of John Hothom, a distant cousin of the Parrs
through the de Thweng family. The Hothoms, an ancient Yorkshire
family seated at Scorbrough near Beverley, held extensive lands in
Yorkshire, Lancashire and Westmorland.19 Several of their
Westmorland properties neighboured those of the Parrs, and Staveley
manor was held of one-sixth of one-quarter of the Parrs' manor of
Kirkby-in-Kendal, Parr being the effective overlord. It was an
exceedingly lucrative wardship, and, as the ward was little more than a
baby,20 it extended Parr's influence into Yorkshire and increased his
power in Westmorland and Lancashire. His income must have at
least doubled if the size of the Hothom estates is any indication. This
substantial royal grant and mark of royal favour from the new Yorkist
king was the pattern of the future for the next three generations of
Parrs.
Thomas Parr's position in his own community is reflected in the types
of office he held there. As a leading member of the local gentry, he sat
on most of the north-western commissions of the peace and many
commissions of array during a thirty-year career. Knighted some time
between 1430 and 1432, he was one of a small closed group of local
magnates who monopolized all Crown commissions in Cumberland
and Westmorland in the fifteenth century. Under Henry VI, he served as
a justice of the peace for Westmorland in July 1432, February 1434,
March 1437, July 1454 and July 1456. As late as July 1459,21 just two
months before he joined his fate irrevocably to the Earl of Salisbury's,
Parr was again named to a commission of the peace for
Westmorland. Under Edward IV, he was justice for Cumberland in May
1461 and for Westmorland in May and September 1461.22 He was
named by Henry VI to the commissions of array for Westmorland of
July 1436, July 1437 (also for Cumberland), and November 1448.23
Edward also appointed him to the commission of September 1461 for
Westmorland and the May and November 1461 commissions for
Cumberland, the latter called to defend the borders from an expected
invasion by Henry VI, supported by Scottish troops.
Parr served also on various special commissions. He was appointed
in January 1436 to the Westmorland commission for tax assessment
to levy the parliamentary subsidy granted in 1435 for the defence of the
realm.25 In February 1457, he served on a commission to inquire into
the lands held by Thomas Lord Dacre at the day of his death, their
value, and the identity of Dacre's lawful heir. In December of the same
year, due to the imminent danger of a French invasion, a commission
to levy fifty-six archers in Westmorland was sent to Parr, Sir Richard
Musgrave, John Crackenthorpe of Hugill, William Lancaster, John
Hilton, John Wharton and Henry Bellingham.27 All these were
Lancastrian commissions, evidence of the fact that, up until July 1459,
Parr was looked upon both as an influential man, whose loyalties
were not suspect enough to exclude him from the operation of local
government, and one whose cooperation was thought necessary for
the government's efficient functioning. Sir Thomas's Yorkist affiliations
were soon to become apparent, and he continued his exercise of local
power with the full favour of the new Yorkist regime. On 12 November
1460, Parr and his two elder sons served on a commission "to arrest
and commit to prison all persons guilty of unlawful gatherings,
congregations, associations, combinations and seiges [sic], and if
they resist, to call together all lieges of Westmorland and Cumberland
and other counties adjacent to fight them". This was an attempt to
protect the Yorkist cause in the heavily Lancastrian northern shires. It
was reinforced by commissions of peace and array, and, on 6 June
1461,29 another commission was named to arrest recalcitrant
Lancastrians, namely Gamaliel Pennington, Christopher Broughton
and James Uriel, and bring them before the king's council. The senior
commissioners were Sir Thomas Parr and Sir Edward Beetham.
Sir Thomas also held local offices which allowed him a wide latitude
of action in the county and supplied him with sources of income and
political control. In 1430-31 he was granted the office of escheator in
Cumberland and Westmorland30 and in 1435-46 under-sheriff for
Westmorland,31 a powerful office because the hereditary sheriff, Lord
Clifford, was not a particularly aggressive official. Parr had Clifford's
full support in the community and appears to have exercised the
extensive powers of the shrievalty with an unhampered hand. Since
the sheriff supervised shire court elections to parliament,32 especially
in the northern shires, the shrievalty took on the appearance of an
executive office and control of this office, in fact if not in title, was
tantamount to control of the shire, particularly when the Crown was
weak. This all-pervasive involvement by Parr in the affairs of the
community, based as it was on his position as under-sheriff, can be
seen in the numbers of land transactions which he witnessed or for
which he served as trustee, and in the assorted local feuds in which
he was involved or on which his influence was brought to bear. These
span his entire career during the reign of Henry VI.
An example of the contempt in which the law was held by the local
gentry, and the lengths to which they would go to subvert it in their own
interests, is the case of Robert Crackenthorpe of Newbiggin.
Crackenthorpe, a justice of the peace for Westmorland, appealed to
Chancery in a suit against William and Oliver Thornborough and
William Lancaster (all established landowners in Westmorland), who
"by instigation of Sir John de Lancaster and Katherine, his wife" had
waylaid him "with intent to slay",33 as he returned from a session of
the peace. "The interesting point is that the offenders included men
who had sat in parliament for Westmorland and held commissions of
the peace. So powerful was their local standing that it would have
been useless to sue them in the country".34 Crackenthorpe's appeal
was supported jointly by the Earl of Westmorland and Sir Thomas
Parr. The Thornboroughs were "maintained" by the Earl of Salisbury,
35 and it is significant that Thomas Parr sided publicly not with them
but with Crackenthorpe and Westmorland, Salisbury's very much
estranged nephew. The cause of the attack on Crackenthorpe was
that, as a justice of the peace, he had held an investigation into a
dispute over lands claimed by the Lancasters. Chancery proved
unable to solve the situation and so prevent further violence.
Crackenthorpe was murdered by the Lancasters and Thornboroughs
in August 1443.
The continuing lack of effective control at the national level exacerbated
local warfare in the 1440s and 1450s, and in Cumbria divisions
deepened between the Percy and Neville factions. In 1453 the rolls of
parliament described the situation in Cumberland as "toon half of the
shire was divided from tother".37 Conditions were no better in
Westmorland. In 1446 Thomas Parr, Sir Thomas Strickland and six
others were the recipients of a penal bond of 200 marks from eight
bondees "to abide the award of certain arbitrators and to keep peace"
38 with Robert Garnett, John Hubbersty and others. Another typical
local feud in which Parr acted as mediator was that of the ubiquitous
Thornboroughs and the Threlkelds of Meaburn, 39 who were related
by marriage. This dispute, over seven marks from Meaburn manor
owed to Threlkeld by William Thornborough, and 13s. 4d. for a black
gown for one of Thornborough's servants, involved jury intimidation,
coercive violence and extensive litigation. In November 1447, an
indenture to keep the peace and settle the dispute was drawn up in
the presence of Thomas Parr, Richard Musgrave, John Broughton and
Nicholas Leyburne, but such indentures were as much use as
miniature dams against tidal waves.
Thomas Parr himself was involved in law-land disputes between 1435
and 1443. In 1440 he lost a legal battle with Thomas, prior of
Conishead, when the prior recovered from Parr, by assize of novel
disseisin, two messuages, 120 acres of land, six acres of meadow,
100 acres of pasture and 10 acres of wood in Scalthwaitrigg, all of
which constituted the Parr interest and right in the Hospital of St.
Leonard's Kendal.40 This had been part of the de Roos inheritance,
and Parr was forced to quit-claim it to the prior although he did retain
the right to present to St. Leonard's chaplaincy.41 The effect of Lord
Clifford's support of Parr in his capacity as sheriff, Parr's own
influential position locally and his place in parliament are exemplified
in the Parr-Bellingham feud, which made itself felt from Westmorland
to Westminister. The Bellinghams, of Burneside near Kendal, were a
long-established and influential Westmorland family. They also owned
land in Helsington near the Parrs and at Strickland Roger. In 1404 the
Bellinghams had held 20s. worth of land in Strickland Ketel of the
Parrs, which they may still have done thirty years later. It may have
been disputes over these lands which provided the spark for the fuse.
In 1441 Henry Bellingham made a complaint in the court of Chancery
against Thomas Parr,42 claiming Parr had come to his house at
Burneside "with a great multitude of people with intent to destroy and
kill". Parr was dissuaded from this intended violence by "true tretyee of
gode Gentilmen of the same cuntre". Bellingham however was still
receiving threats from Parr, but because of Parr's paramountcy in
Kendal, he could not sue him successfully in the county. Robert
Bellingham, Henry's father, was indeed a Clifford feoffee but Clifford
supported Parr and "the coroners of the same Shire bene his (Parr's)
meynyall men".43 Bellingham, therefore turned to the court of
Chancery for aid. Chancery did not satisfy the Bellinghams who took
the matter into their own hands. In February 1445,44 Thomas Parr
was in London as knight of the shire for Cumberland. He took
lodgings "on Cornwallis ground beside the Crane in the Wards of the
Vyntrye".45 In the morning of the opening parliament, he and three
servants, Robert Duket, Thomas Wryght and Matthew Pierson, left their
lodgings for Westminister. On the road to the Thames they were
"assaulted with intent to kill" by Henry Bellingham's two younger
brothers, Robert an Thomas, together with three other.46 Parr's
servants were badly injured and the attackers were arrested. In March,
Parr was granted, by private act of parliament, a writ of proclamations
addressed to the sheriffs of the city of London, whose writ was to order
the Bellinghams to appear before the King's Bench a month from
Easter 1446 or be attainted of felony. The outrage to parliament of an
attack on one of its members caused the passage of an act "to protect
members of Parliament from assault while in Parliament and in transit
. . .".47 If assaulted, a member of parliament was to have a writ of
proclamation to the appropriate sheriff, "as by an Act in this saide
present parliament for Sir Thomas Parr, Knyght, is in like case
ordeined to be hade", to be returned at the King's Bench enabling the
complainant to demand there the appearance of those against whom
the writ was sworn, or else "such execution as is ordeined also in the
saide Acte, for ye saide Sir Thomas".
Before this act two statutes had given members of parliament
recourse at law for any physical attack perpetrated on them or their
servants: in 1432 to protect any lord or commoner attending
parliament or council from assault,49 and a Statute of 1403 protecting
the servants of a knight of the shire from assault. Thus, when in 1445
the Commons prayed that the remedies and process prescribed in
the act for Sir Thomas Parr should be upheld, the king replied that the
two prior statutes should provide sufficient redress for the members of
the Commons, in effect disallowing Parr's act as a precedent for
parliamentary litigation.50 The Bellinghams failed to appear at the
King's Bench "for gret fere and drede of the seyd Acts", their fear of
reciprocal violence being greater than their fear of the courts. In 1449,
however, they petitioned for a settlement of the dispute. In 1449
parliament, in which Thomas Bellingham was a member for Arundel
and Parr for Westmorland, Parr's writ of proclamation was annulled as
"the parties had come to an agreement51 and Sir Thomas Parr and
his servants had received satisfaction",52 The Bellinghams were
pardoned at Parr's request. A remnant of the settlement of this feud
may exist in an undated boundary settlement between Sir Robert
Bellingham and his son, Henry, and Sir Thomas Parr and his son,
William. It fixes the boundaries of their contiguous lands in Strickland
Roger, which may have been the original source of trouble.
Parr was not always either a combatant or litigant in local land
transactions. Frequently, he acted as a witness or mediator for others.
In January 1430, he witnessed a quit-claim, with warranty of
advowson, of a moiety of the church in Sedbergh in Lonsdale,
Yorkshire, from Thomas Harrington, esquire, the son of Sir William
Harrington, to Cuthbert, the abbot of Coverham, and the convent of
Coverham.54 Early in 1435, along with Sir Nicholas Radcliffe, he
testified under oath at Carlisle before William Laton, the escheator for
Cumberland, regarding the inquisition post mortem on Sir Peter Tilliol,
whose daughter and coheir had married Sir Christopher Moresby, a
close friend and later in-law of Parr's.55 In 1437 Sir John de Lamplogh
(or Lamplugh) granted to his grandson, John, certain lands and
tenements in Preston. Parr, who also held land in Preston, witnessed
the grant, together with Richard Musgrave and Sir Thomas Strickland.
On 11 August 1446, Parr, Strickland, Nicholas Leyburne and Robert
Bellingham witnessed a grant of certain Westmorland lands by
Thomas Gate and Robert Preston to Edward Beetham. Beetham held
from Parr the manor of Beetham and other lands, worth approximately
£40 a year.
In June 1452, Parr acted as trustee for Roland Lenthale, taking livery
with the other trustees of one-third of the manors of High Roding, Over
Shamall and Ginge Margaret in Essex, previously granted to the
trustees to uses by Lenthale, who held the manors in right of his wife
Margaret, the sister and coheir of Thomas, Earl of Arundel, with
reversion to Edmund Lenthale, her son.57 This shows Parr's sphere
of interest extended as far south as Essex and that, as a man of
known reputation and influence, he was sought by residents of at least
four shires as a witness or trustee. At the local level Parr's position
was unassailable as the holder of a large and concentrated estate
with a monopoly of shire offices and commissions and one whom the
Nevilles regarded with favour. At the national level however his
influence was limited to the House of Commons where his initiation
was made ó in a somewhat unfortunate manner.
As indicated by the sudden increase in disputed elections during the
years 1427 to 1429, the statutes governing parliamentary elections
were at this time widely abused, due to fraudulent sheriffs, ineligible
electors and falsely-returned knights. In 1429 Parliament was
originally summoned to meet at Westminster on 13 October. The
electors for Cumberland met at a shire court in Carlisle on 30 August
and duly elected Sir William Legh and Thomas de la More as that
shire's representatives. The date for the opening of Parliament was
subsequently brought forward to 22 September and a new summons
issued. As there was no regular meeting of the shire court between
the receipt of this summons and the opening of the session, the
sheriff, Sir Christopher Moresby,58 took it upon himself to make out a
new return for the altered date, naming More and Thomas Parr as
knights of the shire "in an apparently normally attested indenture".59
The reaction was immediate. In 28 September, by royal letters patent,
a full investigation was ordered into the sheriff's actions, the date and
place of the first valid election and the second unilateral one, the
names of the electors and any other facts regarding the dispute. The
first investigation was inactive or inadequate and a new one was
ordered the following year on 10 July. There is no proof one way or
another indicating whether or not Thomas Parr took his seat, but in all
probability he did not. However, it such disputed elections which
engendered the Parliamentary Statute of 1429.
Of twenty parliaments covering the years 1439-83, in fifteen returns or
partial returns available for Westmorland, eleven returns were made
either of a Parr of by a Parr as sheriff in charge of the election.
Disregarding the disputed election of 1429, Sir Thomas himself sat in
six parliaments ó 1435, 1445-46, 1449, 1450-51, 1455-56 and 1459.
He represented Westmorland in 1435, 1449, 1450-51, 1455-56 and
probably 1459 as well. In 1445-56 he sat for Cumberland. Of the
remaining three extant returns, some person connected with the Parrs
was either sheriff or returned as knight of the shire in at least two.
Combined with Neville patronage, this gave the Parrs a forty-four-year
hegemony over Westmorland representation in parliament. The
Cumberland elections show a more limited involvement. From 1439-
83, seventeen returns or partial returns are available, seven with a
Parr directly involved and two with a close friend or relative. This close
involvement in parliamentary elections and attendance was to give the
Parrs a place near the centre of political events for over forty years.
It was during the 1440s that Sir Thomas evolved a contrivance which
he and his sons systematically exploited during this forty-four-year
period. It was designed to circumvent the statute which ruled that a
sheriff of a county could not be elected by that county to serve in
parliament. When Lord Clifford was attainted in 1461 and lost his
hereditary shrievalty, the Parrs took over the office on an hereditary
basis. Sir Thomas, undoubtedly with Neville backing, having obtained
the office of sheriff in one county, proceeded to serve as knight of the
shire for another. This device was exploited by the three Parrs, Sir
Thomas and his sons, Sir William and Sir John, in the parliaments of
1445-46, 1463-65, 1472-75, and 11478. As the interests of the two
shires, Westmorland and Cumberland, were closely allied, and as the
Parrs themselves had interests in both, they thus managed to
integrate the key positions of the two to provide themselves with an
unshakeable hold on the northwest. In the late 1450s, growing
violence between the rival houses of York and Lancaster became
acute. The Yorkists, facing indictments by the council held at Coventry
on 24 June 1459, prepared to take a military stand against their
enemies. The Earl of Salisbury, with his northern retainers, marched
south to rendezvous with the Duke of York at Ludlow. When the
Queen's forces intercepted Salisbury's at Blore Heath in Shropshire
on 23 September, the outcome was indecisive. Salisbury rallied his
men and, joining forces with York and Warwick, turned to face the royal
army at Ludford Bridge near Ludlow. Sir Thomas Parr and several
others came to the Earl, not the Duke, to "offer their services".60 Even
at this late date, however, Parr considered himself a Salisbury
supporter, not a "Yorkist". The Yorkists were out-numbered and were
routed on 12-13 October and Parr almost certainly fled with Salisbury,
arriving, by way of Devon, at Calais on 2 November. All were
subsequently attainted of high treason and all their lands and goods
declared forfeit.61 By December 1460 the Crown began to grant Parr's
estates away,62 but the triumph of Edward IV reversed the process,
and it is hardly likely that, in only a year and a half, Parr's lands
suffered too much damage.
Sir Thomas Parr's position before July 1459 is somewhat anomalous.
Superficially he was a loyal subject of the Crown, continuing to serve
on government-appointed commissions and displaying no overtly
rebellious tendencies. McFarlane includes him in a group of "later
Yorkists whose attitude in 1450 cannot be presumed . . ."63 The
wedge, which finally separated Parr from his allegiance to Henry VI,
was his personal commitment to Richard Neville, Earl of Salisbury. In
1420 Henry V had chosen Salisbury for the office of Warden of the
West March, an office not merely lucrative but permitting its holder to
raise a substantial private army "among the best natural source of
fighting men in the country".64 The Earl of Salisbury's enormous
income and his friendly relations with the King's council were potent
inducements for ambitious northerners like Parr to become his
supporters and retainers. Nor was it only Salisbury's position as
Warden which attracted Parr, it was also the fact that in 1444 he had
been made steward of the Richmond Fee. This brought Salisbury into
personal proximity with Parr of Kendal and offered a welcome
opportunity for each man to make use of the other's support for the
mutual benefit ot both.
In all likelihood, Parr's assumption of Salisbury's patronage must have
occurred between 1435, when he opposed Salisbury's retainers, the
Thornboroughs, in the Crackenthorpe case and 1438, when he
received the Richmond Fee leasehold, possibly through Salisbury's
intervention. Some sort or relationship, however, predates even 1435,
for as early as 1430 Parr, together with the Earl of Salisbury, his
supporter William Fitz-Hugh and Thomas Tunstall, were co-witnesses
of a quit-claim,65 Two other close supporters of the Nevilles,
Christopher Conyers and Christopher Boynton, were also co-
witnesses, as was James Strangways [sic],66 Justice of the Common
pleas. Many of these commissions on which Parr served were headed
by Salisbury.67 Yet, despite his Neville sympathies and two decades
of mutual support, Parr was cautious. He did not appear among the
anti-Somerset partisans at the first battle of St. Albans (22 May 1455),
nor, seemingly, did he take any irrevocable anti-Lancastrian action
until the day he arrived at Ludlow to offer Salisbury his services. Barely
a month later, he was an attainted traitor in exile. He must have
wished often during those months that he had remained cautious and
delayed a little longer. As things turned out, he had made the right
decision after all. In 1460 Parr fought beside Salisbury and York at
Wakefield. In the battle and the executions which followed, York, his
son the Earl of Rutland, and Salisbury died. On three of the four lists of
the slain found in later sources the name of Sir Thomas Parr appears.
68 Supposedly, his head was impaled above the gates of York. Parr,
however, outlived his reported death by another year. In the series of
battles which followed Wakefield, no mention of him has survived, and
he may have been in all or none of them. He had, however, acquitted
himself sufficiently well to earn the new king, Edward IV's, personal
gratitude and favour. The wardship of John Hotham was the first of a
series of grants which were to increase the Parr holdings and income
vastly during Edward's reign. For ten more years, the Parrs supported
the Nevilles, in the person of the Earl of Warwick. But just as the good
lordship of Salisbury had succeeded that of Lancaster, so the
patronage of a king was to prove more desirable than that of his
overmighty subject.
Sir Thomas Parr's personal life was as full as his public one. He had
not followed his paternal forebears in the pursuit of an eligible
heiress. He had married Alice Tunstall, the daughter of his guardian,
Sir Thomas Tunstall of Thurland Castle, Lancashire.69 Alice, although
from an important family, was no heiress. However, in 1427, her
brother, Sir Thomas Tunstall, the younger, married Alianore Fitz-Hugh,
widow of Sir Philip Darcy of Knaith, thus bringing Thomas Parr into
contact with the Fitz-Hugh family, which by marriage in the next
generation, would provide the Parrs with a claim to the lands of the Fitz-
Hugh lords of Ravensworth. Parr's eldest son, William, was born in
1434, and his second son, John, in 1438. The Parrs ultimately had
nine children, three sons, William, John and Thomas, and six
daughters, Anne, Mabel, Margaret, Agnes, Elizabeth and Alianore. They
all made advantageous matches and Parr could number among his
sons-in-law such northern notables as Humphrey, Lord Dacre of
Gilsland, Sir Thomas Strickland and Sir Christopher Moresby.70 The
Tunstall connection, despite its paucity of tangible assets,
nevertheless proved valuable some sixty years later when Cuthber
Tunstall, Bishop of Durham, took very seriously his cousinly duty to
befriend and advise the widowed Lady Maud Parr. By Sir Thomas's
death, between mid-November and 4 December 1461, the Parrs had
risen in less than a century from a position as all but landless
retainers in the household of the Duke of Lancaster to a place as
prominent landholders among the Westmorland gentry. Sir Thomas
had expanded his grandfather's influence by securing a monopoly of
the northwestern shrievalties, as well as the shire seats in parliament.
By 1461, when Sir Thomas and his family's contribution to the Yorkist
cause was about to launch the Parrs into the court circle, Sir Thomas
Parr's position in Westmorland was paramount and unassailable. He
had emerged from the mass of local gentry to stand alone as the man
or power in Kendal. There were men with nobler titles, who held land
and influence in the north, but in Kendal they exercised their influence
through Parr. The last Lancastrian king had offered very little to Parr as
an inducement for support. With the accession of the house York, the
Parrs became royal favourites. The change in administration meant for
Thomas Parr a broadening of prospects and opportunities, and
although he did not live long enough to take full benefit of these, his
sons enjoyed an enviable position as intimates of Edward IV until their
deaths. The eldest son, William, was made a Knight of the Garter, an
honour commemorated on his fine altar-tomb in the Parr Chapel of
Kendal parish church. And his grandson, another Sir Thomas, was not
only controller to Henry VIII but father of that monarch's last wife ó
Katherine. {S20}
Thomas was sub-vice Comes for Westmorland from 1428 to 1437,
and was sheriff from 1461 to 1475. He was assaulted in going to
parliament in 1446, the case being noticed in parliament and took an
active part in the wars of the Roses on the Yorkist side; he was
attainted in 1459, with the other leading Yorkists (ib. v. 348-50).
Doubtless his attainder was reversed in 1461, as he died (in 1464-S5,
S6,S23)(24 NOV 1464-S8). CHILDREN: William PARRE [F13], John
PARRE [F14], Thomas PARRE [F15], Margaret PARRE [F16], Ann
PARRE [F17], Elizabeth PARRE [F18], Agnes PARRE [F19], Maud
PARRE [F20], Eleanor PARRE [F21]. {S5, S6,S8,S19,S20,S23}.

Sir Thomas PARR. (PARYE-S18). Master of the Wards. KG.
Comptroller to Henry VIII. Born about 1483, of Kendal and of Greens
Norton, Northamptonshire; son of Sir William PARRE [F13] and
Elizabeth FITZHUGH. He married Maud (Matilda) GREENE, daughter
of Sir Thomas GREEN and Joan Fogge, of Greeneís Norton and
Boughton, Northamptonshire, in 1508. Maud was born in 1493 and
died 1 SEP 1531-1532. Thomas was knighted. Sheriff of
Northamptonshire in 1509. Sheriff of Lincoln in 1510. He was rich,
owing to his succeeding, in 1512, to half the estates of his cousin,
Lord Fitz-Hugh, and also to his marriage with Maud, daughter and
coheiress of Sir Thomas Green of Boughton and Greens Norton in
Northamptonshire. He died on (November 1517-S15)(12 November
1518-S6)(12 Nov 1547-S5), and was buried in Blackfriars Church,
London. Upon his death, he was seised of various lands in Parr and
Sutton, and a toft in Wigan, one parcel being held of Thomas, earl of
Derby, by knight's service and the yearly rent of 15d., being thus
identified with the quarter of a moiety held by William [F10] in 1370;
another part was held of the Prior of St. John of Jerusalem by the rent
of 12d.; and a third, of Bryan Parr, by the rent of 17d. (Duchy of Lanc.
Inq. p.m. v, n. 8.). His widow died on 1 September 1532, and was
buried beside him. CHILDREN: William PARR [F30], Agnes PARR
[F31], Anne PARR [F32], Catherine PARR [F33], Thomas PARR [F34].
{S5,S6,S8, S15,S19,S23}.

The Morris Clan:
http://www.themorrisclan.com/GENEALOGY/FAMILY%20STUDIES/PARR%
20FAMILY%20STUDY.html
Wednesday, December 09, 2009