♂Sir Peter Bessiles

Peter Bessiles (24 June 1363 – 2 March 1425) was an English knight of Bessels Leigh in Berkshire who held manors in four counties, sat in Parliament for Oxfordshire and Berkshire, and served as sheriff of the two counties. A younger son, he came into the family lands only after the deaths of his brother and his brother’s young son, and while he was still a ward of the king he married Joan Catewy without the king’s licence. He was the sixteenth great-grandfather of Nancy Jane Blanchard (1929–2006) by two separate lines of descent, both through his son Thomas Bessiles (died 1458).

Early life

Peter was born on 24 June 1363, the feast of St John the Baptist, a younger son of Sir Thomas Bessiles and Katherine de Legh. His father died on 9 September 1378, and the heir was Peter’s elder brother John, then sixteen. John died under age, and his own son John died a minor on 28 November 1382, both in the king’s wardship, which left Peter heir to his nephew.

Marriages

While still a minor in the king’s custody, Peter married Joan, the daughter of Thomas Catewy, without licence. The marriage of a royal ward was the king’s to grant, and in 1384 Peter and Thomas Catewy were pardoned on a fine of 50 marks, ten to be paid at once and the rest over four years. In the same year Peter proved that he had come of age, did homage to the king, and was given his father’s lands.

Before October 1424 Sir Peter married Margery Hannys as his second wife. Margery had a son, Thomas. Thomas was born outside marriage; Sir Peter is said to have been his father, and Thomas later called himself Sir Peter’s son. Neither marriage gave Sir Peter a lawful child.

Public life

Sir Peter held Bessels Leigh, Buckland and Carswell in Berkshire with part of Longworth, the manors of Radcot and Grafton in Oxfordshire, Kings Brompton in Somerset with the patronage of Barlynch Priory^W, and Kingston in Warwickshire. When his mother died on 25 February 1406 he was her heir. He sat in Parliament as a knight of the shire^W, once for Oxfordshire and twice for Berkshire, and was sheriff of Oxfordshire and Berkshire^W in 1409.

Death

Sir Peter made his will on 23 October 1424 and named Margery his executrix. He left missals to Salisbury, to the church of St John at Radcot and to his chapel of Our Lady in the manor there, and ordered that Grafton and Radcot, and Bessels Leigh after Margery’s death, be sold and the money given in alms for his soul. Margery was to have Kingston for her life. For Thomas the will provided his schooling and a life interest in a small estate at Longworth.

He died on 2 March 1425. With no lawful child, his heir was found to be a cousin, Robert Cramford, aged fifty and more, a grandson of his mother’s aunt Alice. His wishes for the lands were not carried out. Margery married William Warbelton, and the couple took Grafton, Radcot and the reversion of Bessels Leigh for themselves. Thomas Somerton, Sir Peter’s cousin and next of kin, sued Warbelton in the Court of Chancery^W, complaining that they had held the manors for fourteen years and more. Radcot and Grafton stayed with Margery, and in 1476 she surrendered them to Thomas’s son William.

Lines of descent

Both lines run through his son Thomas, Thomas’s son William Bessiles (1444–1515), William’s daughter Elizabeth Bessiles, her daughter Anne Fettiplace, Anne’s daughter Mary Purefoy, Mary’s daughter Susanna Thorne, Susanna’s son Thomas Dudley^W (1576–1653), later governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and Thomas’s son Samuel Dudley (1608–1683). One comes down through Samuel’s son Stephen Dudley (1654–1735) to Nathaniel Dudley (1763–1844), and the other to Nathaniel’s wife, Anna Smith (1764–1825); the two lines meet again in their daughter Sarah Dudley (1795–1839).

Notes

Sources for his life

Nearly everything here comes from J. Renton Dunlop’s account of the Besils family in Miscellanea Genealogica et Heraldica, 5th series, vol. 5 (1923–25), which abstracts the records: the Oxfordshire inquisition on his nephew John in 1384 (“The said Peter was 21 on the Feast of St. John the Baptist this year”); the pardon for the Catewy marriage (Patent Rolls, 7 Richard II); the order of 1384 giving him seisin of his father’s lands (Close Rolls, 8 Richard II); his inquisitions^W of 1425–1427; an abstract of his will; and Thomas Somerton’s bill in Chancery (Early Chancery Proceedings, bundle 10, no. 304). His mother’s inquisitions of 1406 call him “Peter Besyles, knight, son and heir of Thomas and Katherine”. Dunlop gives his parliaments as 1403 for Oxfordshire and 1415 and 1423 for Berkshire, and his year as sheriff as 1409. The date of the will, the second marriage “bef. Oct. 1424” and the Longworth bequest come from the History of Parliament volumes for 1386–1421 (Roskell, Clark and Rawcliffe, 1993), which say the second marriage gave him no lawful child. The name is also written Besils, Besylles, Besyles and Bessels.

His death

The Warwickshire, Somerset, Oxfordshire and Berkshire inquisitions of 1425 give his death as 2 March “last past” and name Robert Cramford, “son of Margaret, daughter of Alice, sister of John, father of Katherine, mother of the said Peter”, as his heir. Cramford is the spelling of the Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem (vol. 22, nos. 447–450); Dunlop’s abstract, quoted here, prints Cranford. Entry no. 447 of the same calendar styles him a knight. A later Somerset inquisition, taken at Wincanton in 1427, gives the date as 3 March, 4 Henry VI (1426), and says he died without an heir.

Thomas

Dunlop’s pedigree joins Thomas to Sir Peter by the wavy line used for a child born outside marriage, and in a Chancery bill of his own (Early Chancery Proceedings, bundle 9, no. 127) Thomas called himself “son of Sir Piers Besyles, knight”. Dunlop’s abstract of the will speaks of “Thomas, son of Margery”. The History of Parliament calls him “the illegitimate son of his second wife Margery Haines (who afterwards called himself Thomas Bessels and claimed to be Sir Peter’s son and heir)”.