John Ipstones

John Ipstones (died 1394) was an English soldier, politician and landowner. He fought in the Hundred Years War and in John of Gaunt's expedition to win the Crown of Castile. He represented Staffordshire twice in the House of Commons of England, including the Merciless Parliament of 1388, in which he supported the measures of the Lords Appellant. A member of a notoriously quarrelsome and violent landed gentry family, he pursued numerous property and personal disputes until one resulted in his murder.

Background and early life

John Ipstones was the eldest son of

• Sir John Ipstones of Blymhill, Staffordshire, son of John de Ipstones or Ipstanes.
• Elizabeth Beck, of Hopton, Shropshire, and Tean, Staffordshire.

The Ipstones family were prominent in the affairs of Staffordshire, but had a long history of feuding with their neighbours. John de Ipstones, the MP's grandfather, had a particularly violent reputation and had initiated many of the quarrels which still raged in the last decades of the 14th century. In 1316 he and the abbot of Lilleshall Abbey were in trouble for mobilising a large armed force to prevent the arrest of Vivian de Staundon, known to have stolen a large sum of money belonging to the king, Edward II. In 1324 he was involved in a furious dispute with the Brumpton or Brompton family. This initially centred on the church of St Editha at Church Eaton, where he expelled the incumbent, Thomas de Brumpton, by force and installed his own brother, William, garrisoning the church itself and attacking the manor house, which was the home of Mary de Brumpton. In 1325 Ipstones marched to Stafford with a large armed force during a county muster and a pitched battle between the Ipstones and Brumpton forces took place in the town, "to the great terror of the King's subjects, and against the King's peace.”

The next John Ipstones seems to have maintained the feud with the Brumptons, perhaps at a lower level of violence. However, he initiated a new feud which was to continue in his son's lifetime by killing Adam Peshale of Horsley, near Eccleshall, apparently in an attempt to arrest him.

Landowner

The younger John Ipstones inherited estates at Blymhill, Ipstones and Cresswell, Staffordshire from his father on the latter's death, about 1364. He also had land in Corvedale, Shropshire, which he may have inherited through his mother.

Around 1374 Ipstones married Elizabeth Corbet, who was probably 16 or 17 years of age at the time. She was the daughter of Thomas Corbet, who was heir to the very large estates of Sir Robert Corbet of Moreton Corbet and Wattlesborough. However, Thomas had died long before his parents. Around 1363 they had initiated a series of property transactions, using the device of fine of lands, with the aim of keeping most of the estates in tail, to exclude Elizabeth and other female heirs, to the advantage principally of their surviving sons, Sir Fulk and Sir Roger. The devices they used were poorly drafted and self-contradictory, and were to lead to years of litigation and decades of bitterness among the Corbet family.

Ipstones and Elizabeth were the first to challenge this settlement, almost immediately after their marriage, and a year before Sir Robert died. The target of their action in the Court of Common Pleas was the Leicestershire manor of Braunstone. The manor was an example of the subinfeudation monarchs were desperate to end: the Corbets held it under the Harcourts, who held it of the Burdet family, who held it of the Ferrers family of Groby, the tenants-in-chief. Elizabeth's aunt, Margaret Corbet, had married the Warwickshire landowner Sir Thomas Erdington of Erdington and they had taken over Braunstone as early as 1364. The suit went against a second strand in the Corbets' dynastic policy: that of contracting double marriage alliances wherever possible. Sir Robert had married two of his daughters into the Harleys of Willey, Shropshire and a son and daughter into the Erdingtons. Sir Roger, who was the third and final heir, was deeply invested in his sister's marriage, not least because he was married to his own sister-in-law, Margaret Erdington. Hence the case was protracted, strongly contested by the Corbets and Erdingtons. Ultimately the manor was to pass to the son of Margaret and Thomas, the younger Thomas Erdington, and the Erdingtons were to remain tenants there until the last of their line died, sine prole, in 1467. However, Ipstones does seem to have secured some property at Shawbury, including the township of Bessford, and at Bausley, Montgomeryshire, through his marriage.

Ipstones was to make strenuous efforts to gain further land at Tean and Hopton, which he claimed by right of his mother. Initially he was successful, simply seizing the manors. However, this dispute, was to be even more bitter and protracted.

Political and military career

Ipstones, like his forebears, was apt to resort to violence in pursuit of his ends, and his career coincided with a period of considerable, though often exaggerated, disorder in Staffordshire. His neighbour, Thomas Brumpton, sued him for debt and assault in the early 1370s, while he brought an action for trespass against a local man at about the same time. Evidently the times were turbulent but landowners were still mainly using the law to pursue disputes. However, Ipstones and his peers seem to have become increasingly inured to violence during the reign of Richard II, when the balance of power constantly shifted.

War service

In 1374, shortly after his marriage, Ipstones enlisted in the retinue of Hugh de Stafford, 2nd Earl of Stafford and accompanied him on an expedition to France. This gave him an alliance with the most powerful magnate in the county, as well as royal protection for the duration of his military service. By 1376 he had been knighted. However, by 1381, he had allegedly committed an act of robbery with violence on one of Stafford's estates and was sued by the earl.

Ipstones now enlisted instead with John of Gaunt, the most important supporter of the young king, and served with him in his attempt to win the Crown of Castile, which he claimed by right of his wife, Constance of Castile. The expedition set off in July 1386, landing at A Coruña, and fought two inconclusive and costly campaigns against John I of Castile, Constance's cousin, before Gaunt came to terms with his enemy. Ipstones must have served at least competently, as Gaunt formally retained him in 1387 for £10 per annum. Gaunt transferred his attention to Gascony, where he remained until 1389 and Ipstones must have parted company with him by the autumn of 1387, as he was back in England being pardoned by the Crown for the murder of a Richard Thornbury in November. Gaunt was thus away from England during the momentous political events of 1386–88, while Ipstones was able to play a part.

The Merciless Parliament

In November 1386 the Lords Appellant had seized power, with the aim of removing the king's favourites and forestalling peace overtures to France. It is possible that Gaunt's influence helped Ipstones avoid punishment for murder but he was soon taking up a position clearly opposed to both Gaunt and the king. He picked a quarrel with Sir Walter Blount, a veteran of Gaunt's campaigns and his main representative in the region. Blount became a Justice of the Peace in Derbyshire in December 1387 and soon took a bond for good behaviour from one of Ipstones' tenants. Ipstones and a large group of his armed men attacked Sir Walter's seat at Barton Blount and he was forced to surrender the bond, a humiliation for himself and his patron.

Ipstones was returned as a knight of the shire to the parliament, which was called after the Lords Appellant defeated the king's supporters at the Battle of Radcot Bridge in December 1387 and assembled in February 1388. Ipstones seems to have been a willing participant in the purge carried out by this so-called Merciless Parliament of the king's closest associates, many of whom were executed. One of those attainted and sentenced to death was Robert de Vere, Duke of Ireland, who had commanded the royalist forces at Radcot Bridge, but made good his escape abroad immediately after the battle. Ipstones was made a Crown Commissioner for the confiscation of de Vere's lands.

The balance of power began to swing back towards the king after Gaunt's return. Ipstones was not to sit in parliament again until 1394. This time his political career and his property disputes were to intersect, with fatal consequences.

Dispute with the Swynnertons

Ipstones had occupied Tean and Hopton in 1381, claiming them in his mother's right, and simply expelling the occupant, Maud Swynnerton, a granddaughter of Sir Nicholas Beck, in 1381. Maud was backed by her father-in-law, Sir Richard Peshale, who had a grudge against the Ipstones family, dating back to the death of his father Adam at the hands of the elder John Ipstones in 1346. There was a further dimension of conflict within the Corbet family, as Sir Richard's brother and henchman Hamon Peshale was married to Alicia Harley, a first cousin of Elizabeth Corbet, and part of the group within the family who had defended the entail which had so disadvantaged Ipstones earlier. Sir Richard arraigned an Assize of novel disseisin at Stafford. This was authorised by the king at Reading on 12 August and included Robert Tresilian, a justice who was to be lynched during the rule of the Lords Appellant, and David Hanmer, the father-in-law of Owain Glyndŵr. Ipstones' contention that Maud was illegitimate was rejected by the court. However, Ipstones continued to hold the disputed estates and in 1386 was offered £1000 as a recognizance by Sir Richard, apparently as part of an out-of-court settlement. However, the money was not forthcoming before Sir Richard died in 1388.

Maud was now widowed and living with Joan Peshale, Sir Richard's widow at Chetwynd, Shropshire. Ipstones enlisted the help of Sir Philip Okeover of Okeover Hall, a professional soldier and veteran of Gaunt's French and Spanish campaigns Together they raised an armed force and abducted Maud from Chetwynd. In December she was forced to marry William Ipstones, Sir John's son, and induced formally to withdraw her claim to the disputed lands. Ipstones also initiated legal action to take possession of the Peshale estates until his money was paid. The Swynnertons and Peshales sought redress. Ironically, it was the widow Joan who was cautioned in May 1390 “to find security that she should do or procure no hurt or harm to John de ipstones knight.” However, a royal commission was set up to investigate and both Ipstones and Okeover were committed for trial at Shrewsbury. The jury was intimidated and they escaped unscathed. Ipstones also secured a papal mandate dispensing with the problem that the marriage of Maud his son fell within the prohibited degrees of consanguinity, as they shared a great-grandfather.

To the bishop of Lichfield. Mandate, at the petition also of king Richard, to absolve, a salutary penance being imposed, William de Hypsconys, donsel, and Matilda Swyninton, alias Pesal, damsel, from the sentence of excommunication which they have incurred by marrying in a certain private chapel, and without banns, knowing that they were related on both sides in the third degree of kindred. They are to be separated for a time, and are then to be dispensed to remarry, past and future offspring being declared legitimate. Whichever of the two survive the other shall remain perpetually unwed.

Death

Ipstones was elected MP for Staffordshire in the 21st parliament of Richard II, which assembled on 27 January 1394. While travelling unarmed through London to a session of Parliament, Ipstones was murdered by Roger Swynnerton, a relative of Maud.

As an MP attending Parliament, Ipstones was under royal protection. However, he has done little to win affection in the court and it seems that his murderer was well-connected in royalist circles. It was Baldwin Raddington, controller of the king's wardrobe who obtained a pardon for Swynnerton in June 1397. At that point Raddington was coming to the close of a 16-year term in office in which he had been immensely influential. He had been a protegé of Simon de Burley, one of Richard II's closest advisors, executed in 1397, but had survived to build a strong bodyguard around the king. As a particularly close adviser of the king, his actions probably signalled the wishes of the court.

Ipstones seems to have died without issue, William Ipstones having predeceased him. His widow, Elizabeth Corbet, and various members of his family continued to contest ownership of the disputed estates with Maud Swynnerton. Despite the papal prohibition on remarriage, Maud subsequently married one John Savage, triggering a further series of violent disputes between his family and the Peshales.

Marriage and family

Ipstones married Elizabeth Corbet, daughter of Thomas Corbet and niece of Sir Roger Corbet by Easter 1374. Only one son, William, is known and he died shortly before his father. Elizabeth Corbet survived Ipstones by some years.

See also

• Bastard feudalism
• Corbet family

References

Augusta Elizabeth Brickdale Corbet, The family of Corbet; its life and times, Volume 2, St. Catherine Press, London, no date, at Internet Archive, accessed 3 October 2013.

J.S. Roskell, L. Clark, C. Rawcliffe, History of Parliament Online, Ref Volumes: 1386–1421, History of Parliament Trust, 1994, accessed 13 January 2014.

Parliament of England
Preceded by Sir William Shareshull Aymer Lichfield	Member of Parliament for Staffordshire 1388 (February) With: Roger Longridge	Succeeded by Sir Thomas Aston John Delves
Preceded by Sir Thomas Aston William Walsall	Member of Parliament for Staffordshire 1394 With: William Walsall	Succeeded by Sir William Shareshull Aymer Lichfield