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Lord Russell and the Western Counties, 1539-1555

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 January 2014

Diane Willen
Diane Willen*
Affiliation:
Georgia State University
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Extract

The crown's tenuous control over remote regions of the realm created a persistent problem in sixteenth-century England. Feudal ties and social unrest presented greatest danger in the North, but the early Tudor monarchs worried about the West as well. For one thing, the western counties were especially vulnerable to possible foreign invasion. Secondly, the internal power structure in the West included a loyal but independent gentry and a commons far from passive. In such circumstances, royal control in the West might have disappeared entirely without solid aristocratic support. King Henry VIII depended upon his cousin, Henry Courtenay, Marquis of Exeter, to provide such support during the first three decades of his reign. Until Courtenay's execution for treason in 1538, his lands and offices ensured his position as the leading aristocrat, the role which John, Lord Russell assumed in 1539.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of British Studies , Volume 15 , Issue 1 , Autumn 1975 , pp. 26 - 45
Copyright
Copyright © North American Conference of British Studies 1975

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References

1. See Thomson, Gladys Scott, Lords Lieutenants in the Sixteenth Century. A Study in Tudor Local Administration (London, 1923), pp. 17–18Google Scholar; Youings, Joyce, “The Disposal of Monastic Property in Land in the County of Devon, with Special Reference to the Period 1538-1558,” (Ph.D. thesis, University of London, 1950), pp. 170Google Scholar, 4-7; Youings, Joyce, Devon Monastic Lands: Calendar of Particulars for Grants, 1536-1558, new series, vol. I, [Devon and Cornwall Record Society] (Torquay, 1955), xxviGoogle Scholar.

Youings points out that the only peers with sizeable holdings in Devon, the Earl of Bath and the Marquis of Dorset, had their primary interests elsewhere. Devon, Cornwall, Somerset, and Dorset together comprised the Tudor West, but Devon was the most important of these counties.

2. Thomas Cromwell was informed in a letter of March 1539 that the King intended to send Russell into the West; Letters and Papers, Foreign and Domestic of the Reign of King Henry VIII, (hereafter, L.P.), XIV(i), 529Google Scholar; also 590.

3. Youings, , “The Disposal of Monastic Property,” p. 278Google Scholar.

4. Thomson, Gladys Scott, Two Centuries of Family History: A Study in Social Development (London, 1930), p. 163Google Scholar.

5. Jordan, W. K., Edward VI, vol. I, The Young King (Cambridge, Mass., 1968), 458Google Scholar.

6. For a good account of Courtenay's background and career, see Rowse, A. L., Tudor Cornwall, (2nd ed.; London, 1969), pp. 114, 234Google Scholar. For Courtenay's property, see L.P., XIII(ii), 454, 754(2), 1001, 1002.

7. Miller, Helen, “Subsidy Assessments of the Peerage in the Sixteenth Century,” Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research, (hereafter, BIHR), XXVIII, no. 77 (May, 1955), 18, 20Google Scholar; Helen Miller, “Summaries of Thesis. CCXII. The Early Tudor Peerage, 1485-1547,” BIHR, XXIV, no. 69 (May, 1951), 90.

8. Rowse, , Tudor Cornwall, p. 237Google Scholar; Dodds, Madeleine and Dodds, Ruth, The Pilgrimage of Grace and the Exeter Conspiracy (1915 reprint; London, 1971), II, 291Google Scholar. For Cromwell, 's evidence, see L.P., XIII(ii), 954–62Google Scholar.

9. Rowse, , Tudor Cornwall, p. 80Google Scholar.

10. Ibid., p. 239; Dodds, , The Pilgrimage of Grace and the Exeter Conspiracy, II, 318Google Scholar.

11. Youings, , “The Disposal of Monastic Property,” p. 170Google Scholar; and Devon Monastic Lands, p. xxvi.

12. During the Pilgrimage of Grace, Thomas, Lord Darcy claimed that Russell was among the few who “dare and wyll speke to the King the tryth …” PRO, S.P., 1/3, fol. 142; L.P., XI, 1086.

13. PRO, E 315/418.

14. See Youings, , “The Disposal of Monastic Property,” p. 171Google Scholar.

15. Thomson, , Two Centuries of Family History, pp. 143-46, 113, 148–56Google Scholar.

Note that Princess Mary's Council, which was associated with the Marches of Wales, included a John Russell as its secretary, but this was a different man; see Pugh, Thomas, The Marcher Lordships of South Wales 1415-1536, [Board of Celtic Studies, History and Law Series, No. XX] (Cardiff, 1963), p. 296Google Scholar.

16. L.P., XIV(i), 651(18).

17. Ibid., XIV(i), 902(12).

18. Ibid., XIV(i), 1354(12). Further appointments came in September; XIV(ii), 264(17).

19. Ibid., XIV(i), 398, 658.

20. Ibid., XIV(i), 1354 (13); PRO, E 315/418. Cf. Youings, , Devon Monastic Lands, p. 5Google Scholar, note 1. The Tavistock grant was not an outright gift, for Russell did pay reserved rents.

21. Youings, Joyce, “The Council of the West,” Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, (hereafter, TRHS), Fifth Series, X (1960), 44-45, 48-49, 52, 55–56Google Scholar.

22. L.P., XIV(i), 1331. Adding to the confusion, eleven of the twelve men who served with Russell on the commission to maintain coastal defenses also sat with him on the Council of the West; cf. L.P., XIV(i), 398 and 743.

23. For the instructions of the Council of the West, see BM, Cotton MSS, Titus, B. I, fols. 176-77; L.P., XIV(i), 743. Cf. those for the North, L.P., XIII(i), 1269. The best scholarly treatment is Youings, , “The Council of the West,” pp. 41–59Google Scholar.

24. L.P., XIV(ii), 399; XV, 95, 180; addenda I(ii), 1452.

25. Skeel, Youings, “The Council of the West,” pp. 41-43, 56, 58Google Scholar. Cf. Caroline, A.J., “The Council of the West,” TRHS, Fourth Series, IV (1921), 74-75, 79–80Google Scholar.

26. The point is made by both Youings, , “The Disposal of Monastic Property,” p. 279Google Scholar, and Skeel, , “The Council of the West,” p. 75Google Scholar.

27. L.P., XIV(i), 686. See Rowse, , Tudor Cornwall, p. 242Google Scholar.

28. L.P., XIV(ii), 105.

29. Ibid., XIV(i), 398 and XVI, 580(5); XIV(ii), 435(32), 435(35); Thomson, , Two Centuries of Family History, pp. 177, 194, 199Google Scholar. Thomson notes that the younger Trevanion also witnessed Russell's will.

30. PRO, Wards 9/149, fol. 120; Wards 9/187, fol. 33.

31. Wyndham, H. A., A Family History 1410-1688 (London, 1939), pp. 61–62Google Scholar.

32. As one example, in 1539, Russell successfully intervened for young Richard Edgcumbe whose father, Sir Piers, had served on the Council of the West. Edgcumbe was noted in Cromwell's Remembrances and allowed to receive the livery of his lands; his stepmother was made a Lady of the Privy Chamber to Anne of Cleves. Rowse, , Tudor Cornwall, p. 243Google Scholar; L.P., XIV(ii), 371, 455.

I am now working on the whole question of Russell's patronage and plan to discuss it at length in the future. Several other examples exist of Russell's assistance to his western associates.

33. L.P., XX(ii), 159, 242; Thomson, , Lords Lieutenants in the Sixteenth Century, pp. 19–21Google Scholar.

34. Ibid., p. 21. Russell had probably sold some property to Horsey; L.P., XV, 282(1).

35. He would reside at what eventually became known as Bedford House, formerly the priory of the Dominican friars, although he also had a country home in the area. Youings, , “The Disposal of Monastic Property,” pp. 270–71Google Scholar.

36. For the importance of sixteenth-century Exeter, see MacCaffrey, Wallace T., Exeter, 1540-1640. The Growth of an English County Town (Cambridge, Mass., 1958), esp. pp. 8, 13-25, 162Google Scholar.

For the Courtenays and Exeter, see ibid., pp. 2-5; , Youings, “The Disposal of Monastic Property,” pp. 21–22Google Scholar; Thomson, , Two Centuries of Family History, p. 189Google Scholar.

Historians agree that relations between Exeter residents and Russell were cordial. See for example, Thomson, Gladys Scott, “Exeter and the Russell Earls of Bedford,” Devon and Cornwall Notes and Queries, XVII (Jan., 1932), 15Google Scholar; Youings, , “The Disposal of Monastic Property,” p. 280Google Scholar.

37. Bedford Office, London, Papers of the First Earl, No. 5A, fols. 31-32 and L.P., XIV(ii), 190. I would like to acknowledge my thanks to the Trustees of the Bedford Settled Estates and to the archivist Mrs. Draper for their cooperation.

38. L.P., XX(ii), 52.

39. Ibid., XVII(i), 579.

40. Acts of the Privy Council, (hereafter, APC), ed. Dasent, John, I, 174–75Google Scholar.

41. L.P., XX(i), 1104.

42. Skeel, , “The Council of the West,” pp. 73–74Google Scholar. See also Calendar of State Papers. Domestic Series, of the Reigns of Edward VI, Mary, Elizabeth, I, 10Google Scholar; PRO, S.P. 10/4, no.'s 39, 40.

43. PRO, S.P. 46/58, fol. 5; Fletcher, Anthony, Tudor Rebellions, Seminar Studies in History, ed. Richardson, Patrick (London, 1968), p. 49Google Scholar; Rose-Troup, Frances, The Western Rebellion of 1549 (London, 1913), pp. 70-84 88Google Scholar.

44. Ibid., esp. pp. 98, 104, 131, 139. Recent interpretations acknowledge the presence of socio-economic tensions as well as religious grievances in the West. See Fletcher, , Tudor Rebellions, pp. 61–63Google Scholar.

45. Pocock, Nicholas (ed.), Troubles Connected with the Prayer Book of 1549 [Camden Society, XXXVII ] (London, 1884), 8–10Google Scholar; Jordan, , Edward VI, I, 461Google Scholar.

Gladys Scott Thomson notes that the original commission has been lost and it is not clear from Russell's instructions what his exact title was. Thomson, , Lords Lieutenants in the Sixteenth Century, p. 26Google Scholar. Yet in correspondence between Russell and the Privy Council, he was subsequently addressed as the King's Lieutenant in the West. See Pocock, , Troubles Connected with the Prayer Book, pp. 40, 46 ff.Google Scholar

46. Rose-Troup, , The Western Rebellion of 1549, pp. 158–59Google Scholar. Rose-Troup estimates that Russell's original force consisted of eight hundred men, but A. L. Rowse claims it was “a few hundred at most.” Rowse, , Tudor Cornwall, p. 273Google Scholar.

47. Pocock, , Troubles Connected with the Prayer Book, pp. 22-35, 40–41Google Scholar. For troop numbers, see Rose-Troup, , The Western Rebellion, pp. 232-33, 236-37, 243Google Scholar.

48. Sympathetic views include Haywarde, John, The Life and Raigne of Edward VI (London, 1636), p. 61Google Scholar; Froude, James Anthony, History of England from the Fall of Wolsey to the Death of Elizabeth (New York, 1868–1870), V, 170Google Scholar; Thomson, , Lords Lieutenants in the Sixteenth Century, p. 29Google Scholar; Rowse, , Tudor Cornwall, p. 273Google Scholar; Fletcher, , Tudor Rebellions, p. 53Google Scholar.

Contrast Jordan, , Edward VI, I, 468, 476-77, 516Google Scholar.

The debate is discussed in my Ph.D. thesis, “The Career of John Russell, First Earl of Bedford: A Study in Tudor Politics,” (Tufts University, 1972), pp. 240–42Google Scholar.

49. Vowell, John, alias Hooker, , The Description of the Citie of Excester, ed. Harte, W. J.et. al.Google Scholar, [Publications of the Devon and Cornwall Record Society] ed. Tapley-Soper, H. (1919), II, 84–90Google Scholar; Jordan, , Edward VI, I, 472Google Scholar; Rose-Troup, , The Western Rebellion, pp. 291, 296, 299–306Google Scholar.

50. Vowell, , alias Hooker, , The Description of Excester, II, 67Google Scholar. Ironically one of the few gentlemen traitors, John Berry, Esquire, had previously purchased lands from Lord Russell. See Lyson, Daniel and Lyson, Samuel, Topographical and Historical Account of Devonshire (London, 1822), II, 103Google Scholar.

51. Russell wanted Carew included among those chosen in August to serve as his advisers, but the request was not granted: Rowse, , Tudor Cornwall, pp. 274, 280Google Scholar.

52. Historical Manuscripts Commission (hereafter, H.M.C.), Report on the Records of the City of Exeter (1916), Letter 20, p. 21Google Scholar.

53. Ibid.

54. MacCaffrey, , Exeter, 1540-1640, p. 206Google Scholar.

55. Vowell, , alias Hooker, , The Description of the Citie of Excester, II, 90Google Scholar.

56. MacCaffrey, , Exeter, 1540-1640, p. 206Google Scholar; APC, II, 318. Three merchants were involved and, in addition, the Mayor, on behalf of the city, lent Russell £1000.

57. H.M.C., City of Exeter, Letter 20, p. 21; MacCaffrey, , Exeter, 1540-1640, p. 206Google Scholar.

58. H.M.C., City of Exeter, Letter 20, p. 21.

59. BM, Royal MSS, 18, Docquet Book, c. 24, fol. 26 or H.M.C., City of Exeter, Letter 26, p. 24; MacCaffrey, , Exeter, 1540-1640, p. 27Google Scholar.

60. Bodleian Library, Rawlinson MSS, c. 722, fol. 13.

61. Royal Letters and Other Papers, Exeter City Muniments, Letter 27. Taken from the microfilm collection at Widener Library, Harvard University, Reel 65, A-3; see also H.M.C., City of Exeter, p. 22 and MacCaffrey, , Exeter 1540-1640, p. 207Google Scholar.

62. H.M.C., City of Exeter, Letter 24, p. 24.

63. Exeter City Muniments, Widener Library, Reel 65, A-3; H.M.C., City of Exeter, Letter 30, p. 27.

64. H.M.C., City of Exeter, Letter 32, p. 34.

65. Ibid., Letter 33, p. 34; MacCaffrey, , Exeter 1540-1640, p. 207Google Scholar.

66. Thomson, , “Exeter and the Russell Earls of Bedford,” p. 15Google Scholar. Russell had warned the city to be prepared to receive Philip if necessary; H.M.C., City of Exeter, Letter 34, p. 35.

67. Rose-Troup, , The Western Rebellion, p. 294Google Scholar; Pocock, , Troubles Connected with the Prayer Book, pp. 49, 52, 54-56, 63, 68–70Google Scholar. There were many grounds for friction between Russell in the West and the Privy Council in London. See my thesis, “The Career of John Russell,” pp. 275-78.

68. David Pill does claim that the Council of the West was revived, but he speaks casually and offers no evidence; Pill, , “The Diocese of Exeter under Bishop Veysey,” (M.A. thesis, University of Exeter, 1964), p. 313Google Scholar. Caroline Skeel notes that the Council was an important precedent that exerted influence in 1549, although Russell was then holding a military, not a political, office; Skeel, , “The Council of the West,” p. 80Google Scholar. This interpretation is nearer the mark. Professor S. T. Bindoff has been kind enough to show me the transcript of a letter written by Sir Gawen Carew on August 10, 1549 in which a council is mentioned; Thynne Papers, II, fol. 121. But I believe the letter refers only to the advisers helping Russell in the aftermath of the Uprising. I find no evidence that the Council of the West as such was recreated.

69. The issue is a confusing one. Originally devised as a progressive tax to control enclosure, in practice it hurt the small farmer, not the rich. See Fletcher, , Tudor Rebellions, p. 62Google Scholar. For Russell's position, see Pocock, , Troubles Connected with the Prayer Book, p. 67Google Scholar. On September 25, the Council agreed that only those with one hundred sheep should pay the tax; Pocock, p. 75. The tax was totally repealed in the next Parliament, perhaps due to Russell's influence; Rose-Troup, , The Western Rebellion, pp. 359–60Google Scholar.

70. Part of this letter is transcribed in Thomson, , Two Centuries of Family History, pp. 199–200Google Scholar. I am indebted to Mrs. Draper, archivist at the Bedford Office in London, for finding the original; Bedford Office, Papers of the First Earl, No. 5.

The letter was also signed by Sir William Herbert and Sir Hugh Paulet, two of the six advisers appointed by the Privy Council to assist Russell (see Pocock, , Troubles Connected with the Prayer Book, p. 52Google Scholar). Nevertheless, Russell was the main author. He uses the first person and refers to the commission he received from the King, presumably the Lord Lieutenancy.

71. BM, Cotton MSS, Titus, B. 1, fols. 176-77; L.P., XIV(i), 743.

72. Thomson, , Two Centuries of Family History, pp. 199–200Google Scholar.

73. Thomson, , Lords Lieutenants in the Sixteenth Century, pp. 1, 111Google Scholar. For a discussion of the military origins of the office, see pp. 11-13. The history of the Lord Lieutenancy paralleled the earlier development of the JP's. For the relationship between the two offices, see Harding, Alan, A Social History of English Law (Baltimore, 1966), pp. 68–73Google Scholar.

74 L.P., XX(ii), 159, 186, 190; Thomson, , Lords Lieutenants in the Sixteenth Century, p. 19Google Scholar.

75. See Russell's instructions of 1549 in Pocock, , Troubles Connected with the Prayer Book, p. 8Google Scholar.

76. Thomson, , Lords Lieutenants in the Sixteenth Century, p. 35Google Scholar.

77. Jordan, , Edward VI, vol. II, The Threshold of Power (Cambridge, Mass., 1970), 57–61Google Scholar; Calendar of State Papers Spanish, X, 108Google Scholar; Thomson, , Lords Lieutenants in the Sixteenth Century, pp. 30–31Google Scholar.

78. APC, III, 6 or PRO, P.C. 2/4, fol. 5. Sir William Herbert had just been named Lord President for Wales, and this fact probably explains the reference to Russell's former office.

79. APC, III, 225.

80. BM, Royal MSS, 18, Docquet Book, c. 24, fols. 89-90, 208; also APC, III, 258-59; IV, 49, 276. In 1552, Russell also served as Lord Lieutenant for Buckinghamshire where he owned considerable property.

81. Strype, John, Ecclesiastical Memorials, Relating Chiefly to Religion and the Reformation of It (Oxford, 1822), II(i), 424Google Scholar; see Calendar of the Patent Roll;, Edward VI, IV, 26Google Scholar. Just as significant perhaps was the fact that Veysey was succeeded by Coverdale who had accompanied Russell as chaplain during the Western Uprising. I am grateful to Conrad Russell, Bedford College, London, for drawing my attention to Coverdale.

82. Devon Record Office, W 1258, G 1/13, fols. 1-2. This document includes the proceedings of the case; it is a copy, probably by a seventeenth-century hand.

83. Ibid., fol. 1.

84. APC, III, 356-57.

85. H.M.C., City of Exeter, Letter 32, p. 34.

86. Lewis, George, The Stannaries: A Study of the English Tin Miner (Boston, 1908), p. 108Google Scholar.

87. Rowse, , Tudor Cornwall, p. 62Google Scholar.

88. BM, Royal MSS, 18, Docquet Book, c. 24, fol. 47; also reported in Strype, , Ecclesiastical Memorials, II(i), 485–86Google Scholar.

89. BM, Royal MSS, 18, Docquet Book, c. 24, fol. 111.

90. For miners' supplication see APC, IV, 422.

G. S. Thomson suggests that Russell was not named Lord Lieutenant during Wyatt's rebellion because Queen Mary suspected Protestant tendencies on his part. Thomson, , Lords Lieutenants in the Sixteenth Century, p. 37Google Scholar. If so, he nevertheless managed to prove his loyalty and was soon in the Queen's good graces. See my thesis, “The Career of John Russell,” pp. 318 ff.