Nielsen Hayden genealogy

Walter Cotton

Male Abt 1375 - 1445  (~ 70 years)


Personal Information    |    Notes    |    Sources    |    All

  • Name Walter Cotton  [1, 2
    Birth Abt 1375  [3, 4
    Gender Male 
    Alternate birth Abt 1376  Cambridge, Cambridgeshire, England Find all individuals with events at this location  [5
    Death 13 May 1445  Landwade, Cambridgeshire, England Find all individuals with events at this location  [3, 4, 6
    Burial Landwade, Cambridgeshire, England Find all individuals with events at this location  [4, 5
    Person ID I35302  Ancestry of PNH, TNH, and others | Ancestor of JDM
    Last Modified 29 May 2021 

    Father John de Cotton, Mayor of Cambridge,   b. Abt 1330, of Cotton, Cambridgeshire, England Find all individuals with events at this locationd. Between 1393 and 1394 (Age ~ 63 years) 
    Mother Margaret 
    Family ID F20718  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

    Family 1 Margery Fressh   d. Aft 1397 
    Marriage Abt 1396  [4
    Family ID F20737  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart
    Last Modified 25 May 2021 

    Family 2 Joan Rede   d. Bef 1445 
    Marriage Aft 1397  [3, 7
    Children 
    +1. William Cotton,   b. Between 1410 and 1411, of Landwade, Cambridgeshire, England Find all individuals with events at this locationd. 22 May 1455, St. Albans Abbey, Hertfordshire, England Find all individuals with events at this location (Age ~ 45 years)
    Family ID F20742  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart
    Last Modified 25 May 2021 

  • Notes 
    • Prior to marrying Margery Fresshe he was an apprentice to her father, John Fresshe. He later became an alderman (1409-16) and a sheriff (1411-12) of London. A member of the mercers' guild, he bought the Landwade estate in Cambridgeshire and rebuilt the Landwade church, where he is buried.

      From The Ancestry of Thomas Bradbury (citation details below):

      In addition to London business, Walter also was involved in foreign trade to the Mediterranean countries. Some of his ships were looted by the Genoese. He and his partners appealed to the King for letters of marque, which were granted, and then set about evening the score.

      3 February 1412/13, Westminster - Grant of power to all admirals and others, as the king's lieges William Walderne, Drew Barantyn, Walter Cotton, John Reynewell, William Flete, Thomas Broun, William Brekespere, John Glamvyle, John Sutton and their fellows, merchants of London, have shown how lately they sent certain factors and attorneys with a great quantity of wools and other merchandise to the value of £24,000 in divers ships to the parts beyond the mountains to take to the port of Thelamonia by the king's licence, and to the end that the ships should have a safe and sure passage the king sent letters recommendatory to the governors, gentles and commonalty of Genoa, which letters were duly presented by certain of the factors, but they of Genoa not weighing the letters but scheming to impede the passage first detained the factors and afterwards compelled the ships to enter the port of Genoa and spoiled them of the wools and merchandise and sold these to their own use, the factors not having liberty of writing to their masters or livery of any parcel of the wools and merchandise or any money from thence for their maintenance, and although afterwards letters of the king for their delivery and free passage were presented to the said governors, gentles and commonalty nevertheless these have had no effect, and they have prayed the king for letters of marque and the king has assented to their supplication, to seize any Genoese or inhabitant of Genoa at the nomination of the king's said lieges by land and sea with their ships, vessels, goods and merchandise and keep them to the use of the king's said lieges until the latter have had full restitution of the persons and wools and merchandise to the said sum with costs to the sum of £10,000. (Calendar of Patent Rolls)

      12 May 1413, Westminster - To the Mayor of Suthampton, Walter Cotton, John Reynewelle and William Flete. Order, upon petition of Raphael Vaunell of Luca merchant, by mainprise of the petitioner and James Bernardyn of Luca merchant to deliver to him his oil and wax if they exist or otherwise the price or value thereof, the arrest thereof notwithstanding, as his petition shows that at Cyvile in Spain he bought eight tuns of oil and a bale of wax, and put them in a ship of the king of Castille now in the port of Suthampton, and that among other merchandise brought thither in that ship they goods are arrested at suit of the mayor etc. as of merchants of Genoa, though they are his property; and he and James Bernardyn have made oath in chancery that they to answer to the king for the same, are his and not of any Genoese, undertaking under a pain of £100 or for the price or value thereof, in case it may not be proved that they are his property. (Calendar of Close Rolls)

      15 February 1413/14, Westminster - To William Crowemere mayor of London. Order by mainprise of Lewis John and Thomas Walsyngham of London to deliver by indentures made with the captors to Laurence de Platea divers goods of his taken by Dru Barantyn, William Walderne, Walter Cotton, William (John) Reynwelle and William Flete by colour of granted concerning goods of the Genoese and their factors, or the a marque to them value thereof if they exist not, as the said Lewis and Thomas have mainperned in chancery under a pain of £400 that he shall deliver the same again to the captors, or the value therof, if before the feast of St. John Baptist next they may prove that the same are goods of the Genoese etc., bought and purveyed to their use. Vacated, because otherwise (Calendar of Close Rolls)

      Years went by but finally a treaty was worked out and restitution was made for this blatant act of piracy. Many of the principals were dead, but their heirs and the survivors, including Walter Cotton, signed a receipt for the final payment on a £6,000 settlement made by special envoys of the commonalty of Genoa, according to an instrument dated at Devevia 12 June 1421, and letters patent under the great seal concerning the peace concluded between the king and ambassadors of the doge and commonalty of Genoa, dated at Westminster 26 October 1421. The receipt was signed 18 July 1427.

      22 May 1414, Leicester - Grant to John Tiptot, chivaler, Thomas Felde, Philip Morgan and John Ovyngham, doctors of laws, Richard Whytyngton and Richard Merlowe, citizens of London, of full power to judge and determine all quarrels between John Martyns and Augustine Lomelyn, merchants of the kingdom of Castile, on the one part and Walter Cotton, John Reynewell, citizens of London, and William Soper of Suthampton concern- ing the capture of certain goods and merchandise of the former by the latter contrary to the form conduct and of letters patent of the king of safe the truce between the king and the king of Castile and Leon. (Calendar of Patent Rolls)

      8 February 1414/15, Westminster - Grant to the king's servant Jordan de Worsley of £14 which Robert Chicheley, late mayor, and John Reynewell and Walter Cotton, late sheriffs of London, collectors of a subsidy of 6s.8d. on the value of every £20 yearly from the lands and rents in the city and suburbs granted to the king's father in Parliament of 13 Henry IV, are bound to pay to the king. (Calendar of Patent Rolls)

  • Sources 
    1. [S5811] Robert Charles Anderson and John B. Threlfall, "Ancestor Table for Thomas Bradbury of Agementicus and Salisbury (1611-1665)." The American Genealogist 55:1, 1979.

    2. [S47] The History of Parliament. Some citations point to entries from the printed volumes not yet added to the online site.

    3. [S5815] John B. Threlfall, "Thomas Bradbury's Cotton Ancestry." The American Genealogist 57:35, 1981.

    4. [S5861] The Ancestry of Thomas Bradbury (1611-1695) and His Wife Mary (Perkins) Bradbury (1615-1700) of Salisbury, Massachusetts by John Brooks Threlfall. 2nd edition. Madison, Wisconsin, 1995.

    5. [S145] Ancestral Roots of Certain American Colonists Who Came to America Before 1700 by Frederick Lewis Weis and Walter Lee Sheppard, Jr. 8th edition, William R. Beall & Kaleen E. Beall, eds. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Company, 2004, 2006, 2008.

    6. [S145] Ancestral Roots of Certain American Colonists Who Came to America Before 1700 by Frederick Lewis Weis and Walter Lee Sheppard, Jr. 8th edition, William R. Beall & Kaleen E. Beall, eds. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Company, 2004, 2006, 2008., date only.

    7. [S5861] The Ancestry of Thomas Bradbury (1611-1695) and His Wife Mary (Perkins) Bradbury (1615-1700) of Salisbury, Massachusetts by John Brooks Threlfall. 2nd edition. Madison, Wisconsin, 1995., "by 1409".