John Heydon

Notes:

"John Heydon, gentleman, of Baconsthorpe (about 3 miles from Gresham) was a Norwich lawyer who encouraged Lord Moleyns in his attack on Gresham manor. He was J.P. 1441-50 and 1455-60, and M.P. 1445-6, 1459, and 1460-1, but was involved in many illegal and violent incidents. He died in 1479." [Norman Davis, footnote in The Paston Letters, citation details below.]

"Heydon [formerly Baxter], John (d. 1479), lawyer, was the son of William Baxter, a free peasant or yeoman at Heydon in north-east Norfolk in the early fifteenth century. Heydon's humble origins were known to contemporaries and although throughout his career he used the surname Heydon, possibly in order to disguise his origins, legal records as late as 1450 refer to him as John Heydon of Baconsthorpe alias John Baxter of Heydon." [Oxford DNB, citation details below.]

"John Heydon's marriage was troubled. He seems to have believed that the second child born to his wife, Eleanor, was not his; in July 1444 Margaret Paston reported that Heydon 'wille nowt of here, nerre of here chyld', and that he had threatened to cut off her nose 'to makyn here to be know wat sche is' and kill the infant if they came near him. Heydon appears to have remained on good terms with his father-in-law, but his marital problems clearly continued, for in October 1450 he is said to have paled visibly when Chief Justice Markham remarked that he 'levid ungoodly in puttyng awey of his wyff and kept another'. His will, made in March 1478 and proved in 1480, makes no reference to his wife or to any child besides Henry, though it is otherwise a pious and conscientious document." [Oxford DNB, citation details below.]

Family/Spouse: Eleanor Winter. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

1. Henry Heydon was born in of Baconsthorpe, Norfolk, England; died between 20 Feb and 22 May 1504 in Baconsthorpe, Norfolk, England.