John Paston

1421 - 1466  (44 years)

• Name	John Paston  [1]
  Birth	10 Oct 1421  [2, 3, 4]
  Gender	Male
  Death	21 May 1466	London, England   [3, 4, 5]
  Alternate death	22 May 1466	London, England   [3, 5]
  Burial	Bromholm Priory, Norfolk, England   [3, 5]
  Siblings	1 sibling
  + 1. John Paston ,   b. 10 Oct 1421   d. 21 May 1466, London, England  (Age 44 years) ▻ Margaret Mautby ,  m. Between Apr 1440 and Nov 1440   2. William Paston ,   b. 1436   d. 1496, London, England  (Age 60 years) ▻ Anne Beaufort ,  m. Bef 1470
  Person ID	I21130	Ancestry of PNH, TNH, and others
  Last Modified	30 Sep 2020

  
  

  Father	William Paston,   b. 1378, Paston, Norfolk, England d. 13 Aug 1444, London, England (Age 66 years)
  Mother	Agnes Berry,   b. Aft 1399   d. Aug 1479 (Age < 78 years)
  Marriage	1420  [3, 5]
  Family ID	F13045	Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

  
  

  Family	Margaret Mautby,   b. 1422   d. 4 Nov 1484 (Age 62 years)
  Marriage	Between Apr 1440 and Nov 1440  [3]
  Children	1. Anne Paston   d. Between 1494 and 1495 + 2. John Paston,   b. 1444   d. 28 Aug 1504 (Age 60 years)
  Family ID	F13044	Group Sheet  |  Family Chart
  Last Modified	5 Sep 2018

  
  

• Notes

  From Wikipedia: John Paston was the son of William Paston, Justice of the Common Pleas, and Agnes Berry. After he succeeded his father in 1444, his life was marked by conflict occasioned by a power struggle in East Anglia between William de la Pole, 1st Duke of Suffolk, and John Mowbray, 3rd Duke of Norfolk, and by his involvement in the affairs of his wife's kinsman, Sir John Fastolf. A number of his letters survive among the Paston Letters, a rich source of historical information for the lives of the English gentry of the period. [...] In 1455 he was elected as one of the Knights of the Shire for Norfolk, but did not take a seat in Parliament as the Duke of Norfolk 'insisted on his own nominees being returned'. In 1457 he paid a fine for declining a knighthood. In 1458 Paston, his brother William and others were accused of 'riotous behaviour', and the Duke of Norfolk headed a commission charged with arresting them. From 1460–6 he was Justice of the Peace for Norfolk, and was elected as a member of parliament in 1460 and again in 1461. In 1461, as a result of conflict with Sir John Howard, then Sheriff of Norfolk, he was briefly imprisoned in the Fleet. In 1464, in connection with his involvement in the estate of the late Sir John Fastolf, he was accused of trespass, outlawed, and imprisoned in the Fleet.[12][1] In 1465 he was imprisoned in the Fleet for the third time, again in connection with Fastolf's estate. Much of Paston's time from the mid-1450s had in fact been taken up by his position as adviser to his wife's kinsman, 'the ageing, wealthy, and childless Sir John Fastolf'. In 1456 he was appointed one of the feoffees of Fastolf's lands. In June 1459 Fastolf made a will which provided that his ten executors found a college in Caister. However, after Fastolf died on 5 November 1459, Paston claimed that on 3 November Fastolf had made a nuncupative will giving Paston exclusive authority over the foundation of the college, and providing that, after payment of 4000 marks, Paston was to have all Fastolf's lands in Norfolk and Suffolk. Relying on the nuncupative will, Paston took possession of the Fastolf estates, and resided at times at Fastolf's manors of Caister and Hellesdon. Paston's claim to the Fastolf lands was challenged by the Duke of Norfolk, who seized Caister in 1461; by Sir William Yelverton and Gilbert Debenham, who claimed the manors of Cotton in Suffolk and Caldecott Hall near Fritton; by John de la Pole, 2nd Duke of Suffolk, who claimed two Norfolk manors, Hellesdon and Drayton, in 1465; and by Lord Scales, who in January 1466 forced officials of the city of Norwich to seize Paston's property there in the king's name, alleging that Paston was a 'serf of the crown'. In 1464 a legal challenge to Paston's executorship under the nuncupative will was mounted by William Yelverton, one of the ten executors who had been appointed under Sir John Fastolf's written will; however the case was still undecided at the time of Paston's death. During the latter years of his life, Paston fell out with his eldest son and heir, John. He died at London on 21 or 22 May 1466, and was buried at Bromholm Priory, Norfolk.

  
  

• Sources

  [S4342] Norfolk Families by Walter Rye. Two volumes, 1911-13. [S2164] The Paston Letters: A Selection in Modern Spelling ed. Norman Davis. 2nd edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1983., year only. [S76] The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004-ongoing. [S2166] Brad Verity, Edward I Descents for Erasmus Paston. 11 Nov 2015., year only. [S2164] The Paston Letters: A Selection in Modern Spelling ed. Norman Davis. 2nd edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1983.