WASKHAM, Robert

The MP was probably a kinsman of another Robert Waskham of Portsmouth, a smith whose smithy, lodge, stable and shop were situated within the grounds of the royal castle there. He failed to pay into the Exchequer the sum of 7s. 8d. due from him (presumably as rent) in the period from Michaelmas 1429 to 18 June 1430, but 46 years elapsed before Anne Waskham and William Gourney, as administrators of the smith’s goods, settled the long overdue account. When the smith had died is not recorded, nor Anne’s relationship to him.2 E364/109, m. B.

The MP himself had an altogether different career, as a clerk in Chancery. In May 1443 he was named as an attorney to deliver seisin of land in West Meon, Hampshire, to Thomas Kirkby, one of the masters in Chancery and at that time clerk of the Parliaments, which suggests that Waskham’s employment among Kirkby’s subordinates had already begun. The connexion between them may well have been formed in the locality, for Kirkby was the warden of God’s House in Portsmouth.3 CCR, 1441-7, p. 138; 1447-54, p. 339. Although Waskham’s post in Chancery was poorly paid, with wages set at just two marks a year, he probably received fees from private clients, and there was always the possibility of attracting the patronage of the King. On 25 May 1448, not long after Kirkby’s promotion as keeper of the rolls, Waskham obtained a ‘bill’ under Henry VI’s sign manual, instructing the Exchequer to commit to him keeping of the ‘new work’ at Portsmouth (started by Henry V), to hold with all the buildings belonging to it for the next 20 years, in return for an annual payment of 10s.4 C81/1449/44; CFR, xviii. 93. A number of transactions enrolled in the close rolls over the next few years clearly related to Waskham’s position in Chancery, for he was the recipient of ‘gifts’ of goods and chattels from a variety of people, including a vintner, a brewer and a linendraper from London, Stephen Preston† of Dorset, and a Southampton merchant.5 CCR, 1447-54, pp. 124, 279, 338, 437, 499. In this respect he was typical of the Chancery clerks of the period, who became involved in mercantile deals which they were responsible for recording on the rolls. Access to the dorse of the rolls was a customary privilege of the clerks, and came to be used to provide a convenient register of trading agreements, offering the further attraction of security, since agreements so entered could be enforced by the court of Chancery. Of course, there were financial incentives for the clerks themselves to encourage their participation. Waskham remained attached to Kirkby. On 21 July 1451 he collected at the Exchequer assignments for money due to his superior for his salary and those of two chaplains and a clerk serving him – the last probably being Waskham himself. He was at the Tower of London in April 1454 to acknowledge a transaction in Kirkby’s interest.6 E403/785, m. 9 (printed in Issues of the Exchequer ed. Devon, 471); CCR, 1447-54, p. 497.

During his years at the Chancery, Waskham was sometimes styled ‘gentleman’, which indicates that he never entered religious orders. He probably usually lived in the capital, and was called ‘of London’ in February 1453 when the widow of John Willesden granted him and others in trust all the timber from her woodland in Middlesex, along with her crops and utensils, as security for payment of the debt which her late husband owed to John Gloucester II* (the clerk of the pipe at the Exchequer).7 CCR, 1447-54, p. 438. Waskham’s Parliaments all assembled while he was a Chancery official, and he probably owed his election to his availability at Westminster, his familiarity with the departments of government, and perhaps also to a readiness to accept a reduced payment for his expenses. In 1453-4 he and his parliamentary colleague, Henry Uvedale*, were paid 3s. 4d. towards their expenses by the bailiff of the manor of Stubbington, but how much they received from the burgesses of Portsmouth themselves is not recorded.8 Winchester Coll. muns. 15392. Revenues from the manor, which was contiguous with the liberty of Portsmouth, were regularly put towards the costs of parlty. representation, e.g. in 1465: ibid. 15395. Four years later, in June 1457, Waskham was associated with two other Members of the 1453 Parliament – (Sir) Roger Lewknor*, who had represented Sussex, and his half-brother Richard Lewknor*, the MP for Bramber – and with Richard West, Lord de la Warre (who had sat in the Upper House), in receiving together a gift of the goods and chattels of one Richard Odshete.9 CCR, 1461-7, p. 152. Waskham was appointed a commissioner of array in four Hampshire hundreds in the following September. This was his first known appointment of local administration.

Waskham would seem to have retained links with the Chancery as late as the chancellorship of George Neville, bishop of Exeter, which began in July 1460. Together with another Chancery clerk, Thomas Bayen*, he provided pledges in support of petitions sent to Neville by William Shillingford, the son and heir of the late John Shillingford* of Exeter.10 C1/27/141; 29/254. In the 1460s, however, he took up a different appointment, bringing him nearer to his home town, as clerk of the peace in Hampshire.