WEST, John, of Winchester, Hants.

In 1389 West, who was involved in the cloth finishing industry of Winchester, acquired an interest in a garden in Tanner Street in association with some other clothiers. No doubt it contained racks on which they dried their product. In 1394-5 he was assessed for alnage on the sale of 16 lengths of fabric. At the elections to the Parliaments of 1391, 1395 and 1397 (Jan.) he offered sureties for the attendance of Mark le Faire, John Blake I and Nicholas Tanner, respectively, all of whom were occupied in the same trade.E101/344/10; D.J. Keene, Surv. Winchester (Winchester Studies 2), ii. no. 427; Stowe 846, f. 90v; C219/9/8, 11, 12. By the time of his own return to Parliament West had obtained from the widow of a local skinner several properties on the south side of High Street, including a tenement situated on the lane linking Gold Street and Calpe Street which in 1410 he and his wife let on a 12-year lease for an annual rent of 13s.4d. He died before 1417 when a house, cellar and stall in High Street were said to be ‘sometime John West’s’.Stowe 846, ff. 90, 90v, 148v; Winchester RO, D3.