WONSTON (WOLSTON), Alfred

More may be added to the earlier biography. The Commons 1386-1421, iv. 891.

The Wonstons hailed from the Courtenay borough of Okehampton, where members of the family still held property at the end of the fifteenth century. CP25(1)/45/78/69, 72; Devon RO, Okehampton bor. recs., 3248A-0/11/104, 132. Under Henry IV the Wonstons entered the service of the duchy of Cornwall, but it was one Geoffrey (not Alfred) Wonston who served as bailiff of the stannary of Chagford from 1399 to 1405, and who was succeeded in this office by a younger man of the same name, perhaps Alfred’s father or older brother. SC6/813/22, m. 4; 819/10, rot. 15, 18; 819/11, rot. 10d; 819/12, rot. 13; 819/13, rot. 15; 819/14, rot. 14; 819/15, rot. 11; 820/2, rot. 13d; 820/3, rot. 9d. The Commons 1386-1521, iv. 891 erroneously attributes the stannary office to the MP and another Alfred. Conversely, it was probably the MP who served as forester of eastern Dartmoor in 1404-5, and subsequently went on to hold the same position in the western part of the same forest for ten years from 1414. SC6/813/26, m. 2; 815/1, m. 5; 819/15, rot. 3; 820/8, rot. 8; 820/9, rot. 7d. Alfred was thus already a trusted Crown servant when after the untimely death of Earl Hugh the government entrusted him with the custody of the fees of the honour of Okehampton during the minority of the heir. It is not certain whether the Wonstons already possessed ties of service to the Courtenays, or whether it was Alfred’s appointment that first forged these, but Alfred’s putative son, John, later went on to serve both Earl Thomas and the dowager countess Anne as an attorney.