CHAPTER XIII. CHANCELLORS AND KEEPERS OF THE GREAT SEAL FROM THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE REIGN OF EDWARD III. TILL THE APPOINTMENT OF SIR RICHARD BOURCHIER, THE FIRST LAY LORD CHANCELLOR. CHAP. XIII. Jan. 25. 1327. John de Hotham again Chancellor. His death and character. HENRY THE parliament which continued irregularly to sit under writs issued in the name of Edward II., commenced the new reign, by the appointment of a council of regency, consisting of twelve persons-five prelates and seven temporal peers— with the Earl of Lancaster as President or Protector;-and John de Hotham, Bishop of Ely, was called from his retreat to be made Chancellor. But he only consented to hold the office till a settlement of the kingdom should take place; and he finally resigned it on the 1st of March following. In this interval acts of parliament were passed indemnifying the Queen and her partisans for all they had done, and enabling them to carry on the government in the name of the young King. As yet all went smoothly, for he was not of competent age to understand the wrongs done to his father, his mother's shame, or the usurpation on his own rights; and for some time a good understanding continued between the Earl of Lancaster and the Queen and her favourite. Hotham joyfully returned to his diocese, where he occupied himself in repairing and ornamenting the cathedral, till he was struck with the palsy. After being bed-ridden two years, he died in 1336. He is said to have been pious, and naturally shrewd, though of little knowledge acquired from books. He is gratefully remembered by his successors in the see of Ely for the princely munificence with which he enriched it. Till the 12th of May the Great Seal remained in the keeping of Henry de Clyff, Master of the Rolls; and on that XIII. HERSH, day it was delivered to HENRY DE BURGHERSH, or BUR- CHAP. WASH, as Chancellor.* He was of noble birth, and nephew of Bartholemew de Badislimer, Baron of Leeds, a man of great power and fame in the reign of Edward II. Having Chancellor. been educated at Oxford,-in 1320, while yet a young man he obtained, through his uncle's interest, the rich bishopric of Lincoln. He soon after quarrelled with the King, and the temporalities of his see were sequestered. They were restored in 1324, and he was again taken into favour at court. But he subsequently took the Queen's part against her husband, and was active in bringing about the ruin of this unhappy prince. Along with the other chief conspirators, he was promoted at the commencement of the new reign, and enjoyed power till the young King discovered their plots and avenged the memory of his father. Seal. The Great Seal of Edward II., which had likewise been New Great that of Edward I., continued to be used till the 5th day of October, 1327, when a new Great Seal, with the effigies and style of Edward III., was put into the hands of the Chancellor. † The business of the parliament being finished, he accompanied the Queen mother to Berwick. During his absence the Seal was left with the Master of the Rolls, and it was restored to him on his return to court. He went abroad with the King on the 26th of May, 1329, and returned on the 11th of June following, still confident of continuing prosperity. of Mor But the termination of his official career was at hand. Temporary Mortimer, the paramour of Isabella, had quarrelled with the ascendency Earl of Lancaster and the Princes of the blood, and had timer. made a victim of the Earl of Kent, the King's uncle. For a short time Mortimer enjoyed a sort of dictatorship. He threw the Earl of Lancaster into prison, and prosecuted many of the prelates and nobility. The immense fortunes of the Spensers and their adherents were mostly converted to his own use. He affected a state and dignity not inferior to the royal. His power became formidable to every one, Rot. Cl. 2 Ed. 3. m. 26. Rot. Cl. 1 Ed. 3. m. 11. CHAP. Edward the reins of government. and all parties forgetting past animosities conspired in a wish for his overthrow. Edward, now in his 18th year, feeling himself capable of III. seizes governing, repined at his insignificance, and resolved to free himself from the fetters of this insolent minister. By an extraordinary combination of courage and dexterity on the part of Mortimer's enemies, the minion was seized in the castle of Nottingham, in an apartment adjoining the Queen-dowager's, at a moment when he thought himself absolute and permanent master of the kingdom. Nov. 1320. ment. King's speech. Burghersh dismissed. His exile and death. JOHN DE STRAT A parliament was immediately summoned, before which he was accused of having procured the death of the late King, and of various other crimes, and upon the supposed notoriety of the facts, without trial or hearing his answer, or examining a witness, he was convicted and executed. Instead of the Chancellor, the young King himself is said to have made a speech at the opening of this parliament, complaining much of the conduct of the Queen and Mortimer, and intimating that, with the consent of his subjects, he designed to take the reins of government into his own hands. * Burghersh, being an ecclesiastic, was safe from corporal punishment, but he was deprived of the Great Seal†, and on the day before Mortimer's execution it was intrusted to JOHN DE STRATFORD‡, Bishop of Winchester, by whose advice the young King had acted in bringing about this revolution. The Ex-chancellor died in exile at Ghent about ten years after. It is said that "he was a covetous man, and easily abused his power to the oppressing of his neighbours."§ The new Chancellor was a native of Stratford in Essex, from which place he took his name according to the custom Chancellor. of the age. He and his brother Robert, of whom we shall FORD, 1 Parl. Hist. 83. † One of the charges against him was the abuse of his ecclesiastical patronage. It seems the livings in the Chancellor's gift were intended as a provision for the clerks of the different courts of justice who were then all in orders, and that Burghersh had been in the habit of selling them or giving them to favourites; whereupon an order was made by parliament, that "the Chancellor should give the livings in his gift rated at twenty marks and under, to the King's clerks in Chancery, the Exchequer and the two Benches, according to usage, and to none others.". - Rolls, 4 Ed. 3., vol. ii. 136. Rot. Cl. 4 Ed 3. m. 20. § See L. C. 26. CHAP. XIII. tion. have to speak very soon, were instances then not uncommon of persons of talents, enterprise, and perseverance, raising themselves from obscurity to the highest offices in the state. He studied at Oxford, and there acquired great reputation His origin for his proficiency in the civil and canon law. It is curious and educato observe that the law in those times, not less than in the present, was the great avenue for new men to political advancement. In the struggle for power which was ever going on, those who were distinguished for their learning and their subtlety were found useful to the crown, to the barons and to the great ecclesiastics,—were confidentially employed by them on occasions of difficulty, and were rewarded with ecclesiastical and temporal offices in which they had often more influence than the great hereditary nobles.* John de Stratford was early promoted to the deanery of Lincoln, and giving earnest of the talents which he afterwards displayed, he was promoted to the judicial office of Dean of the Arches, which has continued down to our own times, to be filled by men of the greatest learning and ability. Here he showed such knowledge of the laws, and such judgment and prudence in deciding causes, that he was made a Privy Councillor to Edward II., and was admitted to an important share in the government of the kingdom. In 1323 he was sent ambassador to the Pope, then established at Avignon, to settle various points of controversy of great delicacy, which had arisen between the Crown of England and his Holiness. It happened that at that time the Bishop of Winchester died, and the Pope at the earnest request of the Archbishop of Canterbury, without the sanction of the King, somewhat irregularly consecrated his Excellency the English minister Bishop of the vacant see. Baldock, then Lord Chancellor, having intended this preferment for himself, was mortally offended, and took violent steps to prevent the new Bishop from deriving any benefit from the elevation. A very severe proclamation was issued against Stratford in the name of the King, "so that none The two Stratfords who successively held the office of Lord Chancellor in the 14th century, may aptly be compared to the two Scotts, Lord Eldon and Lord Stowell in the 19th. Ambas Pope. sador to CHAP. should harbour or relieve him," and the fruits of the Bishopric were confiscated to the Crown. The Pope and the Archbishop, however, still befriended him, and Baldock's influence declining, he was again taken into favour and employed in His rise several important embassies. In the last year of Edward II. till aphe was made Lord Treasurer, and he adhered with great pointed Chancellor. Constancy and zeal to his unhappy master. Probably this was the reason why, when the regicides were punished and the youthful Sovereign took upon himself the government of the realm, Stratford was appointed to the office of Chancellor. Punish- Measures to restore internal tranquillity. Court of Chancery becomes Under his advice the Queen-mother was confined to her own house at Castle Rising; and to prevent her from again forming a party which might be formidable to the Sovereign, her revenue was reduced to 4000l. a-year, so that she was never able to reinstate herself in any credit or authority. Effective measures were taken to restore order and tranquillity throughout the realm. Writs under the Great Seal were directed to the Judges, enjoining them to administer justice without paying any regard to the arbitrary orders they might receive from any great men or officers of state. As robbers, thieves, murderers and criminals of all kinds, had during the late convulsions multiplied to an enormous degree, and they sometimes enjoyed high protection, a promise was exacted from the Peers in parliament that they would break off all connection with such malefactors, and the ministers of justice were urged to employ the utmost diligence in discovering, pursuing, and punishing them. There was likewise introduced about this time a great improvement in the administration of justice, by rendering the stationary. Court of Chancery stationary at Westminster. The ancient kings of England were constantly migrating,—one principal reason for which was, that the same part of the country, even with the aid of purveyance and pre-emption, could not long support the Court and all the royal retainers, and the render in kind due to the King could be best consumed on the spot. Therefore, if he kept Christmas at Westminster, he would keep Easter at Winchester, and Pentecost at Gloucester, visiting his many palaces and manors in rotation. The Aula Regis, and |