John Cotton, Mayor of Cambridge

Biography

COTTON, John, of Cambridge.

Sir John Cotton of Cambridge, MP,
Mayor of Cambridge Sept. 1376-8.1,
Commr. of array - Cambridge Mar., June 1380, Oct. 1386,
Justice of the Peace (J.P.) in Cambridge 6 May-Sept. 1380,
Tax Collector, Cambs. Nov. 1386.

Spouse: Margaret, 2s.

Coming from a family with a tradition of public service in the borough,[2] Cotton was elected Mayor of Cambridge in 1376.

Acting in his capacity as mayor on behalf of the town, he made a fine of £2 at the Exchequer for the restoration of its liberties, and he also purchased a vacant lot on the bank of the River Cam, which he then leased out for the town at 4d.a year.[3]

At the beginning of his second mayoral term he stood surety for John Sibille when the latter was elected as knight of the shire to the Parliament of October 1377.

After two years in office, Cotton was returned in April 1379 to the first of his own seven Parliaments. In four of these (1382, February and October 1383 and 1385) he was partnered by the current mayor, Richard Maisterman, and when not himself returned he offered surety for the attendance in Parliament of one or both of the borough’s Members at almost every election until 1394.

He occasionally appeared on royal commissions, in spite of having obtained, on 4 Sept. 1378, a royal exemption from official appointments. His own service as a Justice of the Peace in the town in 1380 did not prevent him from becoming embroiled in the factional disputes of the following year, and in February 1381, following charges of obstructing the royal justices in their sessions and inciting the people against them, he was compelled to enter into recognizances of £100 for good behavior. Although he is not specifically recorded as taking part in the riots which disrupted Cambridge that summer, his purchase of a royal pardon in February following suggests that his activities had created suspicion in official circles.[4]

Cotton may have had mixed feelings about the mob’s attack on Corpus Christi college in 1381, for his own relationship with the clerks was somewhat ambivalent.

In 1376 he had leased from the college at an annual rent of 6s.8d. a large walled garden some 35 yards long and 13 yards wide in St. Mary’s parish, sharing the lease with his wife Margaret and son Walter. Yet four years earlier, as a juror at an inquisition ad quod damnum conducted to decide whether certain tenements in the town, including one he himself held, should be alienated to the college in mortmain [that is, the status of lands/tenements held unalienably by an ecclesiastical or other corporation], he had withheld his consent to the transfer. Inquiries made in 1380 revealed that, as a result of bribery, the clerks had secured the property notwithstanding the illegality; nevertheless, in January following, the Crown confirmed the college in its possession, thereby exacerbating the contentions between town and gown [that is, the relations between the residents of the town and the students & faculty associated with a college in the town].

The eventual resumption of good relations between the clerks and Cotton may have been helped by the position of the burgess’s son Thomas as a scholar at the university in the 1380s. Certainly, in August 1389, Corpus Christi college gave Cotton a 40-year lease of a tenement adjoining one he already held near the market in St. Mary’s parish, for which he was required to proffer merely an annual quit rent of a rose.[5] Cotton’s property holdings were extensive, for he apparently owned ‘Cotton Hall’ elsewhere in Cambridge, and the local manor of Cayles which had appurtenances in neighboring villages. The full extent of his interests outside the town is unclear, although in 1375 he had been made a feoffee of land in nearby Trumpington, as well as of the manor of Hempstead in Essex, and in 1387 he acquired property in Swaffham Bulbeck, initially in conjunction with others including John Payn I*, but later, in 1389, taking possession of 32 acres on his own account.6

On occasion, Cotton acted as a patron of local churches. During the 1380s he was a member of a religious guild in the church of Holy Trinity, and in 1392 he joined John Blankpayn*, John Herries* and John Thriplow* in donating to St. Mary’s church a number of properties in Cambridge and Chesterton for the endowment of a chantry.7 The date of his death is not known, but it probably occurred before 1408 when a deed mentioned a tenement in St. Andrew’s parish as formerly belonging to him, while another of the following year referred to his earlier tenancy of a garden in Petty Cury.8

Ref Volumes: 1386-1421 Author: E.M. Wade Notes 1. Add. 5813, f. 142, 5833, f. 132; CCR, 1377-81, p. 143. 2. Cambridge Antiq. Soc. 8to ser. xliv. 14. 3. C.H. Cooper, Annals, i. 117; Add. 5813, f. 142. 4. J.M. Gray, Biogs. Mayors Cambridge, 15; Cambridge Antiq. Soc. lv. 62-63; CCR, 1377-81, p. 513, C67/29 m. 28. 5. CIMisc. iv. 114; CFR, ix. 213; CPR, 1377-81, p. 586; Add. 5813, ff. 142, 172; 5833. Thomas Cotton was dean of Thetford 1375-80 and of Erdham 1385-90; he obtained his BCL in 1390: Biog. Reg. Univ. Cambridge to 1500 ed. Emden, 163. 6. Gray, 15; CP25(1)29/89/83, 91; Essex Feet of Fines, iii. 177. 7. Cambridge Antiq. Soc. xxxix. 108; CPR, 1391-6, p. 132. 8. Cambridge Antiq. Soc. xxxi. no. 142; Add. 5813, f. 168.

Disproved pedigree

• https://archaeologydataservice.ac.uk/archiveDS/archiveDownload?t=ar...
• The origin of these imaginary accounts of the Cotton family is T. Wotton, English Baronetage, 1741, vol. ii, p. 112, which states that Sir Thomas Cotton married Alice, daughter and heir to John Hastings of Landwade and had issue John Cotton who was M.P. for Cambridge temp. Rich. II; that he married Bridget, daughter of Richard Grace of Norfolk, by whom he had two sons, 'Thomas .and Walter,. This account is repeated in J. P. Hore, Sporting Records of Cheveley, 1899., p. 17. But I think the charters printed in the appendix prove that no Cotton married a Hastings or a Grace.”
• The Cotton' family, is one of respectable antiquity, 'but not nearly so ancient as the pedigree 'makers of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries claimed. The surname Cotton was probably common in the fourteenth century. William Cole thought that it was not possible to graft the .Landwade family on to the Cottons who, Owned-Cotton Hall which.stood opposite Pembroke College. We are' only on certain ground when we. read in the' Landwade Chartulary that the manor of Landwade was sold to Thomas and Walter Cotton. It was Walter the mercer who found the money, for in the subsidy of 1428 he is stated to hold one knight's fee in Land wade. Walter was buried in Landwade chapel, as were all his descendants who were lords of the manor until the end of the eighteenth century ...”

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• Residence: Cotton Hall, England
• Residence: Landwade, England
  • Reference: FamilySearch Family Tree - SmartCopy: Dec 19 2016, 4:16:53 UTC

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THE DATA BELOW WAS INCLUDED WITH THE DATA ABOVE BUT IT IS ABOUT SOMEONE ELSE TWO HUNDRED YEARS AFTER THE SUBJECT; IT HAS NOT BEEN DELETED OUT OF RESPECT TO THE PERSON WHO ORIGINALLY POSTED IT BUT IT HAS BEEN SEGREGATED AND PLACED BELOW:

In the north chapel is an extremely grand six-poster monument to Sir John Cotton (d. 1593), with the decorative strapwork so common at that period. There are more Cottons in the south transept, most of them to subsequent 'Sir John's'. In the chancel is a memorial brass to William Cotton.

Previous generations are as given in the Heraldic Visitation of 1619, and are suspect. There is no reason to assume that his father was a knight. The previous generation was presumably intended to explain how Landwade came into the family; in fact it was purchased by John's two sons..

Parents are unknown; he was not the son of Sir Thomas Cotton & Alice Hastings, nor was he married to Bridget Grace

http://www.britainexpress.com/attractions.htm?attraction=4297

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