A HISTORY OF STAFFORDSHIRE 



emergencies till the Parliament which was summoned should meet at 

 Coventry and writs were issued to the sheriffs to summon the forces. 



Henry was perpetually in want of money, and at this juncture the Bishop 

 of Lichfield, John Burghill, lent him the not very munificent sum of 

 100 marks. 162 Loans of this kind were of very little use, and the council 

 issued an order from Lichfield suspending all payments of pensions and 

 annuities from the Exchequer until the next meeting of Parliament, or until 

 further orders. 163 



After this important council was dismissed Henry still remained in the 

 north, and on i September left Lichfield for Tutbury, where he received two 

 commissioners from Robert III, king of Scotland, and took an oath to observe 

 the truce with him. 16 * 



To the Parliament which had been summoned to meet at Coventry in 

 October, 1404, Staffordshire, like most of the other counties in England, sent 

 no borough representatives ; the members for the county were Sir Robert 

 Fraunceys and Sir John Bagot. 165 



In 1407 we have a harrowing tale of the disorder wrought by war in the 

 county. Constant attacks were made on the king's estates, the houses of his 

 tenants broken into, the roads about Lichfield and Stafford were swarming 

 with marauders, women and old men were waylaid and beaten, and one of the 

 king's officers was attacked while collecting the taxes and stabbed to the 

 heart. 166 The chief leaders of these riots were said to be Hugh de Erdeswyk, 

 Thomas de Swynerton, John Myners and his two brothers Thomas and 

 William. 



In the second year of his reign the lawlessness of the county brought 

 Henry V in person to Lichfield, where he remained two months hearing 

 every kind of plaint. The number of assaults, woundings, robberies, and 

 murders committed by gentle and simple is almost incredible. Occasionally 

 the county was in a state of civil war owing to these private feuds, which 

 were aggravated by the political dissension of the day, as shown by such 

 presentments as the following : Hugh Erdeswyk of Sandon and Robert his 

 brother, with many other malefactors to the number of 1,000 men, had 

 congregated to kill Sir John Blount and other liegemen at Newcastle under 

 Lyme, and they kept the field arrayed as for war three days ; and on another 

 occasion, members of the same family with a large body of men beat and 

 wounded several of their neighbours, and would have killed them, but were 

 prevented by a great posse of the county. In another case they entered 

 the town of Newcastle and attacked the house of Sir John Boghay, and 

 intended to kill him, because he had merely done his duty and presented them 

 in the court leet, but he fortunately took refuge in a church and escaped them. 167 

 About the same time we find Edmund Ferrers of Chartley and others presented 

 for giving liveries of cloth to various squires and yeomen contrary to the 

 statute. 



The question of livery 168 was one of the most important of the later 

 Middle Ages, and the Statute Book is full of Acts on the subject. Livery 



16> Cat. of Pat. 1401-5, p. 407. I63 Wylie, Engl. under Hen. IY, i, 462. 



1M Rymer, FoeJera (orig. ed.), viii, 371. I6i Par!. Accts. and Papers, Ixii (i), 267. 



IM Rot. Par!. (Rec. Com.), Hi, 630. m Ibid. 



168 Livery (flberatlo) originally meant the allowance in food and clothes given to the servants and officers of 

 great households, but became restricted to the allowance of clothing only. 



240 



