Family and Education

b. c.1561, s. of John More of Mottisfont, Hants.1 educ. Furnival’s Inn; L. Inn 1581, called 1589.2 m. Dousabell (d.1602), da. of James Paget of Grove Place, Nursling, Hants, wid. of William Paulet of Paultons, Eling, Hants, 4s. (3 d.v.p.) 2da.3 d. 15 Aug. 1620.4

Offices Held

Under-steward, Portsmouth, Hants 1591-1600;5 freeman and alderman, Winchester, Hants 1594-d.;6 j.p. Hants 1598-d.;7 steward, Andover, Hants by 1599-d.,8 Lymington, Hants 1606-d.,9 Basingstoke, Hants 1610-d.;10 commr. gaol delivery, Winchester by 1602-d., Southampton, Hants 1605-d., Poole, Dorset 1611;11 commr. sewers, Hants and Wilts. 1605,12 subsidy, Hants and Winchester 1608,13 aid, Hants 1609, 1612;14 oyer and terminer, Poole 1611,15 Western circ. 1617-d.,16 piracy, Hants, 1611, 1614, 1618.17

Recorder, Winchester 1596-1618,18 Portsmouth 1600-15,19 Romsey, Hants 1608-d.;20 bencher, L. Inn 1603, reader 1608;21 sjt.-at-law 1614-d.;22 counsel to dean and chapter, Winchester by 1618-d.23

Biography

More’s father prospered sufficiently to give his son a legal education and take out a grant of arms for himself in 1590.24 More himself purchased North Baddesley in 1603 from Sir Thomas Fleming I*, his predecessor as recorder of Winchester, and was returned for the city in the following year.25 The records of the first Stuart Parliament do not always distinguish him from his fellow-lawyer Francis Moore, though the latter was by far the more active in the Commons. More’s first two committees were for bills to regulate release from imprisonment (31 Mar. 1604) and to restore the 3rd earl of Southampton (2 April).26 He was named on 20 Apr. to attend a conference with the Lords on the proposed Union with Scotland.27 His other committees in the first session included bills to relieve creditors frustrated by parliamentary privilege (21 Apr.), to regulate legal costs (9 May), and to prohibit usury (9 May).28

As recorder, More welcomed James to Winchester in 1605, terming him ‘our Levi’ who would confer ‘celestial blessings and all earthly benefits’ now that ‘scant, palefaced penury is banished’. He reminded the king of the decayed state of Winchester, whose liberties he asked him to preserve and restore, and presented him with a cup.29 His only committee in the second session was for a bill to enforce the sale of the lands of a Hampshire squire, William Waller of Stoke Charity (27 Feb. 1606).30 The first mention of him in the third session is on 3 Mar. 1607, when he was reported to have departed without leave to ride the circuit.31 He had probably returned three days later, without any recorded apology, when he was named to the committee for the revived Waller land bill.32 In the fourth session he was ordered to consider a bill to regulate the use of commons (19 Feb. 1610), and was named as ‘Sir John Moore’ to the committee for a private bill of one Mr Davison (27 March).33 There is no trace of More in the records of the brief fifth session.

More does not seem to have stood again, no doubt preferring to concentrate on his legal practice, which earned him a serjeantcy in 1614.34 In religion he probably shared the moderate puritanism of Thomas Gataker, chaplain of his inn, who dedicated a work to him.35 He was ill when he drew up his will on 5 Aug. 1620, and died on circuit ten days later. He was buried at North Baddesley.36 He left his elder daughter, married to Samuel Dunch*, only a token legacy of plate, but the younger received £100 p.a. and a portion of £1,600.37 William Noye* was among the trustees appointed during the minority of More’s only surviving son, but when the latter died of smallpox a year later More’s daughters partitioned the estate, commemorating their father and brother with a fine monument.38

Ref Volumes: 1604-1629

Authors: Virginia C.D. Moseley / Rosemary Sgroi

Notes

• 1. Eg. 2364, f. 129v.
• 2. LI Admiss.; LI Black Bks. ii. 12.
• 3. PROB 11/87, f. 28v, Hants Field Club Procs. v. 338; VCH Hants, iii. 436.
• 4. C142/382/30.
• 5. Portsmouth Recs. ed. R. East, 139.
• 6. Hants RO, W/B1/1, f. 282.
• 7. C231/1, f. 52; C66/1988.
• 8. Andover Charters ed. E. Parsons, 19.
• 9. E. King, Old Times Revisited, 41.
• 10. F.J. Baigent and J.E. Millard, Basingstoke, 489.
• 11. C181/1, ff. 36, 123v; 181/2, ff. 144, 355v, 356v.
• 12. C181/1, f. 103v.
• 13. SP14/31/1.
• 14. SP14/43/107; Harl. 354, f. 68.
• 15. C181/2, f. 139v.
• 16. Ibid. ff. 286v, 335v, 181/3, f. 6.
• 17. C181/2, ff. 138v, 208v, 309.
• 18. Hants RO, W/B1/1, f. 286v; W/B1/3, f. 111v, W/B1/4, f. 6v.
• 19. East, 420.
• 20. Add. 26774, f. 123.
• 21. LI Black Bks. ii. 79, 102, 108.
• 22. HMC Buccleuch, iii. 173.
• 23. Diary of John Young ed. F.R. Goodman, 61.
• 24. Harl. 1422, f. 13; Symonds Diary ed. C.E. Long (Cam. Soc. lxxiv), 128.
• 25. VCH Hants, iii. 464; Baigent and Millard, 489.
• 26. CJ, i. 160b, 162a.
• 27. Ibid. 180a.
• 28. Ibid. 181a, 204a, b.
• 29. Harl. 852, f. 5.
• 30. CJ, i. 275a.
• 31. Ibid. 346b.
• 32. Ibid. 349a.
• 33. Ibid. 396b, 415a.
• 34. Order of Sjts.-at-Law ed. J.H. Baker (Selden Soc. suppl. ser. v), 527.
• 35. T. Gataker, Of the Nature and Use of Lots (1619), STC 11670.
• 36. C142/382/30; J. Marsh, Mems. Hursley and North Baddesley, 15, 26-27.
• 37. PROB 11/136, f. 216v.
• 38. C142/389/121; Marsh, 26-7.