Family and Education

Offices Held

Biography

Although he sat only once in the House of Commons, Parson attended all the parliamentary elections for Huntingdon held between 1421 and 1429 inclusive. Not much is known about him otherwise, as he only rarely witnessed local deeds and seems to have acted as a trustee on just one occasion when, in 1419, he obtained a title to property in the parish of St. Andrew. His life was not, however, without incident. Indeed, his involvement in an armed attack launched by the burgesses upon one of the closes belonging to Anne Brinkley, prioress of Hinchingbrooke, in 1425, led to his appearance before a royal commission of oyer and terminer set up to investigate the affray. He and his colleagues, among whom were John Dunhead II* and John Foxton*, had been driven to take such extreme action because of the prioress’s refusal to allow rights of way and communal grazing to the townspeople. As a husbandman, Parson must have suffered particularly from these restrictions, and although a settlement was quickly reached, in late July, on the recommendation of the commissioners, within a matter of days George Gidding* and a group of dissatisfied burgesses had taken the law into their own hands by assaulting the prioress herself. So far as we know Parson was not a party to this second breach of the peace, indeed no more is heard of him from then onwards.1

Ref Volumes: 1386-1421

Author: E.M. Wade

Notes

Variant: Person.

• 1. Add. Chs. 33523, 33527, 33616-17; CPR, 1422-9, p. 303.