HUSSEY, Richard (by 1529-74), of Albright Hussey and Battlefield, Salop; Astley and Coventry, Warws.

Published in The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1509-1558, ed. S.T. Bindoff, 1982
Available from Boydell and Brewer

Constituency

Dates

Family and Education

b. by 1529, 1st s. of Richard Hussey of Albright Hussey and Battlefield by Elizabeth, da. of Thomas Trentham of Shrewsbury, Salop and London. m. (1) by 1550, Ellen, da. and coh. of Thomas Otley of Shrewsbury, at least 2s. 1da.; (2) Elizabeth Lawrence of Fulwell, Oxon., wid. of (Sir) John Welsborne (d.1548) of Fulwell and London and Edward Chamberlain II (d.1557) of Astley, Warws.; at least 1da. illegit. suc. fa. by 1541.1

Offices Held

Biography

Richard Hussey probably owed his election as senior Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme in Mary’s last Parliament to the mayor, Walter Devereux, 1st Viscount Hereford. Himself a considerable landowner, Hussey may have been a servant of Hereford or of William Devereux; he was certainly a close associate of the family, a member of which appears to have stood godfather to one of his sons. He could also have looked for support to his mother’s family, for Richard Trentham (who may have been knight of the shire for Shropshire in 1536) had acquired most of the lands of Trentham priory near Newcastle. Nothing is known of Hussey’s part in his only Parliament but he and his fellow-Member Thomas Egerton are among the 17 whose names, although correctly entered on the original list of Members, are missing from a copy of it.2

Hussey’s father, a man of some prominence in Shropshire and at Shrewsbury, had rebuilt the house at Albright Hussey and purchased Battlefield. To his inheritance in Montgomeryshire, Shropshire and south Staffordshire Hussey was to add both through his marriages and by purchase or exchange; at his death he also held property in Oxfordshire and Warwickshire. It was as of Albright Hussey that he sued out a general pardon on 23 Sept. 1554, but he later moved to Warwickshire, doubtless in consequence of his marriage to Elizabeth Chamberlain: in the last year of his life he was successively at Astley and Coventry. A sick man when he made his will on 20 Dec. 1573, Hussey made ample provision for his wife, his two surviving sons, his mother and his illegitimate daughter. Besides making small bequests to kinsmen and servants he left his best gelding to Sir William Devereux, whom he named an executor with Thomas Bromley II, George Bromley, his cousin Thomas Owen and his son Edward. At an inquisition at Bridgnorth on 16 Nov. 1574 it was found that Hussey had died on 4 Mar. and that his son and heir Edward was aged 23.3

Ref Volumes: 1509-1558

Author: A. D.K. Hawkyard

Notes

  • 1. Date of birth estimated from marriage. Vis. Salop (Harl. Soc. xxviii), 267 gives an unreliable pedigree; (xxix), 380-1; Wm. Salt Arch. Soc. iii(2), 140; C142/167/75; VCH Oxon. vi. 254; VCH Warws. vi. 18; Lichfield Wills (Brit. Rec. Soc. vii), 50.
  • 2. C193/32/2; Wm. Salt Lib. SMS 264.
  • 3. Wm. Salt Arch. Soc. xiv. 168-9; J. C. Wedgwood, Staffs. Parl. Hist. (Wm. Salt Arch. Soc.), i. 352 where father and son are confused; Staffs. Rec. Soc. 1938, p. 35; VCH Salop, viii. 68, 202; VCH Warws. vi. 18; VCH Staffs. v. 57; Erdeswick, Staffs. 241; T. Pape, Newcastle-under-Lyme, 43; CPR, 1548-9, pp. 395-7; 1554-5, p. 356; C142/167/75.