LASCELLES, Christopher (by 1511-69/72), of Sowerby and Breckenbrough, Yorks.

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

Constituency

Dates

Nov. 1554
1555
1558
1563

Family and Education

b. by 1511, 1st s. of Sir Roger Lascelles of Sowerby and Breckenbrough by Margaret, da. of Sir John Norton of Norton Conyers. educ. L. Inn, adm. 1 Nov. 1524. m. Anne, da. and h. of Richard Sigiswick of Walburn, 4s. 4da. suc. fa. 30 June 1551.2

Offices Held

Escheator, Yorks. 1533-4.

Biography

The Lascelles family held Breckenbrough, their chief seat in the 16th century, from its first mention in 1228 until 1624. His domicile there, and at Sowerby, both on the outskirts of Thirsk, doubtless accounts for Christopher Lascelles’s recurrent election for the borough, especially perhaps under Mary when the crown showed its preference for resident Members. By that time he had also added to his inheritance. As early as 1536 he was in a position to offer a fine of £600 for Easby abbey, although he did not secure it. He did acquire other properties in Northumberland and Yorkshire, and in 1543 was engaged in a dispute with Sir John Cavendish over the rent corn of two Lincolnshire parsonages. Involved with the Scrope of Masham inheritance in Yorkshire, he joined with James Strangways in 1553 to grant part of the manor of Spennithorne to Henry Scrope: Spennithorne had been the property of Sir Ralph Fitzrandolph, father-in-law of Lascelles’s cousin Marmaduke Wyvill. The moiety of the manor of Swainby which he acquired partly from his brother-in-law Ralph Dransfield he sold in 1555 to Christopher Wray, but two years later Robert Roos conveyed to him the manor of Seamer.3

In September 1536 Lascelles charged Sir Richard Rich, chancellor of augmentations, with profiteering: his principal grievance was his failure to obtain Easby and he was supported by two of Rich’s senior colleagues, Robert Southwell and Thomas Pope. At this time a Henrician Catholic—in 1535 he signed the indictment of Anthony Heron of Coniscliffe, Durham, for denying the royal supremacy’Lascelles was to accept Mary’s renunciation of it.4

Lascelles was dead by 30 Sept. 1572.5

Ref Volumes: 1509-1558

Author: Alan Davidson

Notes

  • 1. Huntington Lib. Hastings mss Parl. pprs.
  • 2. Date of birth estimated from age at fa.’s i.p.m., C142/93/83. Glover’s Vis. Yorks. ed. Foster, 61.
  • 3. VCH Yorks. (N. Riding), i. 177, 259, 381; ii. 291; LP Hen. VIII, xi, xiii, xvi, xviii, xxi.
  • 4. LP Hen. VIII, ix, xi, xii; M. E. Coyle, ‘Sir Richard Rich’ (Harvard Univ. Ph.D. thesis, 1967), 80-81; Cath. Rec. Soc. monograph ser. ii. 32, 333.
  • 5. Yorks. Arch. Jnl. ii. 93-94.