Family and Education

b. by 1495. m. (2) Elizabeth Rocke; 1s. 1da.5

Offices Held

Bailiff, New Romney 1523, 1540-1, jurat 1531-d., chamberlain 1531-3, 1538-9; commr. subsidy 1523, 1524; bailiff to Yarmouth 1532.6

Biography

William Tadlowe, born at Canterbury, was admitted to the freedom of New Romney on 9 Dec. 1516. From 1518 to 1520 he was deputy to the bailiff of New Romney, at that time appointed by the archbishop of Canterbury; by 1523 he had become bailiff, and as such headed the list of subsidy commissioners appointed for Romney.7

Tadlowe was paid at least £36 by the chamberlains of New Romney for his attendance at four Parliaments. The port itself elected him five times, the third time on 6 Feb. 1552 as replacement for the deceased John Dering, but Sir Thomas Cheyne, lord warden of the Cinque Ports, refused to return him to the Parliament of March 1553; Tadlowe was given 20s. by Romney in compensation for being ‘put away by our lord warden from his election’. Before the next election he and Richard Bunting, who had likewise been chosen by Romney and superseded, went to see the warden to ‘require his favour concerning the election of burgesses’, and this time Tadlowe was returned and attended throughout the session. He also represented New Romney at Mary’s coronation on 1 Oct. 1553, four days before the opening of Parliament.8

Tadlowe was prominent in the assemblies of the Cinque Ports from 1531. In 1542 he was among those chosen to petition the King for relief from the fifteenth and tenth, and in 1547, after the accession of Edward VI, Tadlowe, Nicholas Ballard and Lawrence Elveden alias Cattaneo* were given an allowance of 2s. a day for further negotiations about taxation and the renewal of the port’s charter. In 1554 the latest charter, reissued by Mary, was committed to Tadlowe’s charge; in July 1556 it was transferred to the custody of John Cheseman, probably when Tadlowe died.9

Tadlowe’s will, made on 14 Apr. 1556, was proved on the following 9 Oct. He asked to be buried in the parish churchyard, next to his late wife. To his second wife, his executrix, he left the house in which he lived, and another house in New Romney, all his household stuff, sheep and cattle, corn and grain, and to her son, John Rocke, £6 and a cow. He also provided for his son Thomas and his married daughter, and made a bequest to his brother’s son, George Tadlowe of London. The will was witnessed by Richard Bunting, John Cheseman, Gregory Holton and Simon Padyham.10

Ref Volumes: 1509-1558

Author: Helen Miller

Notes

• 1. Romney chamberlains’ accts. 1528-80, ff. 37, 39v.
• 2. Ibid. f. 53.
• 3. Did not serve for the full duration of the Parliament; Romney ct. bk. 1552-9, f. iv.
• 4. Bodl. e Museo 17.
• 5. Date of birth estimated from admission as freeman. Canterbury prob. reg. C26, f. 149.
• 6. Romney chamberlains’ accts. 1528-80, ff. 12 seq., 38v; LP. Hen. VIII, iii, iv; Cinque Ports White and Black Bks. (Kent Arch., Soc. recs. br. xix), 214.
• 7. Romney assessment bk. 1516-22, ff. 71, 117v, 131; Cinque Ports White and Black Bks. 176; HMC 5th Rep, 550.
• 8. Romney chamberlains’ accts. 1528-80, ff. 37, 39v, 53, 55v, 56, 59, 70, 80v, 81.
• 9. Cinque Ports White and Black Bks. 212, 228-9, 236, 238, 240-1, 251, 253.
• 10. Canterbury prob. reg. C26, f. 149.