William Hankford

Sir William Hankford KB (or Hankeford) (c. 1350 – 1423) of Annery in Devon, was an English lawyer, and Chief Justice of the King's Bench from 1413 until 1423.

Arms of Hankford of Annery, Devon: Sable, a chevron barry nebuly argent and gules [1]

Origins

His parentage is not known, but he came from a gentry family which originated at and took its name from the estate of Hankford, near Bulkworthy in the parish of Buckland Brewer, North Devon.[2][3]

Career

He was educated at the Middle Temple, appointed serjeant-at-law in 1388 and king's serjeant in 1389. He was employed by the Earl of Devon from 1384, and repeatedly as a royal justice and commissioner in southern England. In 1394 he accompanied King Richard II (1377–1399) to Ireland.[2] He served as Lord Chief Justice of the King's Bench for Ireland from 1395 to 1396.[4]

In 1397, King Richard II decided to strike back at the Lords Appellant, a group of noblemen who years earlier had partly usurped royal authority, and had executed several of Richard's favourites.[5] The next year Hankford was among the justices consulted concerning the validity of a legal ruling from 1387 which had declared the Appellants' actions unlawful and treasonable.[6] Hankford expressed his support for the rulings, and said he would have ruled the same way himself.[2]

On 6 May 1398 Hankford was appointed to succeed his friend Sir John Wadham as Justice of the Court of Common Pleas.[7] In 1399 at the coronation of King Henry IV, who as Henry Bolingbroke had in that year deposed Richard II,[8] Hankford was made a Knight of the Bath. In spite of his loyalty to the deposed King Richard II, Hankford was reappointed by Henry IV in October 1399, and shortly after appointed a Justice of the King's Bench. In the following years he distinguished himself and was appointed Chief Justice of the King's Bench at the accession of King Henry V in 1413.}

Marriage and children

By 1380 he had married a certain Cristina, possibly the heiress of the de Stapledon family of the estate of Annery, in the parish of Monkleigh, Devon, according to the Devon historian Tristram Risdon (d.1640).[9] Hankford or his recent ancestor had certainly acquired the estate of Annery, though whether through inheritance by marriage or by purchase is unclear.[10] He had the following children:

  • Richard Hankford (died 1419),[11] MP for Devon in 1414 and 1416.[12]
  • Jane Hankford (d.1448), who married twice:

Death and burial

Pair of sculpted heraldic escutcheons in spandrels of arches in doors of mediaeval wooden screen at west end of Annery Chapel, Monkleigh Church

Hankford died on 12 December 1423, while still in office. A peculiar legend is associated with his death, based on a strong local tradition, reported by both Robert Danby (d. 1474) and Raphael Holinshed (d. 1580). Allegedly Hankford had instructed his forester of his estate at Annery to shoot with an arrow anyone entering his forest, only himself deliberately to wander into the forest at night, where accordingly he was shot. His death thus appears possibly as a noble form of suicide, which would not debar him from Christian burial. As late as the 17th century there was still a tree-stump known locally as "Hankford's Oak" where the judge supposedly was killed. Whether the story is true or not, Hankford had certainly written his testament only two days before his death.[2] He was buried in Monkleigh church, to which he had contributed extensive rebuilding,[2] and his ornate Easter Sepulchre monument survives in the Annery Chapel in Monkleigh Church.

Sir William Hankford's ornate Easter Sepulchre monument survives against the south wall of the Annery Chapel, in Monkleigh Church.

References

  1. Tristram Risdon's Notebook
  2. Virgoe 2004.
  3. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, vol.24, London, 1890, p.293, biography of William Hankford
  4. Ball, F. Elrington (1926). The Judges in Ireland 1221–1921. London: John Murray. p. 169.
  5. Saul, Nigel (1997). Richard II. New Haven: Yale University Press. p. 378. ISBN 0-300-07003-9.
  6. Chrimes, S. B. (1956). "Richard II's questions to the judges". Law Quarterly Review. lxxii: 365–90.
  7. Robert Beatson, 'A Political Index to The Histories of Great Britain and Ireland', p. 414
  8. Harriss, Gerald (2005). Shaping the Nation: England, 1360–1461. Oxford: Oxford University Press. pp. 486–8. ISBN 0-19-822816-3.
  9. Risdon, Tristram (d.1640), Survey of Devon, 1810 edition, London, 1810, p.276
  10. Prince, p.458
  11. Cokayne, The Complete Peerage, new edition, vol.V, pp.504–5, (Baron FitzWarin)
  12. http://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1386-1421/member/hankford-richard-1419
  13. History of Parliament biography of John Wadham by Roger Virgoe:
  14. Vivian, Lt.Col. J.L., (Ed.) The Visitations of the County of Devon: Comprising the Heralds' Visitations of 1531, 1564 & 1620, Exeter, 1895, p.150, pedigree of Cary; See also biography of Sir Robert Cary in History of Parliament
  15. History of Parliament biography of John Wadham

Sources

Legal offices
Preceded by
Peter Rowe
Lord Chief Justice of Ireland
1395–1396
Succeeded by
William Tynbegh
Preceded by
William Gascoigne
Lord Chief Justice of England
1413–1423
Succeeded by
William Cheyne
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