Sex

Female

Parish

Middlewich

Marital Status

At Issue

Spouse Name

Randle

Causes

EDC 5/13/7 – plaintiff

Sex

Male

Parish

Middlewich

Marital Status

At Issue

Spouse Name

Joan

Causes

EDC 5/13/7 – defendant

Sex

Male

Marital Status

Married

Spouse Name

1) Beatrice Calverley 2) Anne Gamul

Occupation Status

Gentleman

Remarks

A man of this name was sheriff of Chester in 1554/5 and mayor in 1561/2. A pedigree of the Cowper family appears in George Ormerod, The History of the County Palatine and City of Chester (second edition, revised and enlarged by T. Helsby, London, 1882), vol. i, p. 375 indicating that John Cowper, mayor of Chester, died in 1579 and was buried in St Peter’s church.

As an ex-mayor, he was a Justice of the Peace, and as such in 1564 he was noted as being favourable to the Elizabethan religious settlement.

Sources:

Cheshire Sheaf, 3rd Series, vii, p. 98

J S Barrow, J D Herson, A H Lawes, P J Riden, M V J Seaborne, ‘Mayors and sheriffs of Chester’, in A History of the County of Chester: Volume 5 Part 2, the City of Chester: Culture, Buildings, Institutions, ed. A T Thacker, C P Lewis( London, 2005), British History Online https://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/ches/vol5/pt2/pp305-321 [accessed 21 January 2025]

Causes

EDC 5/13/4  – witness to the sentence

Sex

Male

Marital Status

Married

Spouse Name

Elizabeth Orrell

Occupation Status

Gentleman

Remarks

Career: Thomas Cuverden was the son of Edmond Kewrden and his wife Elizabeth, daughter of Richard Ainsworth of Penwortham. He married Elizabeth the daughter of James Orell of Turton.

Little is known of his life, but in 1879 his will was listed under the name of Thomas Cuerden [or Cuverden] of Cuerden as being enrolled in the ‘enrollment books in the bishop’s registry, Chester’. The will is dated 1558 and was proved in 1560, so presumably he died between those years.

His son, John Cuerden of Cuerden, left goods valued at the substantial sum of £1,025 9s 6d in 1601.

Sources:

J. P. Earwaker (ed.), An index to the wills and inventories now preserved in the Court of Probate at Chester 1545-1620 (The Record Society of Lancashire and Cheshire, 2, 1879), p. xiii

R. Sharpe France, ‘An Inventory of the Goods of John Cuerden of Cuerden, 1601’, Transactions of the Historic Society of Lancashire and Cheshire, vol. 91 (1939), pp. 193-204. Available online: https://www.hslc.org.uk/journal/vol-91-1939/

F. R. Raines (ed.), The visitation of the county palatine of Lancaster, made in the year 1567 by William Flower, Esq, (Chetham Society, old series, 81, 1870), p. 69

Causes

EDC 5/12/2 – Thomas Cuverden contra Richard Sherley

Sex

Male

Parish

Bury

Marital Status

Unknown

Remarks

He had built a dwelling house called Cobholes on land called Cray or Cragh in the parish of Bury.

Causes

EDC 5/8/1 – defendant

Sex

Male

Approx Year of Birth

1502

Parish

Shocklach

Marital Status

Unknown

Causes

EDC 5/3/2 – witness for the plaintiff; his deposition may be found at CALS EDC 2/2 f. 457v

Sex

Male

Approx Year of Birth

1489

Parish

Deane

Marital Status

Unknown

Causes

EDC 5/3/2 – witness for the plaintiff; his deposition may be found at CALS EDC 2/2 ff. 456v-457

Sex

Male

Marital Status

Married

Spouse Name

Mary

Occupation Status

Gentleman

Remarks

Career: George Cotton was born about 1495, the second son of John Cotton of Cotton in Shropshire. He became an esquire of the body to Henry VIII and obtained a number of official appointments, being knighted in 1542. By the time of his death, he had been appointed vice-chamberlain to the future Edward VI.

In August 1539 he and his wife, Mary (Onley), were granted the monastery and lands of Combermere Abbey, near Nantwich in Cheshire. The Cotton family built a house there which is thought to incorporate part of the old monastic buildings. The Tudor house survived until the early nineteenth century when it was extensively remodelled in the Gothic style by cladding the existing walls.

Sir George and Lady Mary Cotton were granted the manors of Wilkesley and Poulton in Cheshire by Henry VIII and, as indicated in EDC 5/1/10, other grants from the King included the farm of the parish of Great Budworth.

George Cotton died in 1545 and his will is held by The National Archives.

The images are of Combermere Abbey, the black and white image of the house in the Tudor period is from Ormerod’s Cheshire, courtesy of HathiTrust.

Sources: 

Pedigrees made at the Visitation of Cheshire, 1613, eds. Sir George J. Armytage and J. Paul Rylands (The Record Society of Lancashire and Cheshire, 58, 1909), p. 66

A P Baggs, Ann J Kettle, S J Lander, A T Thacker, David Wardle, ‘Houses of Cistercian monks: The abbey of Combermere’, in A History of the County of Chester: Volume 3, ed. C R Elrington, B E Harris( London, 1980), British History Online https://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/ches/vol3/pp150-156 [accessed 28 December 2024]

George Ormerod, The History of the County Palatine and City of Chester (second edition, revised and enlarged by T. Helsby, London, 1882), vol. iii, pp. 404-405, 414-415

Will held by The National Archives, PROB 11/30/417: Will of Sir George Cotton, Vice Chamberlain to the Prince

Causes

EDC 5/1/10 – plaintiff

Sex

Female

Parish

Manchester

Marital Status

Married

Spouse Name

Henry

Remarks

It is probable that Henry and Jane Chetham were the parents of Humphrey Chetham, a very wealthy philanthropist. Humphrey was baptised in the collegiate church in July 1580. The Chetham family were wealthy cloth merchants and lived at Crumpsall Hall in north Manchester.

Causes

EDC 5/1580/11 – plaintiff

Sex

Male

Marital Status

Married

Spouse Name

First wife - Emma; second wife - Alice

Occupation Status

Clerk; fellow of Manchester College

Literacy

Yes - graduate

Remarks

CCEd person ID 22503

Career: Oliver Carter was from Richmondshire, parts of which were in Yorkshire and parts in north Lancashire. He graduated from St John’s College Cambridge with a BA in 1560, MA in 1563 and as a Bachelor of Divinity in 1569, having been appointed one of the College preachers in 1565 and a University preacher in 1567. After parish appointments near Cambridge, he became a Fellow of Manchester College by 1573, where he remained until his death in 1605. In 1578 was appointed by the bishop of Chester as one of the moderators of the Manchester monthly lecture, an institution associated with evangelical Protestantism.

Further notes: 

Manchester College suffered from serious financial problems following its dissolution under Edward VI and restoration under Mary and so was re-founded by Elizabeth in 1578. Carter was, however, himself beset by financial difficulties being obliged to borrow money and to sue the College for unpaid stipend. He thus took on extra work such as tutoring and drawing up wills which distracted from his work as an evangelical.

Henry, earl of Derby was a patron, and he dedicated his 1579 book refuting some Catholic claims to the earl and also preached to the earl and his household. His evangelical views are also evidenced by his presentation to the church authorities for refusing to wear a surplice and his opposition to use of the organ in services. 

Sources:

F. R. Raines, The fellows of the collegiate church of Manchester, ed. F. Renaud, vol. 1, Chetham Society, new series, 21 (1891).

“Carter, Oliver”. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/4795

Causes

EDC 5/1580/10 – commissioned to examine witnesses in Manchester