Family and Education

2nd s. of John Bawde of Maldon; yr. bro. of Roger†. m. 1s.1

Offices Held

Ale taster, Maldon Jan. 1399-1400, 1401-3, 1440-1; wardman 1404-5, 1406-10, 1417-18, 1420-1, 1424-5, 1426-9 1431-4, 1435-7, 1438-45; warden of leather 1405-6, 1408-9, 1414-15, 1428-9; weigher of bread 1416-17 clerk of the market 1417-18, 1424-5, 1431-2; constable 1418-19, 1423-4; chamberlain 1419-20, 1421-2, 1433-4, 1435-6; assessor of taxes 1431-3, 1435-6, 1440-1.2

Biography

The subject of this biography may have been the Richard Bawde who sold a considerable quantity of cloths in Colchester from 1394 onwards, these being the product of his own looms.3 He became a freeman of Maldon on 10 Jan. 1399, and was immediately elected to a minor local office. Thereafter, over the next 40 years he held a number of posts in the town, but never that of bailiff, the most important.

With John Flower*, Richard Bawde was surety of the peace in the local court for his two younger brothers, Stephen and John, in March 1406. He witnessed a grant at Maldon of the lands of John Glover* to Robert Darcy on no May 1421, he and Darcy (then knight of the shire for Essex) presumably having returned home early from Parliament, for the session did not end until two days later.4 Bawde’s elder brother, Roger, represented Maldon in 1423.

Ref Volumes: 1386-1421

Author: K.N. Houghton

Notes

• 1. Essex RO, Maldon ct. bk. i. ff. 3v-5, 22v.
• 2. Ibid. ff. 9-31v; ct. rolls 9, 10.
• 3. E101/342/9, 13, 14, 16.
• 4. Maldon ct. roll 2 m. 3v; CCR, 1419-22, p. 193.