Family and Education

m. (1) bef. 1405, Alice; (2) bef. 1421, Isabel.1

Offices Held

Jurat, Hythe Feb. 1397-8, 1401-3, 1405-6, 1407-9, 1412-15, 1417-21.2

Biography

Philpot acquired several tenements in Hythe between 1400 and 1410. The maltolts he paid show that his principal trading concern was cloth, valued at some £13 a year, and in 1413 he sold the town the fabric needed for its common clerk’s livery. He also handled miscellaneous merchandise, including millstones and a fencing doublet. His chattels, said to be worth £40 in 1412-13, decreased in value over the next seven years to only £28 in 1419-20.3

Philpot was a jurat of Hythe in 1407 when the barons ousted John Smalwode from his post as common clerk on account of his machinations against them; and in the following year he joined other local notables who, still feeling endangered by Smalwode’s plots, brought an action against him in the lawcourts for threatening behaviour. Philpot’s activities on behalf of the town as recorded in 1412 included several visits to Dover to consult with Hythe’s counsel about a lawsuit which the abbot of St. Radegund’s was waging against a fellow townsman, and in May that year he was at Dymchurch for a meeting with Archbishop Arundel’s steward to discuss the prospects of constructing a new harbour for Hythe. Later the same month he went up to London to find out whether Hythe’s exemption from ship-service to the Crown, granted temporarily after the great fire of 1401, still held good against the latest royal demands. In July he attended a Brodhull. Following their election early in 1413 to what was to prove to be Henry IV’s last Parliament, he and his colleague, Stephen Rye, set out on 31 Jan., after being given an advance of £5 6s.8d. towards their wages; but while Rye left the Commons on 25 Feb. Philpot himself did not return home until 26 Mar., so that he was owed a further £3 0s.10d.4

On 14 Mar. 1419 Philpot went to Dover, with the bailiff of Hythe and John Skinner IV*, following a summons from the warden of the Cinque Ports to appear there and do what they should be bidden. The business in hand is not stated; but while there they were evidently expected to give presents to a number of officials at the castle for their counsel and friendship. A week later Philpot and Skinner were at Canterbury, in order to obtain from the prior of Christ Church a copy of an entry in the ‘Black Book’ there concerning Hythe’s liberties, and to speak with Archbishop Chichele’s steward. They also obtained counsel from ‘one Goodrede’ (probably William Goodred* the future judge) with regard to the next sessions of the Kent j.p.s, at which they were required to produce a writ to excuse Hythe’s barons from sitting on juries in the shire or hundred courts. In July Philpot took part in a Brodhull at Romney. He and Skinner attended the Parliament which assembled that October for 35 days; and when they accounted for their expenses it was found that they were owed £7 5s. over and above the 30s. they had received at their setting out, besides incidental expenses, such as 1s. given by them to the usher, 1s. to the clerk ‘de filas’ for noting their attendance, 6d. to the clerk of the petty bag and 6d. for a copy of a bill which affected the Ports’ liberties. On 30 Dec. Philpot represented Hythe at a session of the warden’s court at Dover, where John Bernevale was suing the town because it had arrested his goods to compel him to pay the customary toll of 3s.4d. a head on 17 Frenchmen he had taken prisoner.5

Philpot died before 1430, when his heirs are mentioned in possession of the land at Cheriton which he had acquired in 1419.6

Ref Volumes: 1386-1421

Author: A. P.M. Wright

Notes

• 1. Hythe Reg. 1, f. 23; HMC 6th Rep. 517.
• 2. Romney assmt. bk. 2, f. 34; Reg. 1, ff. 20-23, 28, 30, 31; Hythe jurats’ bk. C, ff. 1, 46; D, f. 39.
• 3. Reg. 1, ff. 20, 22-25; jurats’ bk. C, ff. 12, 41, 61; D, f. 25.
• 4. CCR, 1405-9, p. 397; 1409-13, pp. 273-4; jurats’ bk. C, ff. 18, 19, 24, 25, 61, 69, 83.
• 5. Jurats’ bk. D, ff. 41, 44-46.
• 6. Kent AO, Radnor (Folkestone) deeds, 52, 67.