Family and Education

b. by 1524.1

Offices Held

Town clerk, New Windsor 1545-58 or later, mayor 1556-7.2

Biography

Thomas Butler is first mentioned on receiving 6s.8d., ‘being clerk for his fee’, from the chamberlains of Windsor when their accounts were heard at the guildhall on 16 Nov. 1545. No family connexion is known between Butler and John Pury, the previous town clerk, although Pury had himself succeeded William Pury, presumably a relative. In 1546 Butler was assessed for subsidy at 16d. on goods of unstated value, and in 1551 at 10s. on goods worth £10, the same amount as for William Hanley.3

As town clerk, Butler apparently received the normal wage of 6s.8d. a year until 1558, although sometimes this was supplemented by a further payment of the same amount ‘for his reward’. There were also frequent extra payments for travelling to London on suits concerning the town’s liberties. Thus in 1548 he was given £4 towards his charge for renewing the charter, in 1552 another 20s., and then 40s., ‘for soliciting our cause concerning our charter in the Exchequer’, and further sums in the same connexion in 1555 and 1556. This last commitment may have led to his absence from the annual scrutiny of accounts during his mayoralty on 14 Oct. 1556, when Thomas Good acted as his deputy.4

Butler’s return to Parliament meant that for the second time in Mary’s reign a townsman sat with Richard Ward I, who had been returned with Thomas Good in October 1553. Good was reimbursed at 1s. a day and Butler received 30s. in October 1554 for his attendance during the previous spring at the same rate. He was not included in the subsidy assessment for Windsor in 1560, so that he may have died in the epidemic prevalent at the accession of Elizabeth or have left the town. There are no chamberlains’ accounts to record his replacement as town clerk nor is there a will to throw light on the family, whose name does not otherwise figure in the history of Windsor.5

Ref Volumes: 1509-1558

Author: T. F.T. Baker

Notes

• 1. Date of birth estimated from first reference.
• 2. Windsor recs. Wi/FA c. 1, ff. 49, 63, 70.
• 3. E179/73/167, 74/201.
• 4. Windsor recs. Wi/FA c. 1, ff. 49, 53v, 58v, 62, 63, 64, 70.
• 5. Ibid. f. 60; E179/74/217.