Family and Education

b. 1521/22, o. s. of Andrew Edmonds of Cressing Temple, Essex by Elizabeth, da. and coh. of Thomas Bledlow of Bledlow, Bucks. educ. L. Inn, adm. 24 Apr. 1541. m. 1554/60, Dorothy, da. of Christopher Lidcott or Litcott of Ruscombe, Berks., s.p. suc. fa. 23 June 1523. Kntd. 1592.1

Offices Held

J.p. Oxon. 1573/74-d.

Biography

Christopher Edmonds’s father was an Essex landowner, who since he asked to be buried in the church of St. Lawrence Jewry doubtless also owned property in London, and his mother a cousin of Sir John Raynsford upon whose death in 1559 he became one of the three coheirs to other lands in Essex. He took little interest, however, in his native county, his career being chiefly influenced by his mother’s marriage to Sir John Williams, later Lord Williams of Thame.2

Williams was treasurer of augmentations from 1544 and although Edmonds is not known to have been given a post in that court he and Williams together dealt heavily in monastic lands. In July 1544 they acquired jointly the manor of Wall Hall, Hertfordshire, and in August they sold those of Priors Dean and Colemore, Hampshire. Two months later Edmonds and John Marshe (possibly the London lawyer-merchant and Member) paid £1,000 for monastic property in Berkshire, Northamptonshire, Oxfordshire and Worcestershire, and in 1546 they were both associated with Williams in selling the lordship of Newington, Oxfordshire, which had formed part of this grant. When Williams died without surviving male issue he bequeathed his lease of the manor of North Weston to Edmonds, who also leased the manor of Lewknor (granted to Williams in 1541) from the crown; in 1545 Edmonds and Sir Richard Long, apparently acting for Williams, had bought the manors of Moorcourt and Nethercote in Lewknor for £1,500. Edmonds was involved in many other transactions during the 1540s and 1550s.3

Williams was also in effect, although he is not known to have been formally, high steward of the city of Oxford, and it was presumably to his stepfather that Edmonds owed his return for Oxford, a city where he apparently held no property and where he played no part in civic affairs. Since he did not sit in the first four Elizabethan Parliaments, his failure to do so during Mary’s reign need not be attributed to any early commitment to Protestantism. He was described as ‘the Queen’s servant’ in 1560 and his wife became a gentlewoman of Elizabeth’s privy chamber.4

Edmond’s will of June or July 1595 was proved by his wife as sole executrix in December 1596.5

Ref Volumes: 1509-1558

Author: T. F.T. Baker

Notes

• 1. Date of birth estimated from age at fa’s. i.p.m. C142/40/47, CP, xii(2), 653; Vis. Oxon. (Harl. Soc. v), 122; PCC 22 More; CPR, 1558-60, p. 391.
• 2. PCC 14 Bodfelde; CPR, 1560-3, pp. 117, 140; Morant, Essex, i. 285, 461, 464; ii. 132.
• 3. LP Hen. VIII, xix-xxi; CPR, 1547-8, pp. 48, 50, 99, 164, 333; 1553-4, p. 364; 1558-60, p. 391; 1563-6, p. 283; VCH Oxon. viii. 100-1.
• 4. CPR, 1558-60, p. 391; 1566-9, p. 139.
• 5. PCC 87 Drake.