MITFORD, Henry (c.1543-96), of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Northumb.

Published in The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1558-1603, ed. P.W. Hasler, 1981
Available from Boydell and Brewer

Family and Education

b. c.1543, 1st s. of Christopher Mitford of Newcastle by Jane, da. of Henry Anderson of Newcastle. m. Barbara (d.1596), da. and coh. of Edmund Perkinson of Hulam, co. Dur., 7s. 6da. suc. fa. 1581.

Offices Held

Alderman, sheriff, Newcastle 1582-3, mayor 1584-5, comptroller of the port.

Biography

Mitford’s family had traded as citizens of Newcastle in the fourteenth century. His grandfather, Christopher Mitford, a junior member of the Mitfords of Seghill, was apprenticed to Bertram Anderson in 1532 and subsequently became a freeman, merchant and boothman of Newcastle. His business further prospered under his son, and the family acquired estates at Heaton, Tynemouth and Deanham, as well as property and coal mines in Newcastle itself. Most of these possessions came to Mitford who also acquired Hulam through his marriage.

Though allied to the Andersons and Chapmans, and one of the Newcastle grand lessees, Mitford was never prominent in the controversy which dominated Newcastle politics during the last decades of the century (see CHAPMAN, Henry). He purchased his comptrollership of the port from Charles Smythe for £10 p.a. Although not mentioned by name in the parliamentary journals, Mitford may have attended a committee concerning Hartlepool pier (28 Feb. 1589) to which burgesses for Newcastle were appointed. He died in May 1596 and was buried on the 16th at St. Nicholas, Newcastle. His widow survived him by only a few days and was buried beside her husband. Their eldest son Christopher, who married a daughter of Sir John Conyers of Sockburn Hall, succeeded him.

Gen. Mag. vi. 491-4; J. U. Nef, British Coal Industry, passim; Surtees Soc. xxxviii. 30-2; R. Welford, Hist. Newcastle and Gateshead, ii. 401-2; D’Ewes, 440; Hist. Northumb.(Northumb. Co. Hist. Comm.), xiii. 411; PCC 62 Spencer.

Ref Volumes: 1558-1603

Author: B.D.

Notes