Welsh Journals

several generations, as part of some co-ordinated action by the Stanley family in 1485? Investigation of this theme and of the problems faced by William in securing his own power-base in north Wales and Cheshire throws fresh light on the politics of the Yorkist and early Tudor period. The royal patronage which allowed William Stanley to acquire his influence in the north-east of Wales and the palatinate of Chester came in two distinct phases. On 1 May 1461 he was appointed chamberlain of Chester and sheriff of Flintshire and constable of Flint castle for life. This was a significant grant, for as chamberlain William received the pardons of those in the county who returned to their allegiance after 1461, and served on the most important commissions.4 William had already proved his loyalty to the Yorkist cause at the battles of Blore Heath (1459) and Towton (1461), and after the latter he was knighted by Edward IV; he was already a prominent courtier, in close attendance on the king.5 But in terms of regional authority, the grant of 1461 was more a recognition of the pre-eminence of his elder brother Thomas, the head of the Stanley family, who had been appointed chief justice in Cheshire for life on 1 January 1462.6 The local influence of the Lathom branch of the Stanleys had been well laid earlier in the century by Thomas's and William's grandfather, Sir John Stanley. In the 1420s and '30s, Sir John had built up a powerful system of clientage among local families: he had pursued a vigorous policy of ecclesiastical patronage and frequently acted as arbiter in legal disputes. These activities were consolidated by William's father, Thomas, first Lord Stanley.7 Leadership 3 Deputy Keeper of the Public Records, Thirty-first Report, p. 246; Thirty-seventh Report, p. 679. The profit that could be derived from the office of sheriff in Wales was demonstrated by T. B. Pugh's survey of the career of Sir James Tyrell. sheriff of Glamorgan in the 1470s, in Glamorgan County History, III (Cardiff, 1971), 201. The best account of Sir William Stanley's political activities is to be found in J. M. Williams, 'The Stanley family of Lathom and Knowsley c. 1450-1504: a political study' (University of Manchester M.A. thesis, 1979), pp. 118-39. 4 Cheshire Record Office (henceforth CRO), DVE/AA20 (unclassified deeds), refers to Robert Corbet, who was bound over in recognizances before Sir William Stanley, 27 April 1462; for his pardon, see CPR, 1461-67, p. 336. For involvement on the major commissions, see D. J. Clayton, 'The "Cheshire Parliament" in the Fifteenth Century', Cheshire History, VI (1980), 21-22. 5 A. R. Myers, The Household of Edward IV (Manchester, 1959), p. 240. 6 Deputy Keeper of the Public Records, Thirty-seventh Report, p. 678. 7 On Sir John Stanley (d.1437), see M. J. Bennett, Community, Class and Careerism: Cheshire and Lancashire Society in the Age of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (Cambridge, 1983), pp. 215-23, and P. W. Hosker, 'The Stanleys of Lathom and ecclesiastical patronage in the north-west of England during the fifteenth century', Northern History, 18 (1982), 212-29. A detailed biography of.Thomas, first Lord Stanley is provided in J. S. Roskell, The Knights of the Shire for the County Palatine of Lancaster, 1377-1460, (Chetham Soc., XCVI, 1937), pp. 162-72. For an example of his local influence, see the will of Sir Geoffrey Massey of Tatton, who appealed to Stanley to be a 'gode lorde' to his wife and son: W. Fergusson-Irvine, Lancashire and Cheshire Wills (Lanes, and Cheshire Record Soc., 30, 1895), p. 14. Geoffrey's son John was to serve as Sir William Stanley's deputy in Cheshire; his daughter Joan was to marry Sir William's son, William (Williams, thesis cited, p. 236).