John Andrew was an MP for

Ipswich Ipswich () is a port town and Borough status in the United Kingdom, borough in Suffolk, England. It is the county town, and largest in Suffolk, followed by Lowestoft and Bury St Edmunds, and the third-largest population centre in East Anglia, ...

(1442, 1449) and

Bletchingley Bletchingley (historically "Blechingley") is a village in Surrey, England. It is on the A25 road to the east of Redhill and to the west of Godstone, has a conservation area with medieval buildings and is mostly on a wide escarpment of the Gre ...

(Nov 1449).

Biography

The son of James Andrew (MP), an influential lawyer strongly connected to the

Earl of Suffolk Earl of Suffolk is a title which has been created four times in the Peerage of England. The first creation, in tandem with the creation of the title of Earl of Norfolk, came before 1069 in favour of Ralph the Staller; but the title was forfei ...

, John's early life was upturned by an incident in 1434 in which a land dispute between his father and Richard Sterysacre, a retainer of the

Duke of Norfolk Duke of Norfolk is a title in the peerage of England. The premier non-royal peer, the Duke of Norfolk is additionally the premier duke and earl in the English peerage. The seat of the Duke of Norfolk is Arundel Castle in Sussex, although the t ...

turned violent. James Andrew was killed, forcing his mother Alice to seek the direct protection of Earl Suffolk. With the Earl on one side and Duke on the other, the confrontation threatened to spill over into large scale violence and forced the King's Council to intervene directly in 1435. Both parties were made to agree that they would not interfere in a formal inquiry, which ended with a series of royal pardons. John himself followed in his father's footsteps and became a Lincoln's Inn lawyer, later sitting in Parliament for Ipswich and, later, the

pocket borough A rotten or pocket borough, also known as a nomination borough or proprietorial borough, was a parliamentary borough or constituency in England, Great Britain, or the United Kingdom before the Reform Act of 1832, which had a very small electo ...

of Bletchingley. During this period, in the reign of Henry VI, a

Commons The commons is the cultural and natural resources accessible to all members of a society, including natural materials such as air, water, and a habitable Earth. These resources are held in common even when owned privately or publicly. Commons ...

seat was usually acquired by agreement between the local gentry, with the consent or active intervention of the local lord, while pocket borough seats were controlled directly by the landholder, making it effectively an appointed position.

References

English MPs 1442 Year of birth unknown Year of death unknown Politicians from Ipswich {{15thC-England-MP-stub