Stephen Jenyns

Sir Stephen Jenyns (–1523) was a wool merchant from Wolverhampton, Merchant of the Staple and Master Merchant Taylor who became Lord Mayor of London for the year of the coronation of King Henry VIII. An artistic, architectural and educational patron, he founded Wolverhampton Grammar School, and took a leading part in the rebuilding of the church of St. Andrew Undershaft in the City of London.

Origins and early life

Stephen Jenyns was, according to the Heraldic Visitations of Staffordshire (1614, 1663 and 1664), the son of William Jenyns of Tenby, Pembrokeshire, and his wife Ellen, daughter and coheir of William Lane of Wolverhampton. He was born at Wolverhampton shortly before 1450, and was apprenticed to a London tailor in 1462–63. He settled in London and became a prominent member of the Fraternity of Taylors and Linen Armourers of St. John the Baptist. In 1485 he and two others supported Hugh Pemberton, a senior Taylor, in a bond for payment of £920 for Pemberton's action in the probate of Richard Nayler, Alderman and Taylor, who died in 1483. In 1490–95 he was concerned in the purchase of lands in Westminster with Thomas Randyll (Taylor), Henry Castell (Dyer) and Sir Richard Guildford.

Guildsman, Alderman and Sheriff

In an age of Guild reform, William Buck became Master of the Fraternity of Taylors in 1488–89 and commenced the Treasury Accounts Book for payments and receipts. Jenyns succeeded him as Master and made further reforms. He set aside an old ordinance relating to election of Masters, and decreed that the Wardens in post at any time should have precedence, after the Masters, at all assemblies. At the end of his term he and his successors enacted that various allowances (for fees and expenditures) customarily made to the Master should be discontinued: Jenyns repaid nearly £22 by way of example, including a contribution towards rebuilding a property belonging to the Guild near St Matthew Friday Street. Annual pensions paid to the former Masters and their wives, and fees to the Wardens, were also curtailed.

After the death of John Swan, a former Master, his widow Dame Rose Swan paid £149 6s. 8d. to the Company in 1493 for an Obit for her husband, in the presence of Buck, Jenyns and others. At her death in 1497/8 Jenyns was first-named of the three executors of her richly charitable testament, which they swore to administer. In 1498 Jenyns was elected Sheriff of London, in company with Thomas Bradbury, in the mayoralty of another elder of the company, Sir John Percyvale, who set the example of the foundation of Macclesfield Grammar School. (He was the first Master of the Taylors to become Mayor.) For Jenyns (for use in his 'Shrefewyk', or shrievalty) the Fraternity drew from their treasury twelve beautifully crafted spoons, and six silver bowls given by Rose Swan, with a gift of £26 13s. 4d. Jenyns became Alderman for Castle Baynard in 1499 and occupied that ward until 1505.

Two marriages

During this time, probably after 1490, Jenyns was married, 'the wif of Stephyn Jenens taillour' receiving £4 and a black gown in Rose Swan's will written in 1496. By this marriage he had two daughters, Katherine and Elizabeth, whose mother died before 1502. In 1501 (28 March) William Buck died, and was buried at St. Mary Aldermanbury. For his executors Buck appointed his wife Margaret, John Kirton of London, and William Milbourne, Chamberlain of London 1492–1506. In the Hilary term depicting scenes from the life of St. John the Baptist, to be hung on the walls of their Hall. Buck bequeathed to them three more, for the north wall (valued at £120), 'which I have bespoken to be made in Brucellys'. In January 1502/3 Henry VII incorporated the Fraternity under the new name of 'The Guild of Merchant Taylors of the Fraternity of St. John the Baptist': this was advocated and procured by William FitzWilliam, Master of the Taylors in 1499–1500. Stephen Jenyns gave a further three tapestries, completing the series of nine, to hang at the dais for the High Table and seats of honour in the Hall. Margaret Jenyns, 'for the good zeal that she had for the Company', presented a blue velvet embroidered altar-cloth of St John with a white rose above his head, and with green velvet edges worked with gold fleurs-de-lys and mottos, for their Chapel. All were recorded in an Inventory of 1512.

Margaret Buck (née Kirton) was the sister of John Kirton, originally of St. Paul's Cray, Kent, a trusted lawyer of Gray's Inn and J.P., and (in the footsteps of his father William) M.P. for Southwark in 1491–92. There was also a sister Beatrix, married to the lawyer Henry Tyngledon. Their mother was Margery Milbourne, and John had married Margaret White, granddaughter of Nicholas Gaynesford of Carshalton. In 1498 Kirton and Buck were named executors in Gaynesford's will, and John acted in 1503 for Gaynesford's widow. By his second marriage Stephen Jenyns became stepfather to the four sons and one daughter of William Buck and uncle to John Kirton's five children. Both Jenyns and his maternal aunt, the Lane heiress Isabel Swerder, were godparents at baptism to John's son Stephen Kirton.

Jenyns received £100 from the Privy Purse 'for plegging of sertain of the Quenes juells' in 1503, possibly to settle a loan unpaid at her death. In 1505, as alderman, he transferred to the Dowgate ward (until 1508), and from 1505 to 1507 he was Auditor to the Court of Aldermen. The appointment of John Kirton as Clerk of the Treasury ('clerk of Hell') in 1506 was obtained by royal writ, and was said (by his discharged predecessor) to have been purchased from the king for 300 marks by the management of Stephen Jenyns. Kirton joined with Stephen and Margaret Jenyns, and with John Nechylls, in acquiring lands in Whitstable, Seasalter, Chilham