Family and Education

m. (1) Joan; (2) Elizabeth; (3) Elizabeth.

Offices Held

Controller of customs and subsidies, Bridgwater 1 Sept. 1422-July 1427, 22 Nov. 1436-c.1446.

Coroner, Som. by Feb. 1427.1

Clerk of the peace, Som. 1431-7.2

Biography

Cullyford began his career as a clerk in the service of Robert Hill* of Spaxton, son of Sir John Hill, j.KB. In August 1418 he stayed at Halton for nine days for the purpose of consulting with the receiver of Hill’s estates over matters concerning his muniments, and he may well have been responsible for the compilation of that copy of the family cartulary which is still extant. It is worth noting that when, on 11 Nov. 1420, he was returned to Parliament for Lyme, a place with which he had no known connexions, it was shortly before the end of Hill’s term as sheriff of Somerset and Dorset and when his employer was the returning officer. Cullyford retained his connexion with the Hill family even after Robert’s death. In 1423 he was associated with Robert’s son, John Hill†, in the purchase, from his father’s executors, of livestock on the manors of Spaxton and Postridge; 11 years later he acted as executor of John’s will; and in 1442-3 he received a fee of £2 as steward of the Hill estates, then in the possession of John’s widow, Cecily, and her second husband, Sir Thomas Kyriell†.3

Cullyford attended the shire elections at Ilchester in 1421 (Dec.) and 1431, he himself on the latter occasion being returned for Bridgwater. This election, too, may be attributed to the influence of the Hills, who owned a number of properties in the town. On the other hand, Cullyford had served as controller of customs there only a few years before, was perhaps well known to the burgesses as a former coroner of Somerset, and in any case was then clerk of the peace in the county. The borough paid him 13s.4d. for attending the Parliament. His fellow Member, Alexander Hody† (elder brother of the future chief justice (Sir) John Hody*), subsequently leased to him for life eight messuages and over 600 acres of land in Wembdon, Bridgwater and elsewhere, at an annual rent of £4 14s.4

Cullyford made his will (which was to be discovered in a chest after his death) on 10 July 1445. He asked to be buried in the church of St. John the Baptist in Bridgwater, and left all his property in the town to his widow for life, requiring that after her death it be sold and the proceeds spent for the good of his soul and the souls of his wives. Small bequests were made to the friars of Bridgwater, the vicar of Wembdon, the convents of Cannington and Tarrant and the rector of Winterbourne. Sir William Paulet was to have a silver cup, and John Cullyford and his daughter Alice (whose relationship to the testator was not stated) received legacies of a gown and six sheep. Cullyford probably died in 1446, when the office of controller of customs at Bridgwater, to which he had been re-appointed ten years previously, was granted to another. His will was proved on 26 May 1447, and his widow remarried in 1449.5

Ref Volumes: 1386-1421

Author: L. S. Woodger

Notes

Variants: Coleford, Colynford, Cullynford.

• 1. CCR, 1422-9, p. 295.
• 2. E. Stephens, Clerks of Counties, 155.
• 3. Hylle Cart. (Som. Rec. Soc. lxviii), pp. xiii. xxiv; CAD, v. A11496; Reg. Chichele, ii. 517-18; SC6/1119/17 m. 11.
• 4. Bridgwater Bor. Archs. (Som. Rec. Soc. lviii), 77-78, 107; Som. Feet of Fines (ibid. xxii), 87.
• 5. Reg. Lacy (Canterbury and York Soc. lxii), 21; Som. Wills (Som. Rec. Soc. xix), 343-4.