Family and Education

b. c.1520. m. (3) Jane; 6s. 5da.

Offices Held

J.p. Wilts. 1559-62; j.p.q. Berks. from 1561; escheator, Berks., Oxon. 1574.

?Warden of St. Mary’s hospital, Bath 1571.

Biography

Curteys specialized in estate management. Possibly an attorney, he was specially admitted to Lincoln’s Inn on 5 May 1553. Among the landlords he served were the Duchess of Somerset and her second husband Francis Newdigate. He was granted arms, as of East Enborne, on 2 June 1560, and held a manor court there in the following year. His return for Ludgershall may have been due to the Seymour connexion, or else to Lady Brydges, widow of the former borough owner Sir Richard Brydges, a cousin of the Lord Chandos. Whether Curteys resided at Enborne or at Greenham, his residence when he was classed as a ‘furtherer earnest’ in the 1564 bishops’ returns, he would have been a neighbour of Lady Brydges. His only occurrence in the known records of his last Parliament is a licence to depart ‘for his affairs at the assizes’, 1 Mar. 1563. He made his will on 30 Oct. 1587, trusting ‘to be saved and to be one of His elect at the last day’ and died a month later. The will was proved on 29 Jan. 1588. His surviving—but deteriorating—monument ‘removed from inside the church’ of St. Nicholas (or St. Nicolas as it is now styled) Newbury, where he was buried, shows three wives, six sons and five daughters.

CPR, 1553, p. 109; 1558-60, pp. 301, 423; 1560-3, p. 523; 1569-72, p. 187; KB29/188, 27/1176; Req. 2/129/32; Lansd. 1218, ff. 31, 60; E316/3/228; D’Ewes, 86; Vis. Berks. (Harl. Soc. lvii), 111; Cam. Misc. ix(3), p. 38; HMC Hatfield, ii. 106; PCC 5 Rutland; St. Nicolas Newbury (a guide, anon. privately printed 1971), 15.

Ref Volumes: 1558-1603

Author: P. W. Hasler

Notes