Powys-Lybbe Forbears - Person Sheet
Powys-Lybbe Forbears - Person Sheet
NameJohn Cobham Lord Cobham 
[76, Wyatt article, p.382 (faulty dates)], [54, His own article], [60, Cobham art, Vol III, pp. 344-5], [100, Brad Verity, 26 Nov 2002, "Cobham of Cobham corrections"]
[76, Wyatt article, p.382 (faulty dates)], [54, His own article], [60, Cobham art, Vol III, pp. 344-5], [100, Brad Verity, 26 Nov 2002, "Cobham of Cobham corrections"]Birthbef 1335
Death10 Jan 1408, Maiden Bradley Augustinian priory
BurialCobham
General3rd baron. Statesman, Knt Banneret: 1370. A Lord Apellant for a while.
FatherJohn de Cobham Lord Cobham (-1355)
MotherJoan Beauchamp (->1343)
DNB Main notes for John Cobham Lord Cobham
Cobham, John de, third Baron Cobham d. 1408
Name: Cobham, John de
Title: third Baron Cobham
Dates: d. 1408
Active Date: 1388
Gender: Male
Place of
Burial: Cobham Church
Spouse: Margaret, daughter of Hugh Courtenay, earl of Devonshire
Likenesses: 1...
Sources: Dugdale's Baronage, ii. 66-7; Hasted's History of Kent, i. 490, &c...
Contributor: T. A. A. [Thomas Andrew Archer]
Article
Cobham, John de, third Baron Cobham d. 1408, was the grandson of Henry de Cobham (d. 25 Aug. 1339), and son of John de Cobham, constable of Rochester Castle, and, if we may trust Dugdale, `admiral of the king's fleet from the Thames westward' in 1335 (Dugdale, Baronage, ii. 65; Abbrev. Rot. Orig. Scacc. ii. 78; Collect. Topog. vii. 320). His mother was Joan, daughter of Sir John Beachamp of Stoke under Hamden (Hist. of Kent, i. 490; Coll. Top. vii. 342). Dugdale has confused the two John de Cobhams, and has treated them as one individual who, in this case, must have held the barony for about seventy years. But Dugdale is altogether wrong. According to the extant brasses on the monuments in the church at Cobham, where almost all the family lies buried, Henry de Cobham died in 1339 (Coll. Top. 322), and John de Cobham the elder, who was already married in 8 Edward III (1314-1315), and admiral of the fleet in 1335, died on 25 Feb. 1354-5. The younger John de Cobham succeeded to his father's estates in 1355. He was first summoned to parliament on 20 Sept. 1355. He went to France in 1359, and was made a banneret in 1370. In 40 and 41 Edward III John de Cobham appears to have been serving in France, and in the latter year was despatched as ambassador to Rome to obtain from Urban V the appointment of William of Wykeham to the see of Winchester (Dugdale; Rymer, vi. 542, 567; Palgrave, Excheq. Kalendars, i. 212). In 1374 he was at Bruges negotiating the futile attempts at a treaty with the French (Walsingham, Ypod. Neustr. 379), and is found associated with the Duke of Lancaster on a similar errand in the two ensuing years (Rymer, vii. 58, 88, &c.). On the accession of Richard II he was appointed one of the two barons in the young king's council (ib. 161). On 30 June 1377 Cobham was ordered, among others, to prepare for the defence of the county of Kent against an expected invasion. In 1378 he was one of the commissioners to receive from the Duke of Brittany the castle of Brest, of which Richard Abberbury and John Golofre were appointed keepers. Next year he was sent to treat with the French, and to help in the arrangements previous to Richard's marriage (September 1379). In the course of the next few years he is constantly found negotiating with France and Flanders (Rymer, vii. 229, 248, 412, &c.). In 1382 he was on a committee to consider a petition of merchants requesting protection against pirates on the high seas, and was appointed to confer with the Commons on the grant of franchise and the manumission of villeins, after the great risings of 1381. Meanwhile, his name occurs with unbroken regularity as one of the triers of petitions for England, Scotland, and Wales, and later (from 1382) as trier for Gascony (Rot. Parl. iii. 4, 144, &c.). In 1387-8 he was one of the commissioners of the king before whom the appellant lords brought their charges against Robert de Vere, Michael de la Pole, and Richard's other favourites (ib. 229). This committee had been appointed about Michaelmas 1386, and was originally only intended to continue till Christmas (Eulog. Hist. 360) for the purpose of regulating the royal court and finance. In 1397 he was impeached by the commons for having been a member of this commission, and was brought up for trial in January by the Duke of Lancaster, who prosecuted for the king. A detailed account of the process has been preserved. He pleaded that he had only served on the commission at the king's command; but was unable to meet the retort that he must have been well aware that the king's consent had been obtained by pressure. As regarded the execution of Sir Simon Burley [q.v.], he made a similar defence_that it was carried out by those who were at that time rulers de facto `par yceux q'adonques furent mestres.' Finally he was adjudged a traitor, and sentenced to be hung, drawn, and quartered, a penalty which, however, the king commuted for one of forfeiture and perpetual banishment to Jersey (Rot. Parl. iii. 382). There can be little doubt that Cobham's extreme age (he must have been between eighty and ninety at the time) had something to do with obtaining him so lenient a sentence. Walsingham describes him as `vir grand‘vus, simplex et rectus,' and speaks of the king as granting `the old man' `a life for which he did not care' (Ypod. Neustr. 379). It would seem that he had before his impeachment withdrawn from the world to a Carthusian monastery, whence he was removed for his trial (Gower, Tripartite Chron. i. 433). The punishment of Cobham formed one of the charges brought against Richard II on his deposition (Capgrave, De Ill. Henr. 103); and on the accession of Henry IV Cobham was recalled from banishment (Eulog. Hist. 385). He acted as one of the `triers' for England in 2 Henry IV, apparently for the last time. His name, however, is appended to the document of 1406 in which Henry IV regulates the succession to the crown (Rot. Parl. iii. 580). Shortly after this (10 Jan. 1407-8) he died, being probably not very far short of a hundred years old, and was buried at Cobham Church. He married Margaret, daughter of Hugh Courtenay, earl of Devonshire, to whom he was perhaps betrothed, if not actually married, as early as 1331; she died in 1395 (Hasted; Top. Gen. vii. 323). His heiress was his granddaughter Joan, whose mother, bearing the same name, had married in 1362 Sir John de la Pole, and died about 1388 (ib. 320; Dugdale). This younger Joan, at the time of her grandfather's death, was the widow of her third husband, Sir Nicholas Hawberk. She married five times, and died 13 Jan. 1433-4 (Coll. Top. 329; Hasted). Her fourth husband was Sir John Oldcastle [q.v.], who, in the right of his wife, was sometimes known as Lord Cobham (Walsingham, Ypod. Neustr. 439). By her second husband, Sir Reginald Braybrooke, Joan had a daughter, likewise called Joan, who married Sir Thomas Brooke of Somerset, and thus was ancestress of the Brookes of Cobham (Hasted). Cobham's name is associated with several important occurrences in the reign of Richard II, besides those mentioned above, as, for example, the famous Scrope and Grosvenor case (Rymer, vii. 620), and the letter of remonstrance to the papal court in 1390 (ib. 675). In 1372 he is found transacting business with a certain John Gower, probably the poet (Excheq. Rolls, ii. 78). Ten years previously (1362) he founded the college, or chantry, of Cobham (Hasted, i. 503), and nearly twenty years later (1380-1) received permission to crenellate his house at Cowling, where his inscription and coat of arms, on enamelled copper, are still to be seen over the eastern gate (Coll. Top. vii. 346; Hasted, i. 539). Through his granddaughter Joan this castle passed into the hands of Sir John Oldcastle, and is said to have been the place where he entertained and protected Lollard priests (Hasted).
Sources
Dugdale's Baronage, ii. 66-7; Hasted's History of Kent, i. 490, &c.; Collectanea Topographica et Genealogica, vii. 320-54, where is to be found a very large collection of records from the muniment room at Cobham House; The Lords of Cobham and their Monuments, by J. G. Waller, in Arch‘ologia Cantiana, xi. 64 et seq.; Nicolas's Peerage, ed. Courthope, 118; Walsingham's Historia Anglicana, ed. Riley (Rolls Series), ii. 227; Walsingham's Ypodigma Neustri‘, ed. Riley (Rolls Series), 379, 320; Eulogium Historiarum, ed. Haydon (Rolls Series), 360, 376, 385, &c.; Trokelowe's Chronica et Annales, ed. Riley (Rolls Series), 224; Knyghton ap. Twysden's Decem Scriptores, 2685, 2697; Abbreviatio Rotulorum Orig. Scaccarii, 86, 216, 275, 340; Kalendarium Inquisitionum post mortem (Escheat Rolls), 224, 315, &c.; Rolls of Parliament, iii. 4, 34, &c.; Palgrave's Calendars and Inventories, i. 212; Nicolas's Proceedings of Privy Council, i. 12, 59, &c.; Issue Rolls of Exchequer, ed. Devon (1835), 440, &c.; Issue Rolls of Exchequer from Henry III to Henry VI (1837), 208; Rymer's Federa, vi. 542-3, vii. 58, 88, &c.; Capgrave, De Illustribus Henricis, ed. Hingeston (Rolls Series), 101, 103; Gower's Tripartite Chronicle in Wright's Political Poems (Rolls Series).
Contributor: T. A. A.
published 1887
Name: Cobham, John de
Title: third Baron Cobham
Dates: d. 1408
Active Date: 1388
Gender: Male
Place of
Burial: Cobham Church
Spouse: Margaret, daughter of Hugh Courtenay, earl of Devonshire
Likenesses: 1...
Sources: Dugdale's Baronage, ii. 66-7; Hasted's History of Kent, i. 490, &c...
Contributor: T. A. A. [Thomas Andrew Archer]
Article
Cobham, John de, third Baron Cobham d. 1408, was the grandson of Henry de Cobham (d. 25 Aug. 1339), and son of John de Cobham, constable of Rochester Castle, and, if we may trust Dugdale, `admiral of the king's fleet from the Thames westward' in 1335 (Dugdale, Baronage, ii. 65; Abbrev. Rot. Orig. Scacc. ii. 78; Collect. Topog. vii. 320). His mother was Joan, daughter of Sir John Beachamp of Stoke under Hamden (Hist. of Kent, i. 490; Coll. Top. vii. 342). Dugdale has confused the two John de Cobhams, and has treated them as one individual who, in this case, must have held the barony for about seventy years. But Dugdale is altogether wrong. According to the extant brasses on the monuments in the church at Cobham, where almost all the family lies buried, Henry de Cobham died in 1339 (Coll. Top. 322), and John de Cobham the elder, who was already married in 8 Edward III (1314-1315), and admiral of the fleet in 1335, died on 25 Feb. 1354-5. The younger John de Cobham succeeded to his father's estates in 1355. He was first summoned to parliament on 20 Sept. 1355. He went to France in 1359, and was made a banneret in 1370. In 40 and 41 Edward III John de Cobham appears to have been serving in France, and in the latter year was despatched as ambassador to Rome to obtain from Urban V the appointment of William of Wykeham to the see of Winchester (Dugdale; Rymer, vi. 542, 567; Palgrave, Excheq. Kalendars, i. 212). In 1374 he was at Bruges negotiating the futile attempts at a treaty with the French (Walsingham, Ypod. Neustr. 379), and is found associated with the Duke of Lancaster on a similar errand in the two ensuing years (Rymer, vii. 58, 88, &c.). On the accession of Richard II he was appointed one of the two barons in the young king's council (ib. 161). On 30 June 1377 Cobham was ordered, among others, to prepare for the defence of the county of Kent against an expected invasion. In 1378 he was one of the commissioners to receive from the Duke of Brittany the castle of Brest, of which Richard Abberbury and John Golofre were appointed keepers. Next year he was sent to treat with the French, and to help in the arrangements previous to Richard's marriage (September 1379). In the course of the next few years he is constantly found negotiating with France and Flanders (Rymer, vii. 229, 248, 412, &c.). In 1382 he was on a committee to consider a petition of merchants requesting protection against pirates on the high seas, and was appointed to confer with the Commons on the grant of franchise and the manumission of villeins, after the great risings of 1381. Meanwhile, his name occurs with unbroken regularity as one of the triers of petitions for England, Scotland, and Wales, and later (from 1382) as trier for Gascony (Rot. Parl. iii. 4, 144, &c.). In 1387-8 he was one of the commissioners of the king before whom the appellant lords brought their charges against Robert de Vere, Michael de la Pole, and Richard's other favourites (ib. 229). This committee had been appointed about Michaelmas 1386, and was originally only intended to continue till Christmas (Eulog. Hist. 360) for the purpose of regulating the royal court and finance. In 1397 he was impeached by the commons for having been a member of this commission, and was brought up for trial in January by the Duke of Lancaster, who prosecuted for the king. A detailed account of the process has been preserved. He pleaded that he had only served on the commission at the king's command; but was unable to meet the retort that he must have been well aware that the king's consent had been obtained by pressure. As regarded the execution of Sir Simon Burley [q.v.], he made a similar defence_that it was carried out by those who were at that time rulers de facto `par yceux q'adonques furent mestres.' Finally he was adjudged a traitor, and sentenced to be hung, drawn, and quartered, a penalty which, however, the king commuted for one of forfeiture and perpetual banishment to Jersey (Rot. Parl. iii. 382). There can be little doubt that Cobham's extreme age (he must have been between eighty and ninety at the time) had something to do with obtaining him so lenient a sentence. Walsingham describes him as `vir grand‘vus, simplex et rectus,' and speaks of the king as granting `the old man' `a life for which he did not care' (Ypod. Neustr. 379). It would seem that he had before his impeachment withdrawn from the world to a Carthusian monastery, whence he was removed for his trial (Gower, Tripartite Chron. i. 433). The punishment of Cobham formed one of the charges brought against Richard II on his deposition (Capgrave, De Ill. Henr. 103); and on the accession of Henry IV Cobham was recalled from banishment (Eulog. Hist. 385). He acted as one of the `triers' for England in 2 Henry IV, apparently for the last time. His name, however, is appended to the document of 1406 in which Henry IV regulates the succession to the crown (Rot. Parl. iii. 580). Shortly after this (10 Jan. 1407-8) he died, being probably not very far short of a hundred years old, and was buried at Cobham Church. He married Margaret, daughter of Hugh Courtenay, earl of Devonshire, to whom he was perhaps betrothed, if not actually married, as early as 1331; she died in 1395 (Hasted; Top. Gen. vii. 323). His heiress was his granddaughter Joan, whose mother, bearing the same name, had married in 1362 Sir John de la Pole, and died about 1388 (ib. 320; Dugdale). This younger Joan, at the time of her grandfather's death, was the widow of her third husband, Sir Nicholas Hawberk. She married five times, and died 13 Jan. 1433-4 (Coll. Top. 329; Hasted). Her fourth husband was Sir John Oldcastle [q.v.], who, in the right of his wife, was sometimes known as Lord Cobham (Walsingham, Ypod. Neustr. 439). By her second husband, Sir Reginald Braybrooke, Joan had a daughter, likewise called Joan, who married Sir Thomas Brooke of Somerset, and thus was ancestress of the Brookes of Cobham (Hasted). Cobham's name is associated with several important occurrences in the reign of Richard II, besides those mentioned above, as, for example, the famous Scrope and Grosvenor case (Rymer, vii. 620), and the letter of remonstrance to the papal court in 1390 (ib. 675). In 1372 he is found transacting business with a certain John Gower, probably the poet (Excheq. Rolls, ii. 78). Ten years previously (1362) he founded the college, or chantry, of Cobham (Hasted, i. 503), and nearly twenty years later (1380-1) received permission to crenellate his house at Cowling, where his inscription and coat of arms, on enamelled copper, are still to be seen over the eastern gate (Coll. Top. vii. 346; Hasted, i. 539). Through his granddaughter Joan this castle passed into the hands of Sir John Oldcastle, and is said to have been the place where he entertained and protected Lollard priests (Hasted).
Sources
Dugdale's Baronage, ii. 66-7; Hasted's History of Kent, i. 490, &c.; Collectanea Topographica et Genealogica, vii. 320-54, where is to be found a very large collection of records from the muniment room at Cobham House; The Lords of Cobham and their Monuments, by J. G. Waller, in Arch‘ologia Cantiana, xi. 64 et seq.; Nicolas's Peerage, ed. Courthope, 118; Walsingham's Historia Anglicana, ed. Riley (Rolls Series), ii. 227; Walsingham's Ypodigma Neustri‘, ed. Riley (Rolls Series), 379, 320; Eulogium Historiarum, ed. Haydon (Rolls Series), 360, 376, 385, &c.; Trokelowe's Chronica et Annales, ed. Riley (Rolls Series), 224; Knyghton ap. Twysden's Decem Scriptores, 2685, 2697; Abbreviatio Rotulorum Orig. Scaccarii, 86, 216, 275, 340; Kalendarium Inquisitionum post mortem (Escheat Rolls), 224, 315, &c.; Rolls of Parliament, iii. 4, 34, &c.; Palgrave's Calendars and Inventories, i. 212; Nicolas's Proceedings of Privy Council, i. 12, 59, &c.; Issue Rolls of Exchequer, ed. Devon (1835), 440, &c.; Issue Rolls of Exchequer from Henry III to Henry VI (1837), 208; Rymer's Federa, vi. 542-3, vii. 58, 88, &c.; Capgrave, De Illustribus Henricis, ed. Hingeston (Rolls Series), 101, 103; Gower's Tripartite Chronicle in Wright's Political Poems (Rolls Series).
Contributor: T. A. A.
published 1887