Page:Mediaevalleicest00billrich.djvu/213

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twenty nobles (£6 13s. 4d.), on condition that he should assure to the town land worth l0s. a year, or an annuity of 10s. secured on "the nowe mansion dwelling house of the said Thomas Stanford in Leicester." He may be identified with the "old Mr. Stanford," who left a legacy of £10 for the upkeep of the Free Grammar School, which was built during his second Mayoralty. The legacy was not paid, and a suit was commenced in the Spiritual Court, before Dr. Chippingdale, prebendary of Lincoln, against the testator's son, Richard the Elder, who was also a Butcher and an Alderman of the town. The case was settled by Richard Stanford and Thomas his son delivering to the Mayor and Burgesses a bond of £20 for the payment of £10 in ten years by instalments of £1 at the dwellinghouse of the Mayor.

John Stanford, Butcher and Grazier, who was Mayor of Leicester in 1576 and 1592, was a son of old Thomas Stanford. He was a godson of John Herrick the Elder of Leicester, Ironmonger, who died in 1589, and he married, as his second wife, Herrick's daughter, Elizabeth, the sister of Alderman Robert Herrick. In the year 1572 he was chosen to represent Leicester in Parliament, when his expenses, at 2s. a day, amounted to £7 14s. 0d. He was Alderman of the Ward which comprised the old High Street from the Cross to the South Gate, and he was instrumental in paving the street and also in rebuilding the Cross. A few years earlier he had complained of the "muckell" which stood near his house, and a resolution was passed at a Common Hall, prohibiting any more garbage or muck being added to it. In 1579 he sold to the town for £4 and his charges the bailiwick of Leicester, which he had purchased from John Danet. In the same year he made a donation of 40s. towards the cost of a scarlet gown for the Recorder, the rest of the Company giving 5s. apiece. In the next year, when he was again Member for the Borough, his charges for nine weeks Parliamentary attendances came to £6 6s. Some dissatisfaction was expressed in the Council Chamber that these charges were allowed, for Stanford was reported to have said when elected that "he would not crave his charge except he did good to the

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