On Monday, November 9, 2009 at 11:20:38 AM UTC-5, Matt Tompkins wrote:
> On 9 Nov, 14:16, Douglas Richardson <royalances...@msn.com> wrote:
> > Dear Matt
> > You're correct to question the name of Sir John Mortimer's wife in his
> > IPM as being Alice.
> >
> > Sir John Mortimer's only known wife and subsequently his widow was
> > Eleanor Rossall, daughter and co-heiress of Walter Rossall, of
> > Rossall, Shropshire. She was born about 1377, and died 28 Dec.
> > 1432. At the time that Sir John Mortimer married Eleanor Rossall c.
> > 1409, she was then the widow of Sir Nicholas Dagworth (died 1402), of
> > Blickling, Norfolk. Sir Nicholas Dagworth was a a favorite of King
> > Richard II and a prominent knight of the king's chamber. Sir John
> > Mortimer and Eleanor Rossall had no issue. At her death in 1432,
> > Eleanor's heir was her sister, Alice Rossall's son, John Englefield,
> > then aged 30 and more.
> >
> > For more detailed information on the life of Eleanor (Rossall)
> > (Dagworth) Mortimer, see Complete Peerage, 4 (1916): 29-31 (sub
> > Dagworth) and Roskell, House of Commons 1386–1421 2 (1992): 733–734
> > (biog. of Sir Nicholas Dagworth).
> Ah! Well done, Douglas - a good bit of sleuthing. I wonder what
> caused Stirnet to think Sir John Mortimer's marriage in 1409 was to
> "Alice Neville, daughter of John, 3rd Lord Neville of Raby and widow
> (since 1381) of William, 3rd Lord Deincourt." Was she perhaps the
> husband of a different Sir John Mortimer, knt? There was a Sir John
> Mortimer of Martley and Kyre Wyrard in Worcestershire who died on 28
> Oct 1415 (his IPM is in Birmingham City Archives - he left a son and
> heir, also called John, aged 5 and over - and he is mentioned in the
> VCH Worcs chapter on Kyre Wyrard, iv, 289-97) - could he have been her
> husband?
> The tiny landholdings of the Sir John Mortimer who was executed in
> 1424 - smaller even than a single manor - is surely an argument
> against his having been a legitimate or close relation of the earls of
> March, and a pointer towards his having been a bastard, or at best the
> younger son of a younger son. It's interesting, too, that his first
> and only wife was a widow - by coincidence, I have just been reading
> Christine Carpenter's comments in 'Locality and Polity: a Study of
> Warwickshire Landed Society, 1401-1499', p. 102, that heiresses tended
> to be married to heirs, or if to younger sons then to scions of
> prominent families, and that men with little land or unimpressive
> connections often had to make do with widows (whose landed wealth was
> only a temporary benefit).
> Matt
Here is the response of the Mortimer Society
Dear Alan,

Your message about Sir John Mortimer has been passed to me to answer. My apologies for the delay, but I have been busy for the last few days.

To answer your questions regarding Sir John Mortimer, executed 1424:

1) The relationship is not correct/true. There is no evidence that Sir John was a legitimate son of Edmund Mortimer, 3rd earl of March, and his wife, Philippa. Indeed, there is no evidence at all of John Mortimer's parentage. Because of his execution, some historians have assumed that he must have been an illegitimate son of either Edmund, 3rd earl, or Roger, 4th earl. However, I am currently editing an anthology of essays on the Mortimers which is due to be published in July. One of the essays is on Sir John Mortimer, and it conclusively shows that he was not an illegitimate son of one of the earls, nor linked to one of the direct lines of the Mortimers of Wigmore. It shows that his descent is extremely obscure, but possibly he was a distant relative of a junior line from the junior branch of the Mortimers of Chirk/Tedstone Wafre.

2) Yes, the Sir John Mortimer who was executed in 1424 was the husband of Eleanor Rossall

3) John Mortimer, as he was then, married Eleanor Rosall in c.1409. We know Eleanor was aged about 26 and that it was Eleanor's second marriage, and there are no records of any children; however, there are no reliable records that we know of for John Mortimer earlier than his marriage. So, we don't know whether he had a daughter from a previous relationship. What is your source for this?

I trust this is helpful.

Best Wishes,

Philip

Philip Hume FSA
Secretary, Mortimer History Society