[Sidenote: 1495 / SEPT. 14]
Right entyerly welbelovyd frendys, I comaunde me to you. And for as
moche as I understande that Sire Harry Grey, that is the verry owner and
possessioner of the maner of Ketryngham, is nowe in gret age, and as it
is seide, of right seekely disposicion, and that after his deceasse the
right and title therof shall of right belonge to my right welbelovid
servaunt Thomas Martyn, and his nevewe and heyre of blood, and his eyre
therof by reason of entaylys:--What the seid Sire Harry entendith to do
therin, I knowe not, but it rennyth in reporte, that he is in purpose to
disherite the seid Thomas Martyn therof, contrary to all right and good
conscience. In eschuenge wherof, I desire and pray you as hertely as I
can, that it wull leeke you to be so good maistyrs to the seid Thomas
as, by your wisdams and discrecion, the seid Sire Harry, by you or some
of you, may be moved of conscience and of kyndenesse to his blood to
have regard to the seid right, and not to do eny thyng that shuld be
disheryson to his seid nevewe, and to have the more tender consideracion
to your mocion, for that the seid Thomas is to dyverse of you of kynne
and aliaunce, and to many other gentilmen within the shere in leeke cas.
And for the consideracion that I have, that the seid Sire Harry and
Thomas his nevewe, were of my lordes nere blode, whoes soule Jesu pardon
and assoyle, it were to gret a pete to see hym by disheryson to falle to
penury and poverte, wher by your good exortacion in consideracion of the
premissis, and mo odir by your wisdamys to be remembred, in the lif of
the seid Sire Harry suche inconveniences may be better remadyed; wherin
ye shall not only do an almas dede, and a gret pleasir to God, but also
to me for that blodes sake a singuler pleasir, and cause me heraftir
therather to considir thynge that shall concerne your resonabill
pleasir, with Goddes grace, Who ever kepe you.
At Erle Soham, this xiiij^ne day of Septembyr.
[Footnote 155-3: [From Paston MSS., B.M.] The writer of this
letter was the widow of John Mowbray, the last Duke of Norfolk of
that name, who died in 1475. She survived her husband many years,
and Fenn says, though I know not on what authority, that she was
alive in 1496. Sir Harry Grey, it appears, made his will on the
28th September 1492 (Blomefield, v. 93), and one might imagine
this letter was written in the same month and year. The
inquisition upon his death, however, was only taken on the 26th
October, 12 Hen. VII. (1496), and it does not state the day on
which he died. The jurors found Thomas Martyn, who was then thirty
years old and over, to be his kinsman and next heir, but that
Ketteringham Hall was devised to the use of his wife Jane and of
others after her death. It is certain, moreover, that this letter
could not have been written before the year 1495 when Sir Robert
Clere was knighted; and that is probably the very year, as Sir
Harry Grey was dead at least in October 1496, and most likely a
month or two earlier.]
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