And the Blyssyd Trynyte have yow in Hys kepyng, and send yow good sped in all yowyr matyrs, and send the vyctary of all yowyr enmyis.
Wretyn in hast, on Sowlemas Daye.[4.1] By yowyrs, M. P.
[1.1] [From Fenn, iv. 232.] This letter is ascribed by Fenn to the year 1465, in consequence of the allusion to John Paston’s imprisonment in the Fleet. But there were more occasions than one on which he was confined there. Fenn himself knew of two. Paston was committed to the Fleet, as we know from William Worcester, on Saturday, the 3rd November 1464. He was also confined there in August and September 1465, and may very possibly have been released by the beginning of November. But I am inclined to think this letter refers to an imprisonment prior to either of these. For, in the first place, the news of it seems only to have been recent. It had become general subject of conversation at Norwich, ‘on Saturday last,’ whereas in 1465 it must have been known two months earlier. Secondly, Sir William Chamberlain, whose influence Sir Thomas Howes hopes will be of service, must have died in the spring of 1462. According to Blomefield (Hist. of Norfolk, i. 321), his will was dated the 3rd March 1461 (which would be in the modern computation 1462), and was proved on the 21st April 1462. It may be presumed, therefore, that on receiving the letter from his brother Clement (No. 484), written on the 11th October 1461, John Paston hastened up to London and was immediately thrown into prison. By this letter, however, we find that he was soon afterwards released, and his great enemy Howard sent to prison in his stead.
[1.2] There is no direction to the letter, but the words above inserted are written in an ancient hand upon the back of it.—F.
[2.1] William Norwich was Mayor of Norwich in 1461.
[2.2] John Gilbert was Mayor in 1459 and in 1464. He died in 1472.
[2.3] Sir William Chamberlain of Gedding, Suffolk, a Knight of the Garter, who had served under the Regent Bedford in the French wars. He married Anne, daughter and heir of Sir Robert de Herling, who, though she long survived him, and had two husbands after him, the second of whom was John, Lord Scrope of Bolton, was buried by her own desire beside her first husband, in the chancel of Herling Church.
[2.4] John, Duke of Bedford, Regent of France, died at Paris in 1435.—F.
[3.1] Query, if Sir William Calthorpe, Knight, High Sheriff of Norfolk, etc., in 1464, and died very old in 1494.—F.
[3.2] Thomas Hert was instituted to the Rectory of Hellesdon in 1448.—F.