192 Elton v Elton

192 ELTON V ELTON

Ambrose Elton of Ledbury, co. Hereford, esq v William Elton of the same, gent

February 1638

Abstract

Ambrose Elton complained that William Elton had insulted him at an inn in Ledbury inn during January 1638, saying that he would not have his cause referred to Ambrose Elton, as he was 'a rascally base fellow'. Ambrose Elton had been high sheriff of Herefordshire and was at the time serving as a justice of the peace. Process was granted on 7 February and bond was entered for the plaintiff two days later; but no further proceedings survive.

Initial proceedings

8/1, Petition to Arundel

Elton was 'a gentleman descended of an auncient and generous family bearinge armes, and hath byn high sheriffe of the county of Hereford, and is nowe one of his Majestie's justices of the peace for the county. That one William Elton of Ledbury in the month of January last, at the house of William Hodges, an inne in Ledbury, did publiquely abuse your peticoner, and then and there spake many disgracefull wordes to or of him and some then present, speakinge about the referringe of a cause, William Elton said he would not consent that the cause or matter should bee referred to the peticoner for the peticoner Ambrose Elton was a rascally base fellowe or to that effect'.

Petitioned that Elton be brought to answer.

'Mr Dethick, the peticoner being qualifyed as he informs as to armes, I take the cause to bee fitt for my L. Marshalls Court and I desire process may goe out.'

7 February 1638

Signed by Arthur Duck.

8/2, Plaintiff's bond

9 February 1638

Procured by John Elton of Kingsclere, co. Hampshire.

Sealed by John Watson.

Notes

For a full transcription of Elton's petition, see G. D. Squibb (ed.), The High Court of Chivalry: A Study in the Civil Law in England (Oxford, 1959), appendix IX.

Ambrose Elton of Ledbury, esq, was a J.P. in co. Hereford in 1634, and he married Anne, daughter of Sir Edward Aston of Tixall in co. Stafford, knt. William Elton of Ledbury may have been his elder brother who died without issue.

M. P. Siddons (ed.), The Visitation of Herefordshire, 1634 (Publications of the Harleian Society, news series, 15, 2002), p. 114.

Documents

• Initial proceedings
  • Petition to Arundel: 8/1 (7 Feb 1638)
  • Plaintiff's bond: 8/2 (9 Feb 1638)

People mentioned in the case

• Aston, Anne
• Aston, Edward, knight
• Dethick, Gilbert, registrar
• Duck, Arthur, lawyer
• Elton, Ambrose, esq
• Elton, Anne
• Elton, William, gent
• Hodges, William, innkeeper
• Howard, Thomas, earl of Arundel and Surrey
• Watson, John

Places mentioned in the case

• Hampshire
  • Kingsclere
• Herefordshire
  • Ledbury
• Staffordshire
  • Tixall

Topics of the case

• denial of gentility
• high sheriff
• justice of the peace
• office-holding